World Dashboard Help

US & Canada Dashboard Help

Washington Dashboard Help


The Birder's Dashboard has no affiliation with eBird. eBird publishes an interface that allows any program to access some of the data in the eBird database. The Dashboard uses that interface but otherwise has no affiliation with eBird.

eBird: eBird is a project of Cornell University Lab of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society. All sightings data are from eBird. Learn how you can submit your sightings to eBird.

Versions: For information about the different versions of the Dashboard click here.

NavigationDropdown Menu: The navigation bar at the top of the screenThere is a menu icon in the upper left of the screen. Tap this and a menu appears just below the icon. This menu has links to VERSIONS, which is a page that describes the different versions of the Dashboard, HELP which is a link to this document, and eBIRD which is a link to the eBird website.

Map: The map is a Google map and you zoom, using the + and - in the lower right corner, and pan the same as you do for any Google map. Click on a red or green tear-drop marker and information about that marker will appear.

Print sightings: Above the sightings list is a print button. This takes the contents of the list and places those contents in a popup window. You can then use the browser's print function to print the contents of the popup. If you are using IE or Edge, you can right click on the popup contents. That should cause a menu box to appear and you can choose the print function from the box.

Recency: You may select the number of days of sightings from the drop-down list. The default setting is 14 days.The Dashboard lists eBird sightings from the last 14 days.

Navigation Buttons: At the top of the screen are three navigation buttons: HOME, which takes you to the home screen; LIST, which takes you to the screen that has the list of sightings; and MAP, which takes you to the map.

Home Screen: The home screen has a drop down list for choosing a region . It also has five "action buttons": Notable sightings; eBird hotspots; Look for a species; Choose any location; and Recent checklists.

Choose a world region: Start by choosing a world region. World regions include the continents plus Central America, the Caribbean, and the Middle East. To see a list of the world regions and their associated countries click here.

Choose a country: Next choose a country within the world region. Once you have chosen a country you can bookmark the pagesave the page to your home screen to return directly to this country. To see a list of the world regions and their associated countries click here.

Choose a region: A region is a state, province or corresponding administrative unit. When you choose a region, by default the notable sightings for that region will be listed. You you can then select any of the other views (notable sightings, hotspots, species, any location, recent checklists) for that region.

Once you have chosen a region, you will be able to choose a subregion. A subregion is a county or corresponding administrative unit. If you choose a subregion, all data will be shown for that subregion only.

Map: The map is a Google map and you zoom and pan the same as you do for any Google map. Tap on a marker and information about that marker will appear.

Notable sightings: eBird determines which sightings are notable. When you tap this button a list of sightings appears on the List screen. If you clicktap on the Mark It button for a given notable sighting, then a marker will appear on the map indicating where that sighting occurred. Multiple sightings may occur for the same bird because multiple people may submit sightings for the same bird and all those sightings will show in the list.

Hotspots: Hotspots are popular birding areas. Learn more about hotspots. When you select the hotspots button, hotspots for the region are shown on the map. An alphabetical list of the hotspots will also be shown to the right of the mapon the LIST screen. Only those hotspots with sightings during the selected time periodlast 14 days will be shown. You can see the most recent sighting for each species reported at a hotspot by clickingtapping the marker for that hotspot. See the note on "Sightings list for each location" below.

Look for a species: You can look up all reported sightings of a particular species within the region by selecting a species from the species drop down list. The list includes all species that have been reported to eBird within the selected number of days (default = 14).the last 14 days. If a species is not on the list it means it has not been reported to eBird during that time.
When you choose a species a marker will appear for each location with a report for that species. By clickingtapping on the marker you can see the most recent sighting for all species reported at that location. The target species will be in bold. See the note on "Sightings list for each location" below.

Choose any location: You may clicktap on any point of the map to see sightings nearwithin 10 kilometers of that point that have occurred within the selected number oflast 14 days. Set the distance from that point (in kilometers) from the drop-down list. The default is 10 kilometers. Use the buttons to see all sightings or only notable sightings.

If you have selected "all sightings", when you clicktap on the map, a blue marker marker is placed on the map to show where you clickedtapped. A blue circle appears around the marker to show the area covered. A list for all species at all locations within that area will appear to the right of the mapon the LIST screen. By clickingtapping on a species name all locations with that species will be shown using green markers. The species name in the list will also be highlighted in green. This may take several seconds while the locations are fetched from eBird.

By clickingtapping on a green marker you can see the most recent sighting for all species reported at that location. See the note on "Sightings list for each location" below.

To restore the list of all species at all locations, clicktap the button at the top of the list.

For notable sightings, you will be given a list of notable sightings within the set distance10 kilometers.

Recent checklists: You may view the last two hundred checklists submitted for the selected region (state or province) or subregion (county).

You also have the option to look at checklists for a specific date. Enter the desired date in the date field and click the "Submit" button. eBird will return the checklists for that date, in the region, up to a maximum of 200 checklists.

Sightings list for each location: Hotspots, look for a species and choose any location all place markers on the map. By clickingtapping on a marker a series of eBird checklists appears to the right of the map. For species lookup, the target species will appear in bold.

There may be multiple checklists for the location. A species will not be shown on a checklist if it appears on a more recent checklist. To see an eBird checklist, with all species listed, clicktap on the eBird chklst button.

Contact us: Send complaints, suggestions, etc. to info AT birdingwashington.info. If you want to report a problem, please send as much information as you can about the problem - what type of computer or device, what operating system, which browser and as many details as you can about the problem.