A couple more cents to throw in -;

As Scott says, eBird started out with a different perspective - one that leads to some distinct difference from the orgs & places that do track things like listing records.

1. Introduced/Exotics - this is pretty straightforward, most of the time, I think:
eBird allows birders to enter exotic species because it wants to track these bird populations over time and space in case they do later become established. Good enough, but for ages there have been people asking/begging eBird to allow people to allow birds to be reported but not added to any life list. I think most people eBirding a Yacolt Monk Parakeet or a Mandarin Duck in WA aren't trying to 'sneak in' an extra tick - most are following eBird guidance in including those birds, and presumably if they later submit any lists they have to perform the gymnastics of deleting the exotics.

ABA [and WA Birder here in the state] - do not allow those species to count on big day, big year, or life lists.
For a species to count for a listing record, it has to be 'countable' in the area seen -; The normal standard for this [though not always] is the state BRC official checklist for the state level, with more ambiguity at the county level - WA Birder attempts to help a bit with county level lists, but WA Birder is not as rigorous as the WBRC for each of 39 counties, so a little more interpretation is needed.

If you are playing the listing game [I do, I really enjoy it] - then to make claims at listing landmarks like big years and big days, you should play by the rules of the organizations that keep track of these records ABA [and WA Birder in the state]- just copying over eBird top 100 numbers is unfair if/when someone wants to report big years/big days.

Clearcut examples as I understand things:

Mandarin Duck - definitely not countable on any ABA or WA year/life lists

any parrots - especially the Yacolt Monk Parakeets - countable in other places in the ABA, but not in WA - here's an ABA attempt at a rundown of countable introduced species by region: https://www.aba.org/aba-area-introduced-species/

Northwestern Crow - not countable on either now - but prior to the recent eBird update that lumped with American Crow, eBirders should have been mentally deleting one 'tick' from any state/regional life lists for the ~2 years that eBird and the ABA differed.

Less clearcut examples:
Mute Swan - not accepted as a legit species in WA by the WBRC, but some argue [see Gary Bletsch's message] that there's room for disagreement
Cordilleran Flycatcher - not on the official WA checklist, but the WBRC has explicitly chosen not to make a decision on its status - that leaves the door open, I think, to count if you are confident of the id. Here's hoping that official lump arrives some day soon.
Ring-necked Pheasant - countable on all these lists but Gary B perennially raises pretty solid questions about how legit most western WA pheasant populations are.


There's another difference between eBird and official rules that is less tricky and probably less often problematic. Location.

For ABA/WA Birder lists, a bird must be in the region in question in order to be countable on the big year/big day/life list.

eBird, for its purposes, asks birders to list birds according to the location of the birder. Even if you are looking into other jurisdictions, it is the location of the birder that matters for eBird. So, for example, if you are standing in Discovery Park in Seattle, looking at birds in the Sound - in eBird, all that you are seeing goes on your King County year/life list - but according to ABA/WA Birder rules, anything you see across a the county line in another county is only listable in the county it was observed in.


Most of the time, I think for most people the differences in these interpretations of 'what counts' are small enough that it isn't worth sweating - but if you start getting more interested in listing, and especially for those big year listers, I think it is worth digging in to understand the little differences and adjust lists accordingly. Much of this has to be done by the honor system ultimately, but some shared standards can be helpful if playing in the comparison game that listing becomes, especially at the big year/big day levels.

A good site for ABA guidance:
https://www.aba.org/aba-recording-rules-and-interpretations/ <https://www.aba.org/aba-recording-rules-and-interpretations/>


Matt Bartels
Seattle WA
WA Birder list-keeper
WBRC secretary



> On Sep 16, 2021, at 9:54 PM, Scott Downes <downess at charter.net> wrote:

>

> Tweets,

> Couldn't resist a comment here. As others have mentioned, there are well published standards for listing from ABA can be followed. I wanted to comment as eBird has been referenced a couple of times. While they have the fun "Top 100", the goal of eBird has never been (and doubt it ever will be) listing competition. So, there is no reason that eBird would follow ABA listing standards and the reported number on eBird may or may not be the true number of somebody's list if following ABA standards, they are different subjects.

>

> Scott Downes

> Downess at charter.net

> Yakima Wa

>

>> On Sep 16, 2021, at 9:36 PM, Gary Bletsch <garybletsch at yahoo.com> wrote:

>>

>> 

>> Dear Paul and Tweeters,

>>

>> Some day I hope to see a measly 300 species in one calendar year in Washington! I figured I'd do that as soon as I retired, but tiny viruses intervened. Meanwhile, I just keep to my Skagit patch.

>>

>> The question of countable birds is not really a matter for jerk birders alone--not that you are one, Paul! I remember one year I had a phone call with another birder, with whom I'd been vying for a big Skagit County year. We made an agreement ahead of time, as to what to count and what not to count. We agreed not to count the Northwestern Crow and the Ring-necked Pheasant, as I recall.

>>

>> For the life of me I can't figure out why the Ring-necked Pheasant should "count" in places such as Skagit County, where they don't breed in the wild. Thirty years of birding here, and 2021 is the first year I've seen a hen pheasant with young in the wild in Skagit. Those were the five chicks that my neighbor's hen pheasant had reared in a backyard pen. He released them, and the babies got picked off by predators one by one, in a matter of two or three months. Now there is just the hen, eking out an existence by visiting my bird feeders, while somehow evading the Bald Eagles and coyotes. To the best of my knowledge, every Ring-necked Pheasant that I have ever seen in Skagit County was raised in a pen and released so that hunters could shoot it--with the exception of my neighbor's pheasants, which were released for reasons beyond the scope of this message.

>>

>> I could add quite a bunch of species to my Skagit list, if I wanted to count such species as Ring-necked Pheasant, Chukar, Wild Turkey, Northern Bobwhite, Helmeted Guineafowl, White-cheeked Pintail, Muscovy Duck, and so forth. Heck, I could throw in Red Junglefowl, since I've seen those in the wild, too, after people have released unwanted chickens and roosters here and there.

>>

>> The only species of this ilk that gives me pause is the Mute Swan. I believe that we get the occasional Mute Swan that comes down from British Colombia, where I think there is still a viable population of feral birds. The reason that we are not supposed to count Mute Swans is because they are "bad."

>>

>> I am glad that I never counted any of the Mandarin Ducks that I saw in North America. It was very satisfying to tick them at long last, when I came across a few of them in South Korea.

>>

>> The Monk Parakeet is a more complicated case. There are established populations in the US. To count or not count the tiny population in Washington--is it in Yacolt?--that would require some careful thought.

>>

>> The ABA has for many years published a set of standards for what is countable and what is not. I wish eBird would follow it; I hope cutthroat birding competitors do.

>>

>> Yours truly,

>>

>> Gary Bletsch

>>

>>

>> On Thursday, September 16, 2021, 06:08:46 PM PDT, Paul Baerny <pbaerny at gmail.com> wrote:

>>

>>

>> Great article. For those interested. There are some great big years going on in Washington this year. I believe that Rafeal Fennimore is approaching a King Co. record. And it looks like 3 birders, and maybe more may exceed 350 for the state this year. For those of us that have tried state big years "Awsome numbers".

>> Now the jerk birder in me would love to put out for discussion. Should we count escapees as well as birds that have been considered non countable in the state. Mandarin Duck, and Monk Parakeet for example. Someone could put Indian Peafowl on their Ebird list and it would count.

>> I realize it's each individuals list to put any bird on that they want.

>> But when it comes to big day/ big year competitions? Shouldn't the competitors be following the same set of rules. I'm really interested in what other's have to say about this topic.

>> I just fell off my soapbox and my foot really hurts.

>> Paul Baerny

>>

>> Sent from my iPhone

>>

>> > On Sep 16, 2021, at 4:27 PM, Dan Reiff <dan.owl.reiff at gmail.com <mailto:dan.owl.reiff at gmail.com>> wrote:

>> >

>> > Interesting.

>> > Dan Reiff

>> > MI

>> >

>> > https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/extreme-birding-competition-is-a-cutthroat-test-of-skill-strategy-and-endurance/ <https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/extreme-birding-competition-is-a-cutthroat-test-of-skill-strategy-and-endurance/>

>> >

>> >

>> > Sent from my iPhone

>> > _______________________________________________

>> > Tweeters mailing list

>> > Tweeters at u.washington.edu <mailto:Tweeters at u.washington.edu>

>> > http://mailman11.u.washington.edu/mailman/listinfo/tweeters <http://mailman11.u.washington.edu/mailman/listinfo/tweeters>

>>

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