Give us the birds! (your top 10 species observed)

[average_nature_enjoyer]

Here are mine! All native birds that are pretty easy to photograph. I guess you can tell I like doing birdwatching around bodies of water, haha.

[boattailedgrackle]

LOL, I would love to see one in person some day for sure! I live nowhere near their range, but I do find them very interesting, hence the username choice.

[oksanaetal]

What do you mean? I don’t see anything suspicious.

[austin_ajit]

Thanks! The one that landed was taken quite far away from my home ( I took it while traveling). Based on my (little) experience, the most normal place they land is next to water, like on a pier or on a bridge. I 've been wondering whether I should add those older photos for quite some time, so thanks for the confirmation! Also, if your using a mobile, by increasing the brightness of a photo you can make any colors present more visible. It does make the photo a bit blurry and weird, but it can be a lifesaver when photographing something that seems to be a black blob on the mobile. It makes the bad photos a bit more recognizable. Take this with a bag of salt though, for I’m nowhere near good enough at photography to give reliable advise.

[inkadillo]

Starred ones are in the top 10 most observed birds for all users.

All the songbirds are common yard visitors and then Mallards, Great Blue Herons, and Canada Geese are year-round inhabitants of my favorite birding spots. Cackling Geese aren’t year-round, but I like taking photos of them because of how variable their plumage can be (usually in very subtle ways).

I’m pretty sure I have audio-only observations for each of these as well.

[austin_ajit]

Cool! I’ve never heard a swift before! I’ve only seen them zooming around.

[robotpie]

Absolutely no surprises here that these are my top 10. I also quite like the fact that for many of these species I have observations at multiple different locations (a Seattle mallard is different from a Chicago mallard which is in turn different from an Atlanta mallard!)

[Marie-B]

Here’s my bird bingo card, most are observed in Sydney, except for the Canada Goose seen in London. I expected more White-faced Herons.

[eyekosaeder]

The most surprising thing: Despite being as common in our garden as the Great Tit (Parus major), and despite me liking it more, the Blue Tit (Cyanistes caeruleus) didn’t even make the top 10.

Also, I don’t recall ever making that many observations of the Eurasian Wren (Troglodytes troglodytes), I feel like I have only seen 2 of them in the last few years.

[phma]

You’ve seen a galah! Have you seen a goolayyalibee?
https://mailman.swarpa.net/pipermail/fictionary/2022/005140.html
https://mailman.swarpa.net/pipermail/fictionary/2011/003515.html

I haven’t observed any birds yet. I could have observed some hummingbirds when I was spending days at another surveyor’s house nearby, but it’s not a site I survey, and I didn’t want to run down the batteries on my GPS system while the power was out (though I did use the GPS to measure coordinates of one tree that toppled onto power lines).

[marcellomanara]

[Vireya]

I hadn’t heard of Goolayyalibees, but having read the explanation, yes I have seen them from time to time. I have 12 observations of them. Here’s one from a couple of months ago:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/212570008
Galahs I see just about every day so they don’t get “observed” because they aren’t remarkable. Goolayyalibees on the other hand, I will try and photograph whenever I see, because I don’t see them often.

[annkatrinrose]

@eyekosaeder

The most surprising thing: Despite being as common in our garden as the Great Tit (Parus major), and despite me liking it more, the Blue Tit (Cyanistes caeruleus) didn’t even make the top 10.

I’m always trying to get those, too, when visiting my mom, and often failing. I find they are faster, hide more, and are just harder to catch on camera even though they are definitely around and do visit the feeder.

[giannamaria]

Unfortunately, Northern Bobwhites have been exterperated where I live. I do have four observations of bobwhites, but they are very difficult to find in MI, NY, and other places I have birded in. Hope to see more as I do more traveling in the next few years!

[texas_nature_family]

Here’s mine. They aren’t too impressive because all the birds are on eBird

[ItsMeLucy]

To me they are impressive! I’ve never even heard of a whistling duck and now I am off to look it up because it is adorable and I need to learn more about the whistling, which I suspect I am wildly misinterpreting.

[danly]

@phma

I haven’t observed any birds yet.

That means you can decide which birds to post, and how often, thus ensuring that your top ten observed are also your favorites … and you won’t ever have to say “why on earth did I take so many pix of common species x?”

[ItsMeLucy]

Dear @texas_nature_family :

Thank you for sending me down the best rabbit hole. In my quest to hear a whistling duck, I landed on this Observation, which has both sound and the most adorable photo of ducklings I have ever seen. In sum, I am smitten.

With gratitude and saludos,
Lucy

[dmantack]

Pretty basic assortment. The Zenaida doves are from when I visited family in Jamaica, as well as my time spent on other Caribbean islands.

[jasonhernandez74]

I see that like me, you have only a few of any given species.

Here are mine:

As you can see, “top” birds just mean those I have observed more than once. This also shows my tendency to make more effort when I am traveling in a (to me) faraway exotic place: both of the Rock Pigeon ovservations are from French Polynesia, as are both Brown Noddy, both Chestnut-breasted Munia, both Great Crested Tern, and one of the two Zebra Doves. Imagine that – traveling to Polynesia and making my first feral pigeon observation there.