Rarebirds.com
While searching for where to see White-headed Woodpeckers in California, I came across rarebirds.com. It's an interesting site that used Google maps to record the sightings of rare birds. This site may be familiar to some of you, but it was new for me. This seems like a potentially useful tool. Right now, they seem to use only the state/regional weekly rare bird alerts as a starting point to finding birds in a specific area. For example, the state-wide NJ report is linked when I click on NJ, but locations for specific birds are not pinpointed. There is a form for entering specific bird sightings, but it doesn't seem to have too much usage yet. Check it out if you have some time.
3 comments:
A site like this has potential, but this particular one doesn't even seem to track New York birds. Isn't NYC the capital of the world? That's what I learned in school.
Rarebirds.com looks like a great concept. Unfortunately these open-source projects are only as good as the people who contribute, and they are only useful if birders are inclined to participate. I think that eBird has managed to be (mostly) successful in encouraging participation, but WikiBird has not really caught on yet. So far listserves are still the best way to disseminate rare bird information.
Considering that the United States is the world's premier military power (at least in theory), I would say that DC is the capital of the world.
John, you're dead on with these open source projects. I think the site is good in concept, but not in practicality. It will need a community of people to not only post the new sightings, but to frequently monitor them so they are not outdated. I'm thinking this won't happen because, like you said, the listservs are still the most useful place to get this info.
I'll set up a steel cage match between you and Mike to settle this capitol debate.
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