Estonian Green Birding Year 2014

In 2014 there were more bikers and hikers with binoculars on the roads of Estonia than usual. The reason behind this curious phenomenon was that the twitchers club Estbirding, was organizing Green Birding Year Race. The goal was to see as many birds as possible during the year, without using motorized transport. The race got some publicity on the radio and news portals and over 30 participants took part. The main birding frenzy happened in April and May when birds arrived from their southern wintering areas, but the guys with really big scores were active all year round. For example Margus Ellermaa, the eventual winner, got most of his birds doing migration counts from July to November at Põõsaspea Peninsula. The scores are a good indication how easy certain species are to come by. If we look at the woodpeckers - Black Woodpecker is on the list of 28 participants, Grey-headed Woodpecker on 23, White-backed Woodpecker on 20 and the elusive Three-toed Woodpecker on 8. 

At the end of the year three people had broken the previous Estonian Green Birding Year record of 213 species. 

The top 3 were:

Margus Ellermaa 232

Alpo Koukila 218

Indrek Tammekänd 216

Altogether we saw 261 species of birds and all these were found using only bicycles and our own feet!  Despite this we covered a distance of more than 20 000 km or half way around the world. Over half of the participants also recorded their birding hours and kilometres and the most active were:

Green birding hours - Uku Paal 395h

Walked km - Urmas Männik 1193 km

Cycled km - Uku Paal 2563 km

The route of Uku Paal: cycled 2563 km / 395 h

There were 21 aces, species only one birder saw.

Margus Ellermaa - 14 aces (King Eider, Black Scoter, Yellow-billed Diver, Purple Sandpiper, Red-necked Phalarope, Grey Phalarope, Long-tailed Skua, Common Guillemot, Tengmalm's Owl, Hoopoe, Rock Pipit, Pallas's Leaf Warbler, Yellow-browed Warbler, Twite).

Alpo Koukila - 3 aces (Pink-footed Goose, Steller's Eider, Rosy Starling)
Raul Vilk - 2 aces (Pallid Harrier, Hawk Owl)
Jaak Tammekänd  - 1 ace (Water Pipit)
Uku Paal - 1 ace (Rustic Bunting)

Bird species list of Estonia can be found here...