The Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology is celebrating 90 years of archiving and recording bird sounds. On May 18th, 1929 Arthur Allen and Peter Paul Kellogg made history with the very first recording of wild birds in North America. Since that pivotal day in Ithaca, New York in 1929, the Macaulay Library has grown from an analog library to a digital archive with more than 60,000 contributors and 400,000 recordings of birds. Learn more about our history from the first recording to today on our history pages.
To celebrate our history, we have a challenge for you. Upload 90 qualifying recordings with eBird checklists from 1 April – 31 October 2019 for a chance to win a complete recording package including a Sound Devices MixPre-3 and a Wildtronics Amplified Pro Mono Parabolic Microphone and other prizes! Recordings do not need to be recorded during this time period but need to be uploaded with eBird checklists during this time period. So those sound collections you’ve been holding on to count! If you want to submit historic recordings for the contest, all you need to do is create a historic eBird checklist for those recordings. Once you’ve submitted 90 recordings of one or more species you will be entered into the contest from which winners will be randomly selected. Recordings over 90 do not count as additional entries.
Grand Prize: Sound Devices MixPre-3, Wildtronics Amplified Pro Mono Parabolic Microphone with a feather-light dish, extra battery pack, cables, and a Strut case.
2nd Prize: Zeiss Terra ED 8×42 Binoculars plus an eBird hat.
3rd Prize: an eBird hat plus 1-year subscription to Birds of North America or a $100 gift certificate to Bird Academy where you can choose from over 10 different courses.
Winners will be randomly drawn from qualifying recordings on 1 November.
Special thanks to Wildtronics and Zeiss for their donations!
