The Murmuration Project

In an effort to increase safety and accessibility for birding, The Murmuration Project crowdsources descriptions of top eBird hotspots. Currently, eBird is a wonderful resource for folks to locate birding locations and look up recent sightings, but this can present a safety concern when hotspots are unsafe, on private property, require permission to access, or simply lead to locations where the trailhead or access points are not clear. The Murmuration Project started in Massachusetts in a Google spreadsheet (http://bit.ly/murmurationproject) to allow anyone to add this type of safety information for open access.

If you’re interested in starting a Murmuration Page for your area, feel free to start with our template, then spread the word to get folks to contribute!

Birding locations in Hampshire County, MA:

Additionally, I’ve been collecting my personal eBird tracks to make them available to folks who are visiting and looking for places to bird in Hampshire County, MA. I use this eBird GPS track exporter and download the gpx file, convert it to a kml file so Google can recognize it, then add it to my Google Map.

Birding locations in Lincoln County, ME:

I also spend a lot of time explore less-explored spots in Lincoln County, ME. Many of these trails weren’t even recognized as eBird hotspots, so I suggested them to the reviewer as well as compiled them in this Google Map. Hopefully this increases the birding coverage, which right now is heavily dominated by Monhegan Island!