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I thought I had uploaded these Bobolink photos from last year, but eBird said otherwise. My best to date, they can be surprisingly difficult to photograph!

I think the one in the back is a Violet-green, if you zoom in on the back.

In case anybody hasn't seen this... https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/great-grey-owl-lands-on-camera-1.6397792 Have you ever had a bird land on your camera or taken a picture like that? By the way, I have long thought that Great Gray Owls look like Half Dome in Yosemite, and I'm not the only one. (Warning, if it's needed: that page contains profane language.) There are Great Gray Owls in Yosemite, and maybe someday someone will get a picture with both in one frame, if not in focus.

Tree Swallow https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/430250001

Branch?

Why not Cave? Both birds have paler chins than I would expect on a Cliff.

problem solved on the lifer issue https://ebird.org/checklist/S105863766 Got it today at a different location

Absolutely a Sandhill Crane. Nice bird!

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/430029941 https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/430029921

5,000 Complete Checklists.

https://ebird.org/species/camtro1/ found this on ebird. I think you're right

Belted Kingfisher

I didn't use a list this morning, or much thought. I was just throwing letters together to see what might make a code for my third guess. After I solved the puzzle I still needed to solve the riddle of what bird it was, so I guess I did need the list after all. BRDL 66 ???? ???? ????

Don't scroll past the first photo right away. Do you see it? Colorado's Eastern Plains do not have a lot in the way of trees and as a result Great-horned Owls will nest just about anywhere.

"Birds you hear or see - as long as you were able to confidently identify the bird, you should enter it regardless of whether you heard or saw it." I think this paragraph is worded to confirm that audio identification is as valid as visual, not to exclude ID'ing from photos. From the "Do NOT include in your lists" section, these are the only paragraphs that refer to images. Neither mentions birds identified from photos you took in the field, pro or con. "Remote sensed images or video - do not enter any data from nest cameras, feeder cameras, trail cams, Google maps, etc. "Media from other dates, places, or people - only add photos and sound recordings to your checklist if they were taken by you during that checklist." From "Why doesn't eBird accept observations of dead, captive, or remotely sensed birds?" section: "eBird is designed to collect in-person observations of living wild birds. When eBird data is used for science and conservation, researchers assume observations were made using more or less the same process (i.e., all birds were observed alive and in situ). The process of detecting dead, captive, or online birds differs too greatly from in-person birding for us to combine these observations in our scientific database." From Birding as your 'Primary Purpose' and Complete Checklists, "Is my checklist complete? Your checklist is complete if: You made your best effort to see or hear all the birds around you You made your best effort to identify every bird you saw or heard as precisely and accurately as possible (even if you couldn't count* or ID them all) Every species you detected and identified, to the best of your ability, is included on your checklist" With all that said, I can't find anything that explicitly takes a stand on identification from photos. *count - Do we agree it's okay to use photos to count the number of birds? If so, why wouldn't identification also be acceptable? Yours pedantically.

Bobolink! One of my favorites. I thought I had already uploaded these photos, but somehow I didn't. Some audio here too if you care to listen to what he was singing ? https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/342206741

Can anyone help ID this bird? I've never seen a Sandhill Crane, as they are somewhat rare in these parts. I saw this bird flying overhead in the late afternoon while walking near the wetland area of Macrae Farm Park in Colchester, Vermont. Great Blue Herons are common in this locale, but this bird flew differently. It was flying circles as if scouting a place to land in the still half-frozen wetland. It was not beating its wings, but rather just using the wind to circle around. The light was quite tricky, and I did not see a red crown. A couple of the photo's I took seem to show a hint of red near the eye if really push the 'vibrance' control function in Lightroom.

Barn Swallow - my only shot to get noted somewhere on eBird as it has 95 ratings.

Yes, note the pale nape in the last photo.

Seen soaring today Bonus possible leucistic yellow rumped warbler

Barn Swallow...streeetcchhh

Least Sandpiper

Definitely!

Troupial? Pretty sure I've seen one at the zoo.

Cliff and a Tree Swallow.

BRDL 66 ???? ????

BRDL 66 ???? ???? Lucky second guess

All of the birds in that photo are American Wigeons.

Here's a Belding's

wife: Hubby, do you think my new dress makes me look fat? Hubby: NOO ! Autocorrect changed it to MOO Hubby is now in room 412 at Fircrest Hospital

I did it again and guess what???? I got it on the first try!!!!!!!! ? BRDL 66 ????

These are Cave Swallows.

Lesser Black-backed Gull

I just reread Tony's article. I'm going to number the photographs attached to your last post 1-4 from top to bottom. One and two are the same bird. The shadows make colors difficult to discern, but clearly picture 2 identifies it as a male based on Bill color. The eye line is longer than most pure mottled ducks but may be within the spectrum of length for a mottled duck. The gape spot is small but according to Tony that doesn't eliminate pure. What I'm saying is both of these markers indicate hybrid but do not positively confirm it. The tail appears to be black on the upper tail coverts with the butt being white on the side and the bottom. These are the colors of a male mallard, so assuming I'm seeing the correct colors that eliminates any chance of a pure mottled duck. However, it's unusual to not see any curl in the tail. Picture 4- I still say the duck on the right is probably a pure mottled duck, but need a good picture of the head to confirm.

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/428794271 Red-breasted Nuthatch.

I'd guess some kind of oriole maybe looking at the bill and color

The suggestion that was made here and at the eBird group on Facebook wasn't that you shouldn't use photos in identifying birds. It was that you shouldn't list birds on eBird if you weren't aware of them till you saw them in your photos, or if you do list them, they should be in an incidental list. My example was that I photographed ducks on a river, and when I looked at the pictures on my full-size screen, I saw a pipit on the bank. So pedantically, as you say, these are not birds you saw or heard or observed. You might say they were birds you detected, in a sense. I agree that eBird gives no explicit rule against that. However, some apparently knowledgeable people told me that listing birds you only saw in your photos causes problems with the methods ornithologists use to estimate bird abundances from eBird reports marked "complete". Those would be minor problems.

Looks like Northern Rough-winged Swallow in the back, and Bank Swallow in the front.

https://ebird.org/hotspot/L374029, featuring our famous beached barge in the background.

Agreed looks good

https://ebird.org/checklist/S105863766 Got the lifer Horned Grebe

There are computer apps that can recover deleted files if the files have been deleted but the card/drive hasn't been reformatted. After EVERY shoot I import the photos to the computer and then format my CF/SD card IN CAMERA, never on the computer. I also don't delete any images in camera, I only delete images from the computer after import. That way the camera image count will track with the image file number.

Red-winged Blackbird

Domestic genes in this bird I assume, but she was still really pretty!