Thanks for that. There is a lot of information and examples there (mostly from America). This relates to policy and suggestions regarding ebird. So
you could say just relevant to that context.
I find most of it refers to populations of birds that are established or beginning to establish. There is nor much said about the situation of finding
single birds that are known only to be held in captivity in that part of the world and are not part of an established population in that region (such as this macaw).
Two extracts:
“Remember: please only report free-flying, unrestrained birds to eBird. Captive
birds in zoos and wild bird parks, as well as free-roaming pets that return to houses and farms each night (such as peafowl and domestic chickens), should not be reported on eBird checklists. Checklists that report multiple captive species on one list may
not be eligible for public display and scientific use.”
And
Report ALL free-flying species—including Provisional and Escapee species—whenever you find them!
A bit confusing.
As an aside, I happen to have a bit of a grammatical aversion to the word “escapee”: Based on that other words with “ee’ or “er” suffixes, the usual use is the
“ee’ is for the entities to whom the event happens whereas the “er” is the entity who does the thing (such as payer and payee). Thus one who escapes is an escaper or escapist. Or probably in this case a relesee. But most people don’t agree with my reasoning
there.
From: Kim Farley
Sent: Saturday, 5 September, 2026 12:12 PM
To: Canberra birds <>
Cc: Geoffrey Dabb <>; Philip Veerman <>
Subject: Re: [Canberrabirds] Macaw
Hi all
eBird has done a fair bit of work on Exotic species in recent years. This was very welcome as it has made reporting of Exotics easier for birders (and for long suffering eBird reviewers too). For those who like the definitions, background
or detail, here is a link to eBird's help page on Exotic and Introduced Species
Kim
Writing as ACT eBird reviewer
On Sat, Sep 5, 2026 at 11:52 AM Philip Veerman via Canberrabirds <> wrote:
It may be premature to call it an “escape”. It may not be an “escape”. That word best applies
when it is no longer under the control of someone. It could still be someone’s pet. They can be free flown and trained to return to the owner. I am not suggesting I know, as I don’t.
There is also a case for use of the name “releasee” (basically “introduced”). A bird or
colonising group that has been released, mainly because it is too hard to handle, rather than having escaped. That is believed to be the origin of the Rainbow Lorikeet population around Perth.
Philip
On the Facebook Canberra Notice Board group there has been an interesting report of a blue and gold macaw in the Macarthur area. In some parts of the world categories of exotic
sightings have been classified with a high degree of sophistication for eBird purposes. The Macarthur macaw would fall into the category ‘Clear Escape’, which I believe is the category of least relevance for eBird purposes. The eBird category should be distinguished
from a ‘Clean Escape’, which is the name of a well-known science fiction short story about an amnesia sufferer who as a result of a corporate conspiracy becomes president of the United States and destroys most of humanity in a nuclear event.
--
This is the email announcement and discussion list of the Canberra Ornithologists Group.
Emails posted to the list that exceed 2 MB (2,000 kB) in size, including attachments, will be rejected.
All emails distributed via the list are archived at
http://bioacoustics.cse.unsw.edu.au/archives/html/canberrabirds. It is a condition of list membership that you agree to your contributions being archived.
Canberrabirds mailing list
https://lists.canberrabirds.org.au/mailman/listinfo/canberrabirds
