Category Archives: News

World Series Scouting: As Darkness Falls

(The Redheads and the Anti-Petrels are in southern New Jersey scouting their routes for the World Series of Birding on Saturday, May 14. More info and scouting reports.) Dusk is gathering under the pines at Belleplain. Swainson’s Thrushes and Veeries called off and on through the day, but what’s ruling the airwaves right now is [...]

Busy, Birdy Scouting for World Series of Birding Teams

Wednesday was the first full day of scouting for our two World Series of Birding teams, the Redheads and the Anti-Petrels. We’re doing what you do during scouting week—re-learning bird calls, re-finding birds we can count on, obsessing over which route we should take on Saturday, second guessing the route we took last year, and [...]

Anti-Petrels pedal for the medal in the World Series of Birding

Along with the Redheads, the Cornell Lab’s other team in next week’s World Series of Birding is the Anti-Petrels. They’re competing in the “Carbon Footprint Cup,” which means they do all of their traveling on the day of the event by bike. Last year they rode 101 miles to win their category with 150 species—but [...]

Redheads head for gold in the World Series of Birding

It’s been two weeks since Team Sapsucker set the Big Day record in Texas—but that’s not quite the end of the 24-hour birding marathons. The World Series of Birding is next Saturday, May 14, in New Jersey, and in this post and the next we’ll introduce the two teams we’re sending: the Redheads, made up [...]

Harpy Eagle sighted at Cornell Lab!

Okay, it was a captive Harpy Eagle, but nevertheless, when the world’s largest raptor pays a visit to your workplace it tends to grab your attention, even if you can’t count it on your ABA list. On Monday and Tuesday we were lucky to have a visit from videographer Neil Rettig, who helped film our [...]

Why Public Lands Matter: State of the Birds 2011

The 2011 State of the Birds report was released today by Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar. This year’s report focused on putting some specifics to the idea of the value of public lands. The effort was coordinated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and involved scientists from the Cornell Lab, the U.S. Geological [...]

Big Day scouting report: Heating up in Texas

At the Cornell Lab yesterday we had snow, hail, freezing rain, and regular rain. In Texas, where our Big Day team is scouting for an attempt at the North American record on Friday (and raising money for conservation), it was 88 degrees with a hot 30-mph wind blowing out of the south. Over the phone, [...]

Big Day Team Hoping for a Big Win—You Could Too (Video Contest)

Team Sapsucker, the Cornell Lab’s competitive birding team, is scouring the Texas back roads for Black-capped Vireos, Rock Wrens, and Green Jays. They have two days of scouting left before they make their attempt at the North American Big Day record. For 24 hours, from midnight to midnight on Friday, April 22, they will race [...]

Oil Spill and Delta Restoration Videos Look To the Future

The one-year anniversary of the BP oil spill is this week, and chances are you’ve seen plenty of reminders on TV and online. Many news outlets are again playing the images of tarballs, beach cleanup, and containment boom that made last summer seem so endless and awful—and they’re beginning to tell the story of economic [...]

NestWatch Looks at the (Citizen) Science in a Few Proverbs

They say birds of a feather flock together—but we’re getting into the time of year when those big winter flocks break apart. Birds are pairing up and getting busy nesting. They say a leopard can’t change its spots, but a whole lot of brilliant spring warblers, tanagers, and orioles are on their way to our [...]