The organisers of Global Big Day, one of the biggest annual international bird watching events, are calling on bird lovers in Macao to take part in the occasion by submitting birding data online on 11 May, either as individuals or in a team.
Participation in the free event is easy – residents are simply asked to observe the birds around them and report their sightings by filling out a checklist on the eBird website or the eBird mobile app.
The submitted data will be available for viewing on eBird, a publically available bird observation database that is aimed at helping scientists and researchers to better understand the distribution of bird species worldwide.
Global Birding and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, two of the organisations involved in Global Big Day, hope that Macao can be better represented in the event and share more data with the world regarding the birds that inhabit the city. “Since 2020, only one year has had Global Big Day contributions from Macao: 2022,” said Ian Davies, the international strategy director of eBird.
“That year, 45 species were reported. With no contributions in any of the other past few years, it’s more difficult to understand what birds might be found, and how their populations might be changing.”
[See more: A Macao team has won the inaugural GBA birding competition]
Davies told Macao News that by comparison, there were 38 different people in neighbouring Hong Kong who reported over 160 bird species during Global Big Day 2023.
Currently, there are teams from Hong Kong, mainland China and Taiwan registered for the 2024 event, but none from Macao.
Last year’s Global Big Day saw participation from nearly 60,000 individuals who submitted almost 150,000 lists that featured over 7,500 species.
As of writing, there were 323 recorded Macao-based bird species on the eBird database, as well as 178 eBirders in Macao, including friends Eric Kwan and Ken Kwan, who are best known for establishing the Chief of Macau Ecology Facebook page.
While the event may appear to be the domain of bird enthusiasts, Penny Robinson and Tim Apple of Global Birding, highlight its inclusive nature. “There is no barrier to who can take part or where they can take part,” they said. “We have some incredible people going to great lengths to list birds for Global Big Days, as well as those people who stay at home and list birds seen from their backyard or local park.”
