u/Physical-Energy-6982

…I mean it.

Just driving to pick up something for lunch on my break from work in a busy suburban village, sitting at a red light with the windows down and heard some killdeer freaking out

I don’t see any people or dogs in that direction, so I look up in a tree and see an American Kestrel.

I recently got my lifer Black-necked Stilts from a Dollar General parking lot.

Birding just raises your awareness to the world around you, and blurs the societal distinction between just “outside” and “outdoors”, and forces you to notice that nature is everywhere. Even in your city/town.

I barely use Amazon anymore but just placed an order as I have a trip coming up I need a few things for and time got away from me, and I need the stuff quick

I placed an order with 5 items and received a confirmation email on 4/29, but when I click the link it just brings me to a “placeholder” order with no information, no items, can’t even display my payment info. If I look at order history, the order isn’t there.

I chatted with CS today and they told me to “rest assured” my order was there, I asked if anything shipped yet and he said no the order was still processing. Couldn’t give me any ETA. I don’t even have a *pending* charge on my card.

That all being said, one of the items arrived today. I’m just so confused and hoping everything else comes before I leave on Wednesday lol

I’ve been birding seriously for a while now and genuinely I love *love* when new people get into the hobby. I do *not* want this to come across as patronizing, or gatekeeping, etc. This may or may not be a repetitive post, but it also might be a newer birders first time seeing it—therefore I’ll make my argument.

We were all beginners once, but everything I learned, I learned from the super helpful and more experienced people in the community, online and IRL.

With that out of the way, the widespread use of and reliance on the Merlin app needs to be addressed.

Point 1: Merlin is a great tool for beginners and seasoned birders alike. I’m glad it exists for many reasons.

Point 2: Merlin is *frequently incorrect*. I use Merlin almost daily, and I’m telling you *every single time I use it*, it makes mistakes. If I didn’t know better, I’d be reporting birds that simply aren’t there on a near daily basis. Example: my shoe squeaked on some wet grass today and Merlin told me I heard a Black-backed woodpecker. I never want to say anything’s impossible, but that’s a pretty impossible bird for my area. Later on, a Brown Thrasher was going off and Merlin “identified” its song as at least 4 different species, repeatedly.

Point 3: When you submit an eBird checklist, you aren’t just doing something for fun. eBird data, submitted by users like you, is not only used by other birders in your area, but it’s also used for research. You’re contributing to citizen science by using eBird and I wish more people recognized that that comes with some responsibility to be as accurate as you possibly can.

When you report inaccurate sightings, the data becomes inaccurate and harder to actually use for research to further conservation and preservation efforts.

When possible, try to lay eyes on the bird. If you can’t, save your Merlin recording and when you get home compare what you recorded to verified bird calls. It’ll make you a better birder, it will help keep eBird data accurate. And I know it sucks to think you might have heard something but if you can’t say with confidence that it was there, *don’t report it on ebird*. Kindly, keep your own list on a different platform if you don’t care about accuracy on that level.

Merlin is a tool that requires oversight, it shouldn’t be doing all the birding for you.