I’m an IDer working mostly with Australian vertebrates. Very early on in this journey I figured out that we don’t really need more of those, so I started trying to branch out into a few more niche aspects of that work, one of which was bird eggs. I think I’m the only person who is actively working on identifying bird’s eggs in Australia, which is far from ideal. And sadly, I don’t think a lot of the obs I identify ever get to RG because I’m the only one who’s IDing eggs. It’s quite depressing at times, and I think this is an area where we desperately need a few more IDers, even just people who can confidently ID a handful of common species.
Anyway, this is both an offer and a call for help. Anyone out there like me who’s working on Australian vertebrates and wants to get into a more specialized area? Wants to do harder ID’s but doesn’t want to do invertebrates or fungi? Works on bird eggs in another country and is open to expanding? I’d love to find anyone who is open to learning some Australian bird egg ID, and of course I’d be happy to share any resources and tips with anyone who is even vaguely interested. And as well as that, if anyone has worked in this area and has any tips or resources, please let me know! I would love to learn more!
If there’s anyone out there who knows anything about this area or is open to learning, please let me know, I need help out here
I know that Atlas of Living Australia has many images of birds eggs. Select the bird you are interested in and go to ‘images’. Having a photograph of an egg and trying to assign it to a particular bird is a bit more difficult I guess,
I’ve got a copy of Gordon Beruldsen’s book “Australian Birds, their nests and eggs” so I suppose I could start having a go at the Top End/NT birds. Is there a bird’s egg project?
I read this and thought I might be able to help by going through and separating the egg from the not egg in Australia, but there’s almost 2 Million bird observations not annotated with Evidence of Presence, so good luck with all that. I did like 60; hopefully Life Stage looks better for you.
With this post, with the earthworm post, and others, maybe we should have a forum category for “become a taxonomic expert” or something.
It doesn’t have to be an actual forum category. Maybe even a bullet point list of opportunities, or a wiki.
Just a kind of listing of opportunities (mentors offering mentorship), and a place where mentees who want to contribute more, can go and view current opportunities. Rather than a random scattering of forum threads.
Great idea. I joined up and put my two egg observations up and it helped my get (what I think) is the correct ID for a long standing mystery observation of mine. https://inaturalist.ala.org.au/observations/26373953
Pick a State or Territory. I’m a Northern Territorian so I try to annotate those. As I live in Darwin I set up a “Darwin #cityofbirds” project just to keep track of the species we see so I tend to focus on the urban birds.
That’s such a great idea, Adam! A “become a taxonomic expert” section or mentorship list would be incredibly useful, especially for people who want to learn how to ID species but aren’t sure where to start. Having mentors and regional focus points, like Donna’s “Darwin #cityofbirds” project, could make the learning curve much easier. It’d be amazing to see a shared space where folks can post challenges, ID tips, or even just fun finds like unusual eggs or nests. Count me in if this gets organized, I’d love to help or contribute observations!
