[CALBIRDS] California Bird Atlas: First Week Report
6:42 am
San Diego is heavily featured in the week one highlights of the California Bird Atlas (see below). Be sure to check out the story posted on eBird.org as it includes a helpful overview of common pitfalls with breeding code usage: https://ebird.org/atlascalifornia/news/atlas-dispatch-jan-1-7-2026
Special shout-out to my ‘blockmate’, Chris McCreedy, who’s already confirmed breeding activity for at least 6 of our local species!
A few minutes outside each night in your own backyard will really help build out our nocturnal effort hours. Duetting Great Horned Owls should be coded “C” for courtship as they begin egg-laying. Even if nothing is heard, these checklists are valuable, so please submit them. And of course those backyard nesting hummingbirds are great contributions!
Justyn Stahl
North Park (Block ‘Point Loma NE’)
———- Forwarded message ———
From: Van Pierszalowski via groups.io <van=californiabirdatlas.org@groups.io>
Date: Sat, Jan 10, 2026 at 5:25 PM
Subject: [CALBIRDS] California Bird Atlas: First Week Report
To: <CALBIRDS@groups.io>
From: Van Pierszalowski via groups.io <van=californiabirdatlas.org@groups.io>
Date: Sat, Jan 10, 2026 at 5:25 PM
Subject: [CALBIRDS] California Bird Atlas: First Week Report
To: <CALBIRDS@groups.io>
Hi Birders,
As previously announced, California’s first statewide Bird Atlas officially launched on January 1, 2026 and will run through December 31, 2030. If you haven’t joined yet, this short Quick Start video walks through how to participate and submit checklists via the California Bird Atlas eBird project. As a reminder, we encourage all California eBirders to submit all checklists through the Atlas project, whether or not breeding behavior is observed.
We’re excited to share that the Atlas is off to an incredible start. The level of enthusiasm and engagement in just the first week has exceeded all expectations.
In the first seven days of 2026 alone:
- 445 atlasers submitted 2,656 checklists
- Coverage spanned 831 atlas blocks across 51 counties
- 2,865 observations were assigned breeding codes
- Confirmed breeding codes were reported for at least 15 species.
- Atlasers recorded 628,723 individual birds
You can explore a full summary of the first week’s results (with photos!) in this article on the California Bird Atlas eBird website.
A special shout-out to Liam Huber, who is currently leading the pack with an impressive 106 complete Atlas checklists, spanning 70 different atlas blocks. California Bird Atlas Top 100 stats can be found here.
Thank you to everyone contributing, and to those who have supported the project through the Donate link. We’re just getting started.
We won’t spam this listserv with weekly updates every week, but we’ll continue to share periodic updates as appropriate.
With sincere appreciation,
Van Pierszalowski
Executive Director, California Bird Atlas
Los Angeles, CA
P.S. We’re assembling a team of Regional Coordinators across the state. If you’re interested in learning more, email me directly.