Wednesday, January 18, 2023

The Cornell Lab’s 2022 Milestones

From the 20th anniversary of eBird to the expansion of Merlin Sound ID, and innovative new tools powering scientific and conservation internet applications, there’s a lot for the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s members, staff, and contributors to celebrate! More people united in a shared appreciation for birds than ever before in 2022, including the more than 10 million people who used the Cornell Lab’s resources to learn, study, and contribute to the conservation of bird populations, including more than 110,000 new eBirders and almost 3 million Merlin first time users!

The Macaulay Library reached 2 significant milestones, including the contribution of the 40 millionth bird photograph and the 1½ millionth sound recording through eBird reports. More bird photographers and recordists archived their media in the Macaulay Library during the past year than ever before, when 69,800 photographers contributed almost 10 million photos, and 15,645 recordists contributed more than 370,000 recordings of bird songs and calls. Also, the eBird Mobile app was used to submit 11½ million eBird checklists in 2022.

The eBird Status and Trends Project now provides modeled abundance and range maps for 2,068 species, including 868 species added just last month. For the first time, these ground-breaking visualizations are now interactive, so you can zoom in and search for detailed local population information across a species’ full global range. 2022 also marked the launch of new eBird Trends maps for 586 species around the world. These maps are created using eBird data to show precisely where bird populations are increasing and decreasing. Localized insights into population changes are a game-changer for people working to restore declining bird populations and habitats.

Birds of the World, the Cornell Lab’s premiere online ornithological reference tool now includes all 10,906 species and 249 families of birds, including 568 updated published species accounts last year. With more than a 25 percent increase in subscribers over the past 12 months, birders, researchers, and conservationists from 130 countries use and rely on Birds of the World’s comprehensive scholarly content. You can visit the free species accounts on the Birds of the World homepage to see what this definitive science resource has to offer.

Using eBird data, researchers published 160 scientific articles in 2022, bringing the total number of scientific publications using eBird data to more than 780.

The Merlin Bird ID app for your smart phone now helps you identify more than 10,000 species, nearly every bird species on Earth, and the latest release of Sound ID includes an improved model for 510 species found in the United States and Canada, plus sounds for 507 common and widespread species found in Central and South America, along with 277 species found in Europe.

The newly introduced BirdCast Migration Dashboard reveals nightly bird migration action above the Lower 48 United States, including near-real time migration stats for each county, such as how many birds are currently aloft, how high the birds are flying, and what direction they are moving – it’s all fascinating, especially when combined with the other high-tech aspects of BirdCast!

There is much more to review in the complete annual report for the Cornell Lab of Ornithology; see 2022 Year in Review: eBird, Merlin, Macaulay Library, and Birds of the World - eBird