Frequently asked questions

To learn more about eBird, please visit their website at https://help.ebird.org/customer/en/portal/articles/973841-what-is-ebird-(https://help.ebird.org/customer/en/portal/articles/973841-what-is-ebird-)

Your eBird checklist is only visible for World Shorebirds Day if the checklist is shared with our account. Our eBird username is worldshorebirdsday (without spaces!!!)

Shorebirds inhabit many kind of different habitats all around the world. The name confuses many bird lovers but shorebirds don't exclusively occur on shores. From alpine habuitats, to wet grasslands, salt marshes, sewage ponds, salt pans, urban habitats, mangroves, semi-deserts, woodlands, rainforests, arid steppes or agricultural fields, they all can be found.

While the Global Shorebird Counts only focuses on shorebirds, it is highly recommended to utuilize the full power of eBird and add all the bird species detected on the certain counting location. Of course, if time for obsercation and counting is then shorebirds have to be prioritised.

The more, the better. Rather than submitting multiple checklists from one location, the ideal would be to cover as many different areas as possible during the week/long counts. On the other hand, migrating numbers can be changed dramatically within counting week, so if you only have a single'shorebird' location around you, it can be interesting to see the changes.

Definitely. The Global Shorebird Counts is aimed to promote bird monitoring and citizen science therefore involving more participants (both new eBirders and long-time users) is important.

There is a never-ending debate about what species are considered to be shorebirds. Many think that all birds, like pelicans, skimmers, gulls, terns and even herons, inhabiting the shores, are shorebirds. World Shorebirds Day follows the IOC taxonomic list for shorebirds what contains a good number of species which uses other habitats than beaches. The list of shorebirds can be found at this link: https://www.worldshorebirdsday.org/list-of-shorebirds(javascript:void(0))