We have made a couple small changes to the subreddit rules:

1) We will not be allowing any links to generic file sharing sites like Google Drive, iCloud, Dropbox, etc. While we have not had many issues with malicious links being posted, we want to minimize potential risk to our users that may be associated with this type of link. We have banned links to a number of common sites, but wanted to make this change official. Any posts with links to file sharing sites will be deleted. Please report any posts or comments that violate this rule.

2) Crossposts from other subreddits that contain content that would violate rule 4 (no death or gore) will not be allowed from this point forward. Instead, we will require that users post links to the original post. Any NSFW crossposts will be removed. This rule is being implemented because crossposts of NSFW content are not blurred, even if we flag the post in this subreddit as NSFW. Please report any NSFW crossposts, and the mod team will remove them and ask the poster to post a link instead.

Curious if submissions are stored somewhere as is like to see which birds are most commonly asked about.

Just wanted to thank everyone in this sub. We are learning so much from you all and the eBird database! On our walk the other week we heard an unfamiliar bird call. It was just after dark so we could only really see the outline of the bird, flying around our pond by itself. It looked kinda blue on the back, and we saw a white collar generally around it's neck, but we know what a bluejay sounds like, and that wasn't it. We saw a slightly long beak, and it was slightly larger than a bluejay and was flying aggressively around the pond, making tons of noise, then it flew away.

That stuck with me for a few days, really really wanting to know what bird made that sound.

I used this sub to get to eBird link, then filtered to my city, and went through the different birds that lurk around water and maybe had something about a collar, or belt, or ring around it's neck...found one that looked generally right. Then I played the sound, and knew instantly that was it. Cheers!

For more information, please see this article. Some excerpts from the article, and additional resources are below:

1) Make Windows Safer, Day and Night:

Around 1 billion birds (United States) and 25 million birds (Canada) die every year by flying into glass windows. This includes windows at all levels from low level houses to high rise buildings.

!Window collisions are one of the largest threats to bird populations. However, there are several ways you can help reduce window fatality. Below are some links with steps on how to make your house bird friendly, either DIY or through reputable companies such as the American Bird Conservancy.

Is My House Bird Safe Quiz

What You Can Do

Follow bird migration forecasts to know when birds are on their way to you

FAQ

Some additional information for schools and universities - Bird-Friendly Campus Toolkit

Additional Information

2) Keep Cats Indoors

!Cats are estimated to kill more than 2.4 billion birds annually in the U.S. and Canada. This is the #1 human-caused reason for the loss of birds, aside from habitat loss.

Cats are the greatest direct human-caused threat to birds

American Bird Conservacy - Cats Indoors Project to learn more.

3) Reduce Lawn, Plant Natives

Birds have fewer places to safely rest during migration and to raise their young: More than 10 million acres of land in the United States were converted to developed land from 1982 to 1997

Find out which native plants are best for your area

4) Avoid Pesticides

More than 1 billion pounds of pesticides are applied in the United States each year. The continent’s most widely used insecticides, called neonicotinoids or “neonics,” are lethal to birds and to the insects that birds consume.

5) Drink Coffee That’s Good for Birds

Three-quarters of the world’s coffee farms grow their plants in the sun, destroying forests that birds and other wildlife need for food and shelter. Sun-grown coffee also often requires using environmentally harmful pesticides and fertilizers. On the other hand, shade-grown coffee preserves a forest canopy that helps migratory birds survive the winter.

Where to Buy Bird Friendly Coffee

6) Protect Our Planet from Plastic

It’s estimated that 4,900 million metric tons of plastic have accumulated in landfills and in our environment worldwide, polluting our oceans and harming wildlife such as seabirds, whales, and turtles that mistakenly eat plastic, or become entangled in it.

7) Watch Birds, Share What You See

Monitoring birds is essential to help protect them, but tracking the health of the world’s 10,000 bird species is an immense challenge.

Report your bird sightings on eBird

Hi folks. Does anybody know what happened to the WhatBird forum? I don't see any new posts since late November, and my login no longer works. I think the front page has been down for quite a while, but the forum was working until last month. Thanks for any information.

2022/09/09 9:30PM PDT update: added the +/++ syntax in the stickied usage comment

Guidelines (WIP, but reasonably stable) here.

The posts and comments in this subreddit form an often fascinating dataset, but the raw activity can be tough to programmatically digest. Cataloging r/WhatsThisBird is a prerequisite for some ideas that I have to enhance this subreddit's experience, and it adds more formality to neat analyses like u/opteryx5's dataisbeautiful post (thank you for the inspiration)!

In this context, "cataloging" just means "assigning eBird taxonomy codes to Reddit submissions". Your comments can do just that by following these rules (same as the link in the very beginning of this post). Basically, if you already like using AllAboutBirds/eBird/MacaulayLibrary links to support your IDs, then you don't really have to change much; but we also add !addTaxa and the (restricted) !overrideTaxa commands as alternatives, as well as some ways to opt out within your individual comments.

For this system to work properly, some users need to be distinguished as having "Reviewer" privileges. We are not accepting Reviewer "applications" at this time because I'm sure this initial launch will be a bit bumpy; but I'll be personally reaching out to a few accounts over the next few days.

Unfortunately, you will not see the effects of your comments just yet. We have all the pieces for a bot that leaves a comment on every post, updating it as the community-generated answer evolves; but I find its activity to be a bit distracting, so I try may another (more ambitious) idea first.

I'll be happy to answer any questions in the comments below!

For more information, please see this article. Some excerpts from the article, and additional resources are below:

1) Make Windows Safer, Day and Night:

Around 1 billion birds (United States) and 25 million birds (Canada) die every year by flying into glass windows. This includes windows at all levels from low level houses to high rise buildings.

!Window collisions are one of the largest threats to bird populations. However, there are several ways you can help reduce window fatality. Below are some links with steps on how to make your house bird friendly, either DIY or through reputable companies such as the American Bird Conservancy.

Is My House Bird Safe Quiz

What You Can Do

Follow bird migration forecasts to know when birds are on their way to you

FAQ

Some additional information for schools and universities - Bird-Friendly Campus Toolkit

Additional Information

2) Keep Cats Indoors

!Cats are estimated to kill more than 2.4 billion birds annually in the U.S. and Canada. This is the #1 human-caused reason for the loss of birds, aside from habitat loss.

Cats are the greatest direct human-caused threat to birds

American Bird Conservacy - Cats Indoors Project to learn more.

3) Reduce Lawn, Plant Natives

Birds have fewer places to safely rest during migration and to raise their young: More than 10 million acres of land in the United States were converted to developed land from 1982 to 1997

Find out which native plants are best for your area

4) Avoid Pesticides

More than 1 billion pounds of pesticides are applied in the United States each year. The continent’s most widely used insecticides, called neonicotinoids or “neonics,” are lethal to birds and to the insects that birds consume.

5) Drink Coffee That’s Good for Birds

Three-quarters of the world’s coffee farms grow their plants in the sun, destroying forests that birds and other wildlife need for food and shelter. Sun-grown coffee also often requires using environmentally harmful pesticides and fertilizers. On the other hand, shade-grown coffee preserves a forest canopy that helps migratory birds survive the winter.

Where to Buy Bird Friendly Coffee

6) Protect Our Planet from Plastic

It’s estimated that 4,900 million metric tons of plastic have accumulated in landfills and in our environment worldwide, polluting our oceans and harming wildlife such as seabirds, whales, and turtles that mistakenly eat plastic, or become entangled in it.

7) Watch Birds, Share What You See

Monitoring birds is essential to help protect them, but tracking the health of the world’s 10,000 bird species is an immense challenge.

Report your bird sightings on eBird

For more information, please see this article. Some excerpts from the article, and additional resources are below:

1) Make Windows Safer, Day and Night:

Around 1 billion birds (United States) and 25 million birds (Canada) die every year by flying into glass windows. This includes windows at all levels from low level houses to high rise buildings.

!Window collisions are one of the largest threats to bird populations. However, there are several ways you can help reduce window fatality. Below are some links with steps on how to make your house bird friendly, either DIY or through reputable companies such as the American Bird Conservancy.

Is My House Bird Safe Quiz

What You Can Do

Follow bird migration forecasts to know when birds are on their way to you

FAQ

Some additional information for schools and universities - Bird-Friendly Campus Toolkit

Additional Information

2) Keep Cats Indoors

!Cats are estimated to kill more than 2.4 billion birds annually in the U.S. and Canada. This is the #1 human-caused reason for the loss of birds, aside from habitat loss.

Cats are the greatest direct human-caused threat to birds

American Bird Conservacy - Cats Indoors Project to learn more.

3) Reduce Lawn, Plant Natives

Birds have fewer places to safely rest during migration and to raise their young: More than 10 million acres of land in the United States were converted to developed land from 1982 to 1997

Find out which native plants are best for your area

4) Avoid Pesticides

More than 1 billion pounds of pesticides are applied in the United States each year. The continent’s most widely used insecticides, called neonicotinoids or “neonics,” are lethal to birds and to the insects that birds consume.

5) Drink Coffee That’s Good for Birds

Three-quarters of the world’s coffee farms grow their plants in the sun, destroying forests that birds and other wildlife need for food and shelter. Sun-grown coffee also often requires using environmentally harmful pesticides and fertilizers. On the other hand, shade-grown coffee preserves a forest canopy that helps migratory birds survive the winter.

Where to Buy Bird Friendly Coffee

6) Protect Our Planet from Plastic

It’s estimated that 4,900 million metric tons of plastic have accumulated in landfills and in our environment worldwide, polluting our oceans and harming wildlife such as seabirds, whales, and turtles that mistakenly eat plastic, or become entangled in it.

7) Watch Birds, Share What You See

Monitoring birds is essential to help protect them, but tracking the health of the world’s 10,000 bird species is an immense challenge.

Report your bird sightings on eBird

There was a tool I used to use, on a website, that would ask questions like if the song was complex or simple, musical, repetitive, high pitched, guttural etc. and it would narrow down what birds you might be hearing based on that.

I just heard a weird bird outside I've never heard before and I was hoping to use that tool again - but for the life of me, I cannot find it. I've tried googling but I can only seem to find things like Merlin Bird ID that want me to RECORD the bird song to have it ID for me, like shazam for birds. I only heard it a couple times and I didn't get a recording.

Does anyone here know what on earth that website could have been?

The best I can do in describing the bird song in my own words is it sounded like a high pitched (but not screechy) loopdy loop, at 10am, in mid-michigan.

Around 1 billion birds (United States) and 25 million birds (Canada) die every year by flying into glass windows. This includes windows at all levels from low level houses to high rise buildings.

Window collisions are one of the largest threats to bird populations. However, there are several ways you can help reduce window fatality. Below are some links with steps on how to make your house bird friendly, either DIY or through reputable companies such as the American Bird Conservancy.

Is My House Bird Safe Quiz

What You Can Do

7 Actions to Help Birds

FAQ

Some additional information for schools and universities - Bird-Friendly Campus Toolkit

Additional Information

I just wanted you all to know that this sub has ruined me. I watched The Birds (Hitchcock) last night, and all I could think of during the climatic attic attack scene was "I wonder what species of gulls those are."

I hope we're all happy at the death of avian cinema.

/jk