Learn — BirdPulse

Bird migration is the seasonal movement of birds between their breeding grounds and the places they spend the rest of the year. Twice a year — north in spring, south in fall — billions of birds shift across continents, tracking longer days, melting ice and the flush of insects and seeds that feed their journeys. Many travel at night, navigating by the stars, the setting sun and Earth’s magnetic field.

• 🧭Why and how birds migratePhotoperiod, fuel and weather drive the journey; many species fly at night and can be picked up on weather radar.
• 🗺️The world’s flywaysMigration concentrates along broad continental corridors — the Americas’ four flyways, plus major routes across Europe, Africa, Asia and the Pacific.
• 📝How sightings are recordedeBird turns birdwatchers into a sensor network: checklists log species, counts, location, time and effort, anchored at shared hotspots.
• 📊Reading migration countsCounts track reporting, not true abundance — effort and observer coverage shape the numbers, so read the timing, not the absolute total.