Hi everyone
I hope you are well. This short post is just inform you that Verdicts from the records circulation conducted by EBRC in Nov 2021, concluded in early December, are now online. Most of the records considered were from May to early November 2021 (but there was one outlier from 1994... better late than never!)
As ever, I am grateful to all EBRC members for the work they have put in on judging these records, plus the associated secretarial work of maintaining the archive, communicating decisions and records from the UAE to Sandgrouse etc. None of this happens without a lot of effort behind the scenes and I would particularly like to thank Tommy, Ahmed and Mark for this sort of thing.
One thing that EBRC members really shouldn't have to do is to fill in rare bird reports for other people's records. We will do this (as it is very fast and we need formal documentation for any record we assess, plus we also need to archive the record for the future) but only as a last resort. Therefor I would like to make a plea to everyone that you submit the RBR for any rarity you are lucky enough to find yourself. As a glance at the form will show (see https://www.uaebirding.com/report - red link) we have made this very easy and fast indeed. Whilst we can fill in RBRs if images exist of the bird in questions, the quality of the RBR will be much higher if the finder completes it, as they can then, ideally, include a little bit of context / background details and that sort of things makes the archive far more valuable.
We are enjoying a terrific run of rare birds at the end of 2021, so, if you are lucky enough to find one, please submit an RBR. We welcome them any time; the next circulation will be in April or May 2022.
Many thanks and best wishes for 2022!
Oscar (on behalf of EBRC)