JP48

I have that Peterson Guide, by Rick Wright. It is very good, in a different way than the Warbler Guide. It describes each sparrow species in detail, including sub-species, and goes into a lot of information about the naming history for each one. Good to read, if you're that patient, and good for a reference.

Maybe a song sparrow.

Once, in a train station parking lot, I watched one imitating a truck's backup warning signal.

Hairy Woodpeckers sharing a meal.

The subject of ratings in general raises some questions in my mind. I've had so-so pictures rated as 5 stars (perhaps someone liked the picture, but ignored the quality), and I've seen other people's excellent photos rated quite low (no idea why that would be). But as to the sudden flurry of ratings, I was poking around on eBird a few days ago, and clicked on a quiz link. It seemed like you were expected to rate the photo you were shown. I don't know how many people use that quiz mechanism, but possibly some ratings come from there.

I just went back to find the pictures I mentioned above, and discovered that he had changed his ID to Cooper's Hawk. I suspect the local reviewer has been approaching these guys.

There have been at least two other reports of NOGO at or near this location since. One eBird report has some pretty good pictures (funny, but I drove by the guy making the report as he sat in his car on the side of the road, just at the time of his report - I didn't see any hawks there that day). I can link his re4port if other people think it's appropriate. That road is quite near me, and I've driven it maybe 10 times in the last few weeks. I've spotted Red-tailed and Rough-legged Hawks, but not this bird.

I should modify what I just posted. The 'recent visits' list is current, with entries including this morning, but the list of 'Sightings, Last Seen' shows Feb 6th as the most recent. I suppose I've not really looked much at that list, so I can't say what is 'normal'.

I just looked at a couple of locations near me. They don't appear to have been updated since Feb 6th (my state and county). However, individual hotspots appear to be current, and the 'needs' lists I subscribe to have current entries.

Not just me, then. It's good to know that someone else has noticed this. As for your other prob;em, I don't have that - really quite the opposite. Very occasionally I'm sent to a post that is several above the one that is marked as the first unread one. It will be interesting to see whether personal settings have any effect on these things.

Interesting. I started using 'Unread Content' and 'Next unread topic' for a few months. I don't think I ever had the problem recently described, but always went to the first unread post in each thread. However, I've noticed that I sometimes missed posts altogether. I'm not sure how to explain it, but when I go to Unread Content, and count the number of posts there, then keep track of the number of posts I get by using Next Unread Topic, often there would end up being fewer posts by the time they were all cleaned out. Anyway, I went into my profiler and changed 'take me to the first post'

I have zero interest in starting an argument here, so please realize that this post is not for that purpose. I realize that many here (most?) prefer their tried and true field guides. However, I wish to state that for me, I like iBird. It does everything I want, goes beyond what I can get with any of the several paper guides that I own, and is easier to fit into my pocket when I want something with me in the field. It's never occurred to me to want to use it to view anything by time of year, so I can't address the topic at hand, and I suppose that could be viewed as a failing of the app.

I don't know about the ebird gods, but I'm pretty sure that each user is the only average user who is able to see his/her own track. Even with that, I use and appreciate the track mechanism. I, too, used to estimate distance by my number of steps as recorded by a fitness tracker.

Yes, it's at the edge of the marsh, near the campground. I have some not-so-good pictures from about exactly two years ago, so it might be a reasonable time of year to be checking it out. I haven't seen any reports recently on ebird, though.

There is a box at the mouth of Dead Creek where it empties into Otter Creek (this is a Vermont thing) where a Screech Owl is occasionally seen. I don't know if it dwells there or just hangs out, but the box is less than 8 feet above the ground. Maybe they prefer something higher, but you might be OK.