With the onset of summer, our resident birds seem to be well underway with their breeding activities– the dawn chorus waxes, and the air is filled with bird sounds. A lot of birders are looking to document interesting breeding behaviours.
This month, the challenge focuses on both birding effort as well as sound recordings. In this way, let’s collectively build up a repository of Indian bird sounds, adding to the 49,000+ recordings already uploaded to the eBird/Macaulay Library from India!
The challenge is to upload a minimum of 30 eligible lists, and at least five lists among the 30 should have one or more audio recordings. The more the number of lists with audio, the greater the chances of winning!
- Check out this quick video guide on how to record and prepare your audio before upload to your checklist.
- Whenever you see birds showing any signs of breeding, choose the breeding behaviour codes. To do this in the eBird App, tap the species name, tap on ‘Add breeding code‘, and select the appropriate purple circle that is closest to your observation (see the example below). (Please note, Flyover is not a breeding code).
While birding, please ensure that you adhere to COVID-19 related instructions by central and local authorities.
Please upload all your lists by 10 May 2021 so that we can announce the results soon after that.
* Eligible checklists are those that report all species seen/heard (and are therefore marked ‘complete’), report numbers for all species rather than Xs, and are of at least 15 minutes or longer in duration.
Here are the general rules of our monthly challenges. And check out the yearlong challenges for 2021 as well! You can keep track of fresh lists coming in from India on this page.
A list of challenges at the global level can be seen here. The global eBirding challenge of the month will be posted soon.
For those new to eBird, read the brief description, and go through our detailed beginner’s guide; create an account and start using eBird right away to get used to the platform.
Header Image: Spot-winged Starling Saroglossa spilopterus by Hemant Dhadnekar/ Macaulay Library
