The Birdlines and birding-aus all serve different purposes. The Birdlines
are "...for the reporting of rare or unusual birds outside their normal
range, unusually high or low numbers, early or late arrivals or departures
for migrant species and interesting behaviour or unusual habitat usage."
(quoting the site)
Birding-aus is a discussion forum - in other words, a mechanism by which any
topic, but hopefully Australian birds and birding related, can be discussed,
with the discussion available to be participated in by everyone.
The Birdlines cover Victoria, Tasmania, New South Wales, North Queensland,
Central and Southern Queensland, the Northern Territory, Indonesia and Papua
New Guinea. There is, in addition, a national Birdline covering rarities of
national significance. A number of people, myself included, have attempted
to have truly national Birdline coverage in the past, with the inclusion of
South Australia, Western Australia and ACT. Personally, I believe that this
would be highly beneficial. The Birdlines are designed to be a one-stop shop
to see the rare and unusual sightings both in one's own state, and also in
the other states and nationally.
In its simplest form, a Birdline is simply a website with a chronological
list of rare and unusual sightings - including the location of the sighting,
the species seen, some detail of the sighting, and the observers. The
sightings are moderated, although current practice is to allow "possible"
sightings to be published early, to give potential observers as much of a
heads-up as possible.
To my mind, this means that the Birdlines are similar to Birds WA sightings
page. Birdpedia is slightly different, but basically offers the same sort of
information for South Australia. I believe that Canberra also has a web site
for sightings.
Birdlines are available as "feeds" for inclusion in websites. I believe that
both bird-o and BOCA make use of these feeds. I have also turned these feeds
into Twitter streams - in that way it is possible to be informed of the
sighting the moment it is published on Birdline.
I am also responsible for posting the weekly summary Birdlines to
birding-aus. I don't believe that the Birdlines and birding-aus are mutually
exclusive - and there is no reason why sightings should also not be be
posted to birding-aus. I note that there are many subscribers to birding-aus
that make use of these weekly Birdline postings. In fact, in around October
of last year there was a technical glitch that prevented the posting for one
week, and numerous people complained! I also note that Tim Dolby (one of the
Victorian Birdline moderators) has the habit of reading birding-aus and
posting Birdlines from sightings that are only recorded on birding-aus.
One of the real benefits of the Birdlines is that all sightings are recorded
in one logical, consistent and structured location. This makes searching for
them so much easier. It is also much easier to look for sightings in one's
own state and neighbourhood very simply. This is a technique Ruth and I made
extensive use of last year when doing our VicTwitch.
Birding-aus is a phenomenal resource for Australian birders, but as an email
discussion forum and not a database, I think it is a long bow to draw to
suggest it is the most suitable repository for bird sightings. For rarities,
to my mind the national repository should be the Birdlines. For a national
database of bird observations, Birds Australia's Birdata (the online atlas)
is probably the resource, however I prefer to use the Eremaea sightings
database (this is NOT the Birdline repository).
Paul Dodd
Docklands, Victoria
-----Original Message-----
From:
On Behalf Of Frank O'Connor
Sent: Saturday, 15 January 2011 8:37 PM
To:
Subject: was (no subject) now eremaea v birding-aus
A useful topic, that probably needs to be discussed annually for new
subscribers to birding-aus.
I would love birding-aus to be for the mega rarities, and as Dave
Torr suggests use the Birdlines for the local rarities. This is the
case with the WA sightings. If someone emailed me a very unusual
sighting for WA, I would forward the details to birding-aus and to
the birdswa email list (and put it on the Sightings web site). Alan
Collins now looks after the Sightings web site, and I think that he
would also do this, although as far as I can remember, all the major
WA / Cocos / Christmas / Ashmore rarities have been posted to
birding-aus by the observers, so there was no need for Alan to do it.
As others have commented, it is easier just to look through the
birding-aus archives, than it is to check four or five Birdlines.
I am looking to come to Melbourne in a week or so to look for the
Stilt Sandpiper, and so I would prefer that the sightings continued
on birding-aus, but I do have a link to the Birdline just in case. I
would also like failed attempts to find the bird to be reported,
because of course it may move on, especially with all the rain around.
_________________________________________________________________
Frank O'Connor Birding WA http://birdingwa.iinet.net.au
Phone : (08) 9386 5694 Email :
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