The Power of People

Your support, along with foundation support, has been instrumental in helping us see exceptional details of birds throughout the year. For the first time we can watch migration happen at the scale of continents for more than just a few species with eBird Status and Trends. Knowing all the points where and when a bird occurs, is what scientists call the annual cycle, an aspect that was previously difficult to pinpoint for more than a few individual birds. Watch the journey of Barn Swallows, a bird found darting over fields and lakes from South America to Canada. The detail and information in the animations is breathtaking. Not only can we see how Barn Swallows move, we can see where they are most common. “eBird Science also shows the power of people working together,” says Chris Wood, eBird Project Leader. “It’s amazing; all of this began with people recording what they saw in notebooks and now on smartphones,” and now, says Wood, “we can see the speed of migration of a Canada Warbler moving from the Colombian Andes where they are concentrated to a broad area across the U.S. and Canada—all from observations of bird watchers.”