303 episodes

The American Birding Podcast brings together staff and friends of the American Birding Association as we talk about birds, birding, travel and conservation in North America and beyond. Join host Nate Swick every Thursday for news and happenings, recent rarities, guests from around the birding world, and features of interest to every birder.

The American Birding Podcast American Birding Association

    • Science
    • 4.7 • 566 Ratings

The American Birding Podcast brings together staff and friends of the American Birding Association as we talk about birds, birding, travel and conservation in North America and beyond. Join host Nate Swick every Thursday for news and happenings, recent rarities, guests from around the birding world, and features of interest to every birder.

    08-30: This Month in Birding - July 2024

    08-30: This Month in Birding - July 2024

    It's This Month in Birding for July 2024 with Stephanie Beilke, Martha Harbison, and Mikko Jimenez the aeroecologist! The panel discusses recent bird news including AOS splits and lumps, bird intelligence, and bird regalia, but that's hardly all. Join us for another great conversation about birds, science, and, for some reason, the Insane Clown Posse. 
    Links to articles discussed in this episode:
    AOS Checklist Redux 2024
    Birds barcode food to map stashes
    These crows have counting skills previously only seen in people
    Do Magnetic murmurs guide birds? A directional statistical investigation for influence of Earth’s Magnetic field on bird navigation 
    'As I Stood There, a Bird Watcher in Full Regalia Paused Next to Me’
    Subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a rating or a review if you are so inclined! We appreciate it! And don’t forget to join the ABA to support this podcast and the many things we do for birds and birders!
    Thanks to our friends at OM System for sponsoring this episode. Embrace the outdoors and find new ways to enjoy birds and birding. Visit omsystem.com or log in to your ABA member account to claim your exclusive 10% discount on cameras and lenses like the all new weather-sealed bodies and lenses.
    Subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, and Google Podcasts, and please leave a rating or a review if you are so inclined! We appreciate it!

    • 57 min
    08-29: Dare to Bird with Melissa Hafting

    08-29: Dare to Bird with Melissa Hafting

    The incredibly diverse and unbelievably photogenic landscape of British Columbia is on display in photographer and birder Melissa Hafting's new book, Dare to Bird, and with it, the birds that make this part of the continent so special and inspire Hafting’s effort to spread the joy of birding and photography around the province, across Canada, and beyond. She joins host Nate Swick to talk about it, along with rare bird recordkeeping, young birders, and more. 
    Also, new hope for Hawaiian birds in the form of mosquito air drops. 
    Subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a rating or a review if you are so inclined! We appreciate it! And don’t forget to join the ABA to support this podcast and the many things we do for birds and birders!
    Thanks to our friends at Zeiss for sponsoring this episode. For a limited time you can get $200 of all ZEISS Conquest HD binoculars. Visit your local optics dealer or visit ZEISS.com/nature to find a dealer near you.
    Subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, and Google Podcasts, and please leave a rating or a review if you are so inclined! We appreciate it!

    • 33 min
    08-38: Birding with Benefits, A Discussion

    08-38: Birding with Benefits, A Discussion

    Birding with Benefits, a new book by author Sarah T Dubb, is a unique new addition to the birding canon. While we shouldn’t be too surprised that all the new attention paid to birding has seen it turn up in surprising places, but the pages of a romance novel certainly seemed like a stretch. To help discuss birding's introduction into the romance genre, host Nate Swick turns to his own birding adjacent relationship and beach read enthusiast to talk about this unlikely intersection. 
    Also, SpaceX turns out to be a bad neighbor to birds in South Texas, according to The New York Times. 
    Subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a rating or a review if you are so inclined! We appreciate it! And don’t forget to join the ABA to support this podcast and the many things we do for birds and birders!
    Thanks to our friends at Zeiss for sponsoring this episode. For a limited time you can get $200 of all ZEISS Conquest HD binoculars. Visit your local optics dealer or visit ZEISS.com/nature to find a dealer near you.
    Subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, and Google Podcasts, and please leave a rating or a review if you are so inclined! We appreciate it!

    • 35 min
    08-27: 2024 Splits and Lumps with Nick Block

    08-27: 2024 Splits and Lumps with Nick Block

    Birders around North America look forward to midsummer every year for the publication of the AOS North American Classification Committee’s Taxonomic Supplement, the splits and lumps that affect our life lists. And for this conversation we turn, as we have since the very beginning of this podcast, to our own taxonomy guru Dr Nick Block of Stonehill College to talk shearwater splits, gull confusion, redpoll DNA, and everything else in the 2024 list of proposals. 
    Don’t forget to donate to the ABA’s Nesting Season Appeal, which raises money for our excellent young birder programs. And check out our upcoming community weekends!
    Subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a rating or a review if you are so inclined! We appreciate it! And don’t forget to join the ABA to support this podcast and the many things we do for birds and birders!
    Thanks to our friends at Zeiss for sponsoring this episode. For a limited time you can get $200 of all ZEISS Conquest HD binoculars. Visit your local optics dealer or visit ZEISS.com/nature to find a dealer near you.
    Subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, and Google Podcasts, and please leave a rating or a review if you are so inclined! We appreciate it!

    • 1 hr 1 min
    08-26: This Month in Birding - June 2024

    08-26: This Month in Birding - June 2024

    The summer solstice marks another turn of the seasons to nesting and post-breeding dispersal, and, in some cases southward migration once again. And the end of the month means turn to This Month in Birding, our roundtable discussion with some birding friends. We welcome back Nick Lund, Jordan Rutter, and Brodie Cass Talbott for a wide-ranging discussion that includes polyamorous shorebirds, Giga-geese, and birder "would you rathers". 
    Links to articles discussed in this episode:
    Tiny New Zealand bird delivers a lesson in birdsong evolution
    Polyandrous birds evolve faster than monogamous ones, new study finds
    New fossils show what Australia's giant prehistoric 'thunder birds' looked like
    Don’t forget to donate to the ABA’s Nesting Season Appeal, which raises money for our excellent young birder programs. And check out our upcoming community weekends!
    Subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a rating or a review if you are so inclined! We appreciate it! And don’t forget to join the ABA to support this podcast and the many things we do for birds and birders!
    Thanks to our friends at Zeiss for sponsoring this episode. For a limited time you can get $200 of all ZEISS Conquest HD binoculars. Visit your local optics dealer or visit ZEISS.com/nature to find a dealer near you.

    • 55 min
    08-25: The Importance of Insects with David Leatherman

    08-25: The Importance of Insects with David Leatherman

    When birders talk about the importance of a bird-friendly yard, they often mean insects even if they don't mention them explicitely. And so people that want to attract birds need to get comfortable with bugs. Colorado birder David Leatherman is a fan of bug-bird interactions and in his piece The Importance of Native Plants and Insects Amid the Reality of Modern Bird Habitats, in the April 2024 issue of Birding magazine, he encourages birders to familiarize themselves with living bird food. He joins host Nate Swick to discuss it. 
    Also, it's 2024 Young Birder of the Year Season! Meet our new awardees and learn more about this exceptional program. 
    Don’t forget to donate to the ABA’s Nesting Season Appeal, which raises money for our excellent young birder programs.
    Subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts and please leave a rating or a review if you are so inclined! We appreciate it! And don’t forget to join the ABA to support this podcast and the many things we do for birds and birders!
    Thanks to our friends at Zeiss for sponsoring this episode. For a limited time you can get $200 of all ZEISS Conquest HD binoculars. Visit your local optics dealer or visit ZEISS.com/nature to find a dealer near you.

    • 37 min

Customer Reviews

4.7 out of 5
566 Ratings

566 Ratings

flybeagle ,

Thanks

Newer birder here. Thanks for doing this podcast. It’s my favorite birding podcast to listen to.

Oye333 ,

Love to Nate

Love this podcast. Nate Swick is the best host! I look forward to Thursday mornings. Light, healing and positivity to Nate and his family.

THEPAINFROMMAIN ,

ABA Podcast Review

But I just dont like how all the people Nate interviews are all woke! If the left is so inclusive of all people bring in some conservative birders! This podcast took a turn for the worse😢. If this is a podcast about birds then stop bringing up politics. Also Nate will probably end up saying hes a 13 year old girl and swims on the girls swim team🤣

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