Using NABA’s Butterflies I’ve Seen Database
This page contains a step by step walkthrough for entering a sighting, a quick description of the menus and a glossary of terms for the site. We are always looking to improve this information and would like your input. Please email any suggestions or updates to
INDEX
Introduction
Step by Step Instructions
Quick Overview of the Menus
Glossary
Thanks
The “Butterflies I’ve Seen” link off the NABA.org web page takes you to a separate server where you can track your own personal butterfly observations.
From the NABA main web page (www.naba.org): Follow the link to “Butterflies I’ve Seen” in the main menu on the left.
STEP 1: Find and click on the “Login” button in the top middle. This is just below the “Butterflies I’ve Seen” header.
STEP 2: At the “Login” page, follow NABA’s instructions to create a personal user account. This is mandatory in order to be able to use the “locations,” “life list,” and “field trips/sightings” links. The general public can access the “discussions” and “news” links without having accounts.
STEP 3: You will now be returned to the welcome page.
DISCUSSION: At this point you’re able to access all areas of the database. This allows you to track sightings, and life list information. The data we enter is ours alone and no one outside NABA has access. Observations can be yours personally, the results of a group effort, or just about anything you want them to be. One of the first things you have to know is where the observations were made. The “locations” link utilizes the United States Geologic Survey (USGS) database of 1.7 million locations throughout the USA. The NABA version is currently around 2 million locations because of folks like us entering our own locations and expanding the information. If you routinely go to a known geographic location to make your observations, a local park, school, nature area, etcetera, then try to locate it in the existing data. However, if you’re like me and do 99% of your observing in your own backyard, you’ll need to build that location in the database (see Step 4). When you add a location, it will become a “User” location and only you will be able to access it to start. “User” locations will regularly be reviewed and made into “Official” locations that will be available to everyone. Maintaining privacy may be important to you and any name that is significant to you will work.
STEP 4: If you don’t need to load your own location, proceed to STEP 5.
To enter a location, click on the “Location” link in the menu. Then click on the “Add Loc” link. You will be asked for all of the data about the location (required data will hace red labels). If possible please try to include latitude and longitude data, as NABA will be attempting to map and perform other calculations based on this. The following provides guidance on finding this information.
To build your location into the database requires the latitude and longitude of the location. A global positioning system (GPS) receiver like those used for hiking can give the answer in an instant. Likewise, many fishing boats have GPS mounted. Perhaps a local forestry or county agriculture agent can help. If none of these are available, or useful, you can do it yourself online.
I hope you’re comfortable with maps. Don’t be daunted by this. It’s not terribly difficult. Suggest you have a local street map handy so you can reference it.
I recommend www.topozone.com for accomplishing this feat. On their site, select “place, name search” on the left towards the top of the screen. For your home you start by entering the city, state, and county. Maneuver around the resulting map until you’re satisfied you’ve located your neighborhood. I recommend the 1:25000 view once you’ve generalized your location. Depending upon the age of the available USGS maps, you may have to approximate your location using your best estimate of the topography around you. In my case, the USGS map was older than 1987 when this subdivision was built. Once you’ve found your observation area, click on it with the mouse cursor. After the red crosshair appears, select the “Quad Info” link at the top of the map. This takes you to a page that lists the USGS reference maps being used. It also tells you the latitude and longitude of the “location you were viewing” from the location of the red crosshairs. This is your decimal LAT/LONG which requires one more “conversion” step to be useful. Take these decimal coordinates to www.geology.enr.state.nc.us/gis/latlon.html and enter them. Write down the standard latitude and longitude expression that results.
With the required LAT/LONG information you’re now ready to go to the “locations” link. Select the “add a new location” option and proceed. It’s self explanatory.
STEP 5: Its time to load an observation!
A. Select the “field trips/sightings” link. You can explore the “view field trip list” and the “view sightings list” options, but there won’t any data until you load it.
B. Select the “add a field trip” link to do this. The first thing you’ll have to do is select the location where the observation was made. If there’s nothing in the favorite locations box, then select one using option 2. I assume it’ll be the location you just built.
C. First you must define background information such as date, time, and any notes. The date may be specific or general. The default is general. If you know the timeframe the observation was made in, use the “advanced date entry” link to establish an hourly observation spread. The notes section can be used for anything. I like to track weather conditions such as temperature, wind speed and direction, the general atmospheric conditions relative to clouds. I also add anything unique here, such as references to long periods of drought, the occurrence of rain, a tropical system, or hard freeze. Whatever you want. It’s yours. You can load today’s information or historic. I’ve been slowly loading two years worth of journal entries from our backyard observations.
D. The next screen is the actual data recording area. The butterfly listing is automatically tailored to those known to frequent your state. By using the filter options you can change the listed/available butterflies. This may be required if you have a sighting not normally found in your area. The on-screen directions were fairly understandable to me when I did this. Let me know if you require assistance in this area.
E. Assuming the data is acceptably filtered for your use, scroll through the list of butterflies until you locate one you have observed. Enter the number seen.
NOTE: For NABA purposes, an observation is always the total seen in any moment in time, not an accumulated count over a period of time. One Monarch in the morning and one in the afternoon is only one Monarch. However, I have occasionally documented two when I have absolutely no doubt it was two individuals due to wing damage or other clearly observable differences. Use your judgment.
F. Next, select the appropriate life stage for your observation. If you have multiple life stages in one observation period you’ll have to make separate field trips to capture them both. The current software doesn’t allow multiples life stage recordings in one event.
G. Finally, make any notes relevant to the sighting. I use this “note” section to document what the butterflies were seen on. I use a simple flower abbreviation format. After loading all observations for this “field trip” simply “save” the record using the button at the bottom of the page. You should get an indication that the trip was successfully saved.
From here you can now follow the other links and see the information you’ve loaded. You’re always able to edit a specific trip and make changes if you discover you’ve made a mistake. As you enter data, the life list populates itself from your data. That’s fun to watch as it grows.
News: This displays current news articles about butterflies. Clicking here brings up a submenu that allows you to read the news about butterflies, view a list of articles about butterflies and to post new articles about butterflies. If you post new articles, they will be sent first to an editor before posting.
Discussions: This displays the list of current discussion topics posted by other butterfly enthusiasts. You may create new topics as well as post messages to other users here.
Locations: This displays a list of your favorite locations and brings up a submenu that also allows you to add a favorite location, add a new location, view entered locations, and find a location.
Life List: This displays
your life list and brings up a submenu that also allows you to edit your life
list.
Field Trip/Sightings: This displays a list of your field trips and brings up a submenu that also allows you to add a field trip and view a lit of your sightings.
Current News: A list of recent news items.
News Archives: A complete list of articles that have appeared on the site.
Submit News: A form for sending in a news article for publication.
View Topics: Lists all of the discussion topics available.
Add Topic: Allows you to enter a new topic for discussion
(You must be logged in to access this area)
View Favorite Locations button: This displays a list of your favorite locations. If you click on a place name, you will get the full information for that site. Under Action, you can also remove one of your favorite locations.
Add a Favorite Location button: This leads you through adding a new favorite location by looking up a location in the central database of sites.
Add a New Location button: This allows you enter a new location not found in the central database of sites to your personal list of locations.
View Entered Locations button: This allows you to view a listing of your personally entered locations.
Find a Location button: This allows you to search the central database of sites. The process is similar to that under Add a Favorite Location but this process does not allow you add this location to your list of favorites.
Life List
(You must be logged in to access this area)
View: Display your life list, including information related to when a species was first recorded on a field trip.
Edit: Displays and editable version of the life list where you can enter notes, or mark species as having been seen (regardless of having entered data for a field trip)
Filter Manager: This lists all of the Filters you have created (filters allow you to limit the data displayed). You may edit and delete filters from this screen.
(You must be logged in to access this area)
View Trips: This lists all of the field trips you have entered into the system
All Sightings: This lists all of your butterfly sightings for all of your field triups. This is a 2 step process. First you select what information you would like to see (and perhaps limit it by creating a filter). Then you will be presented with a list of all the data.
Filter Managemer: This lists all of the Filters you have created (filters allow you to limit the data displayed). You may edit and delete filters from this screen.
Map It: This is a PROTOTYPE area that is still undergoing testing. It will provide the ability to map all of your sightings using Adobe Acrobat 5.0.
Field Trip - A date/time and location where one or more butterflies were
seen. This can range from a 3 day journey, to walking around in the back yard.
We needed some what of tracking the when and where of a butterfly sighting and
the name "Field Trip" is used. You must create a "Field
Trip" in order to enter a butterfly sighting.
Filter - A filter is just a method used to reduce the amount of data
presented at a single time. Depending on what part of the system, different
items are used to filter the data. A simple example would be a "NY"
filter used when entering the sightings for a field trip in New York. This will
limit the list of species presented to the user to species regularly found in
New York State. Other filters include a range of dates (for use with the
Sightings List above), as well as a particular name (such as "White"
to only display species with the word White in their names). Any time you see a
button marked "Apply Blank Filter", this will remove any filter on
the data you are seeing and display everything to you.
By default the species list you see when entering a Field Trip are filtered by
the state that the trip occurred in.
Life List - A list of all species (the NABA list), with a place to mark
which you have seen. This lets you simply identify if you have ever seen a
particular type of butterfly (it does not track any details).
Locations - Simply a place where you have seen a
butterly. There are about 1.7 million "Official" locations in the
system currently. If you cannot find a location you may also add your own
"User" location. "User Entered" locations will only be
available to the user who has entered it, until it becomes an
"Offical" location. The list of "User Entered" locations is
reviewed on a regular basis and many locations will become official ones.
Sighting(s) - The sighting of a particular species of butterfly (1 or
more) at a particular time and place. In the system a "Sighting" just
stores the species and number of butterflies seen. Each "Sighting" is
linked to a "Field Trip" which provides the date/time and location of
the sighting.
Sightings List - This is a list of all of the sightings you have entered
into the system (regardless of the field trip they occurred on).
A large note of thanks to Scott Diemer and Jim Springer for providing the basis of this document, as well as all of their help with the site.
We would also like to thank the generous support of the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation for their grants in support of the site.
Main North American Butterfly Association (NABA) Website:
www.naba.org
Mailing Address
NABA
4 Delaware Road
Morristown, NJ 07960
Email:
nabaadmin@redshift-tech.com