Cape Florida Banding Station

The Cape Florida Banding Station (CFBS) is located in Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park (BBCFSP) at the southern tip of Key Biscayne, a developed barrier island lying just off Miami’s coast. Every spring and fall, millions of songbirds stop at Bill Baggs to refuel as they fly north or south along the Atlantic Flyway, heading for North American summering habitats or southern wintering destinations in the Caribbean and South America. Volunteer Community Scientists at the Banding Station have been banding these neotropical migrants during their Fall Migration since 2002, from mid-August through the first week of November.

In 2020, Tropical Audubon Society (TAS) and the Banding Station formed a partnership to nurture and grow the Banding Station’s operations, and to ensure that one of South Florida’s longest-running Community Science programs continues for generations to come. The purpose is to facilitate a deepening of scientific research and an expansion of public outreach and education about South Florida’s avian visitors.

Florida Keys Hawkwatch (FKH)

FKH is the southernmost migration monitoring project in the continental United States, and is the sole project of its kind in Florida and the Southeast. Continually tracking the movements of birds as they prepare to cross the Florida Straits and Gulf of Mexico into the Caribbean – a region with few monitoring sites – is of critical importance to understanding and protecting these descendants of theropod dinosaurs.

The Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC)

The GBBC, coordinated by National Audubon Society and Cornell Lab of Ornithology, is a four-day, global bird count held every February. Anyone can participate by tallying the numbers and kinds of birds they spot in their yard for at least 15 minutes on one or more days of the count.

Results can be submitted to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s online database known as eBird. The count creates an annual snapshot of the distribution and abundance of birds.

Christmas Bird Count (CBC)

The CBC is a long-standing program of the National Audubon Society, with over 100 years of community science involvement. It is an early-winter bird census, where thousands of volunteers across the U.S., Canada, and many countries in the Western Hemisphere go out over a 24-hour period on one calendar day to count birds. To view a map of CBC locations, click here To participate in CBCs in the Miami area, click here.

Audubon EagleWatch

Based at Audubon Center for Birds of Prey, Audubon EagleWatch seeks information about Bald Eagles, active nest locations and possible disturbances or threats to nesting activities. The EagleWatch program provides valuable information on nesting activity and the current trends of eagle populations in Florida. As a volunteer, you’ll spend some time monitoring one or more eagle nests in your vicinity. These observation reports will help eagle biologists to determine the right conservation measures to ensure the success of the species. Additionally, the reports may be used by law enforcement agencies to prevent any harm to the birds and their nesting sites.

Humming Birds @ Home

By joining Audubon Hummingbirds at Home you will join a movement to crowdsource rigorous science that is meaningful for hummingbirds.

You will become an integral piece of a continent-wide network of community scientists helping uncover how hummingbirds are affected by climate change and providing the information necessary to devise actions to help them.

eBird

eBird’s global reach allows birders to keep track of their personal lists and collects vast amounts of data that can be used for science and conservation. eBird can generate graphs, maps, and detailed analysis tools to help scientists better understand patterns of bird occurrence and the environmental and human factors that influence them.

NestWatch

NestWatch participants help scientists track the breeding success of birds across North America by collecting information about nest location, habitat, bird species, number of eggs, and number of young. Launched in 2007 with funding from the National Science Foundation, NestWatch is building an unmatched database which, combined with historic data, is helping scientists understand how breeding birds are affected climate change, urbanization, and land use.

Project FeederWatch

Each year, thousands of people in the United States count birds at their feeders from November through early April for Project FeederWatch, enabling scientists to monitor changes in the distribution and abundance of birds. Using FeederWatch data, scientists have studied the influence of non-native species on native bird communities, examined the association between birds and habitats, and tracked unpredictable movements in winter bird populations.

Eyes on Kites

Is there a Swallow-tailed Kite nest in your area? ​Avian Research and Conservation Institute is looking to collaborate with volunteers on a brand-new community science initiative, called Eyes on Kites. Data gathered from nest monitoring will be used to measure the productivity of Swallow-tailed Kites around Florida and beyond.

Mark My Bird

A team of researchers, based at the University of Sheffield, are taking 3D scans of the bills of all of the world’s bird species from museum collections. The 3D scans are incredibly detailed but before they can use them they require a process called landmarking. Landmarking involves placing points on features of the bill that are common to all specimens. They can use the landmarks to mathematically describe the shape of bills so that they can compare and test how they differ among species. By landmarking the 3D images you can contribute to real science. The digitised data will help researchers to understand how and why the 10,000 species of birds diversified.

Cats Indoors

After habitat loss, predation by feral cats has become the most serious human-caused threat to birds in the United States. Over a billion birds are killed annually by outdoor cats, according to the American Bird Conservancy. In Miami-Dade County, neighborhoods and natural areas, in particular county parks, are overrun with feral cats. To read an excellent summary of the feral cat problem in Florida, click here.

Endangered species such as the Key Largo Woodrat have been severely impacted by south Florida's feral cat population explosion. To learn more, read the following articles from Smithsonian and The Nature Conservancy.

Tropical Audubon Society is seeking the assistance of local citizens to collect feral cat data, which we would then share with county decision-makers. A form is available for data collection.