Recent eBird Sightings Summary By Location - Version 1.0

Summary

This API provides a summary of eBird and eTT observations for an eBird hotspot, over the past few days.

Google Gadgets

There are Google Gadgets with eBird Trail Tacker and eBird branding which can be used to consume the data provided by this API. Information about using those gadgets.

Suggestions for Improvement

For both gadgets:
- Ability to sort by Most Recently Observed (followed by taxonomic order)

- Ability to sort by High Count (followed by taxonomic order)

For eBird gadget:
- Show first and last name of reporting observer

For eTT gadget:
- link to AAB species on species names
- link to map showing location of sighting (using eTT map)
- identify rarities and specialties

API

URL	description	status	notes
http://ebird.org/ws1.0/product/byloc/recent	Return summary of recent sightings for most active hotspot over the past 24 hours	deployed
http://ebird.org/ws1.0/product/byloc/recent?locID=L97555&locID=L259855&daysBack=7	Return summary of recent sightings at the given locID(s)	deployed

Parameter Descriptions

parameter	required	default	value options	example value	description	status
locID	no	n/a	locID of hotspot locations	L97555	The data summary is computed using data submitted to the given locIDs (up to three). The eBird-1.0-HotSpot web service lists valid hot spot locIDs.	deployed
locale	no	en_US	Java standard locale codes	en_US	Language/locale of common names provided in the response (when translations are available)	deployed
daysBack	no	0	0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7	7	How many days backwards to look in computing the summary. Zero means use observations submitted for today. One means use observations for today and yesterday. Etc.	deployed

Result Caching

Results are cached on the server for 30 minutes, so repeated calls to the same URL will usually result in exacted the same response. The time that the response was actually computed is provided in the header time stamp.

XML Result Format

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<response>
    <header>
        <locale country="US" language="en"/>
        <timestamp>2008-06-27T15:57:58.877-04:00</timestamp>
        <criteria>
            <property id="locID" value="L97555" description="Sapsucker Woods"/>
            <property id="daysBack" value="7"/>
        </criteria>
    </header>
    <result>
        <sighting>
            <species-id>cangoo</species-id>
            <scientific-name>Branta canadensis</scientific-name>
            <common-name>Canada Goose</common-name>
            <how-many>20</how-many>
            <num-checklists>2</num-checklists>
            <obs-dt>2008-06-27</obs-dt>
        </sighting>
        <sighting>
            <species-id>norbob</species-id>
            <scientific-name>Colinus virginianus</scientific-name>
            <common-name>Northern Bobwhite</common-name>
            <how-many>1</how-many>
            <num-checklists>1</num-checklists>
            <obs-dt>2008-06-25</obs-dt>
        </sighting>
    </result>
</response>

Potential Improvements

Support more time frames (week, month).
Support multiple points (via point in polygon computation).

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