Thinking about a Big Year?!

Red-tailed Hawk - digiscoped with Swarovski ATX 85mm and hand-held iPhone.
I was low and in the weeds, hence the weed blur which I thought was a kinda cool effect.

Ada County, Idaho

The idea of a birding "Big Year" - striving to see as many birds as possible in one calendar year - has always intrigued me. I don't see myself in much of a position to attempt a Big Year on a grand scale like the ABA area or even my own state of Idaho. Just the thought of a Big Year in Ada County in which I live, seems daunting enough. It's a large county as far as square miles to cover and hosts a nice diversity of habitat and birds. According to eBird, there are right around 300 bird species documented here. I think it would be a fun and exciting challenge, but I'm trying to give myself a reality check about how much time and effort might be involved before approaching my family for support. When I do things like this, I go all the way, fully committed. My personality type would not allow me to do this casually.

If you're gonna do a Big Year, ya gotta start planning early. So I turned to eBird for information. I've downloaded the eBird data for Ada County and begun sorting the list in several ways. I also ranked each species by the probability of seeing it:

1 = Should be easy to see
2 = Should be able to see with some effort
3 = Should be able to see with some luck and additional effort

There are about 130 species I should be able to see fairly easily just by getting out and about with the same regularity I currently go birding. There are another 70 species that are regularly occurring that I should be able to see by expending some additional effort. The remaining 90-100 species will take a bit of preparation combined with a lot of luck and the aide of fellow birders willing to share sightings with me.

Ada County Major Birding Hotspots

The eBird data also shows the window of opportunity I have for seeing each migrating species. Knowing your window of opportunity is critical to Big Year planning no matter what scale you are attempting. I'm also able to see on the eBird maps, where the best places are to see each species. I've started gathering this information into an Excel spreadsheet which is helpful to me in sorting and filtering for the information I want.

Some people might try and do a Big Year all on their own effort, and more power to them...but I won't be shy about asking for all the help I can get. If I do this Ada County Big Year, the Idaho birding listserv will be a great source of leads. I've also compiled a list of active and experienced Ada County birders I would plan to ask to be my consultants for the best times and locations to see each species, to be my trip companions, and to have me on speed-dial in their cell phones when they see something I haven't seen yet. At the same time, I hope my efforts might help spread the joy and excitement of birding as I share my escapades in the coming year.

Here area a couple more recently digiscoped images just for fun...