USGS PWRC - Bird Phenology Program

The North American Bird Phenology Program, part of the USA-National Phenology Network, was a network of volunteer observers who recorded information on first arrival dates, maximum abundance, and departure dates of migratory birds across North America. Active between 1880 and 1970, the program was coordinated by the Federal government and sponsored by the American Ornithologists' Union. It exists now as a historic collection of six million migration card observations, illuminating almost a century of migration patterns and population status of birds. Today, in an innovative project to curate the data and make them publically available, the records are being scanned and placed on the internet, where volunteers worldwide transcribe these records and add them into a database for analysis.
From the close of the program in 1970 Chan Robbins continued to make sure the records were kept safe. In 2008, Sam Droege and Jessica Zelt, with help from the National Phenology Network revived the migration program and dubbed it the North American Bird Phenology Program. The program that started as Wells Cooke’s research in the Mississippi Valley and grew through the help of the American Ornithologist Union to become the Division of Economic Ornithology would later become the US Fish and Wildlife Service. The records are now being digitized and with help from citizen scientists the information will be combined in an online database accessible to the public. What began as a quest to find out how and why birds migrate, turned into one of our Nations greatest and longest running programs.

北美鸟类生态学观察项目，作为美国国家生态学网络的一部分，是一个由志愿者观察员组成的网络，他们记录了北美地区候鸟首次到达日期、最大数量和离开日期等信息。该计划自1880年至1970年活跃，由联邦政府协调并由美国鸟类学家协会赞助。如今，该项目已成为一个包含六百万份迁徙卡片观察记录的历史藏品，这些记录揭示了近一个世纪的鸟类迁徙模式和种群状况。在创新地整理数据并使其公开可用的项目中，这些记录正在被扫描并放置于互联网上，全球志愿者正在转录这些记录并将它们添加到数据库中进行分析。自1970年项目结束以来，Chan Robbins持续确保记录的安全。2008年，Sam Droege和Jessica Zelt在国家级生态学网络的帮助下，恢复了迁徙项目，并将其命名为北美鸟类生态学观察项目。该项目始于Wells Cooke在密西西比河谷的研究，在得到美国鸟类学家联合会的协助后逐渐发展成为经济鸟类学部，最终成为美国鱼类和野生动物服务局。如今，这些记录正在被数字化，在公民科学家的帮助下，这些信息将被整合到一个面向公众的在线数据库中。这一项目始于探究鸟类迁徙的方式与原因，最终成为我国历史上最伟大且持续时间最长的项目之一。