We Want to Help AI: How to report eBird, the new age of bird watching II

To use eBird, first you download the app and register yourself at eBird site by creating your account. Next, install the app and sign in. The first task you’re assigned is logging in to eBird with your account info. After clearing this, the app will ask your permission to use phone’s GPS info. You tap “Yes” then eBird shows you a suitable Bird Pack for your location. Bird Pack is the list of the bird for your location, say if you’re in Japan the list is for Japan. Please download the Pack of your choice, and you’re ready to report your bird-watching session to eBird. When you open eBird, you’ll find a bar at the bottom to start reporting. 

You tap it, then it will show you the list of possible birds you could meet according to the GPS data of your phone, which may look like this. Sorry! It’s in Japanese and the bird pack is for birds in Japan. But you can choose the language at the very beginning with eBird. Also, if you do this in your place, the language will be adjusted accordingly, and I guess the place of bars etc on the screen is the same anyway.

Say, if you report you met five large-billed crow, you can scroll the list or tap in “large-billed crow” in the search bar of the above list. It comes like the below. The number in the box left of the “crow” is the number of birds you’ve met. You can either tap this square to increase the number (in this case five taps), or simply write “5” here. When you’ve done, tap the check in the bottom right-hand corner (yellow arrow), and the first step for reporting is done.

When you complete your reporting draft from the bird-watching session, tap the bottom right-hand corner with yellow arrow in the photo before the last. The screen will ask you to confirm the end of bird-watching session. To end the draft, please tap the bottom right-hand corner (yellow arrow in the below photo).

The screen proceeds to the next step to report your session to the database. First it will ask you if you name the place where you’ve done the observation session, in the third line from the top with “!” mark. You tap it, then the cellphone ask you if you want to name the place instead of latitude and longitude.

Whatever your choice, you tap when you confirm the location data, and the next step appears. First you say “Yes” if you report your observations to eBird database by tapping the bar of the yellow arrow in the below photo. After this, please tap “Send” bar for the red arrow. eBird will tell you your data has been sent to Cornell Lab.

The sent data will refine the list we downloaded at the beginning. According to the rangers of Wild Bird Society of Japan, people in Cornell will check if the data is worthwhile to believe it. If it passes the screening the reported result is added to the global data set. If the list includes some endangered species, and so it would be better to limit the people who can see the database for this bird with the reporting location, eBird automatically set the access for this info only to the reporter, so the rangers said. In any case, when the AI receives more data, the accuracy of its identification based on the data will become more reliable, or so I hope. The point becomes more important when we use to Merlin. I tell you my adventure with Merlin next week with magic wand, nope, via my cellphone.

If you have any questions about Yokohama’s Green Tax and Green Up Plan, please make a contact with

Strategic Planning Division, Green Environment Bureau, City of Yokohama
横浜市みどり環境局戦略企画課

Phone: 045-671-2712
FAX: 045-550-4093

Email: mk-kikaku@city.yokohama.lg.jp