COUNTING CROWS

Around the world, birds have been the first and most popular projects involving citizen scientists. Longterm projects underway in India include a Kerala Bird Atlas (KBA) and Common Bird Monitoring Programme (CBMP). For the KBA, 1,500 enthusiastic birdwatchers accompany expert birders to survey birds, water bodies, fruiting trees and invasive plants.

“The data will help us analyse how landuse and habitat patterns affect bird populations,” says Praveen Jayadevan, a district coordinator. The five-year project, to be completed by 2020, will be the first systematic bird atlas for an Indian state.

The CBMP, launched by the Bombay Natural History Society last year, has participants walk the same 2-km grid thrice a year, to spot birds along an invisible transect line. “This method, over the years, gives an accurate idea of trends in common bird populations,” says Dr Raju Kasambe, a project manager at BNHS.

Retired banker Madan Tillu, 64, is working on CBMP with his wife, Prachi, 59, a banker. “She tracks birds, I make notes. It’s a great bonding exercise,” he says.

The largest citizen science database of bird records in the country is eBird India, a two-year-old website and mobile app powered by Bird Count India, a collective of conservation organisations, and the UK-based Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

Authors have begun to use eBird data from India in published papers around the world, adds Aasheesh Pittie, ornithologist and founding editor of the South Asian ornithology journal, IndianBIRDS. “With digital technology, more data can now be gathered from across the country, and this will greatly benefit conservation efforts.”