Bird Banding Laboratory: What we do

By Bird Banding Laboratory

The Bird Banding Laboratory (BBL) is an integrated scientific program established in 1920 supporting the collection, archiving, management and dissemination of information from banded and marked birds in North America. This information is used to monitor the status and trends of resident and migratory bird populations.

Because birds are good indicators of the health of the environment, the status and trends of bird populations are critical for identifying and understanding many ecological issues and for developing effective science, management and conservation practices.

The BBL, since 1923 and in collaboration with the Bird Banding Office (BBO) of the Canadian Wildlife Service, administer the North American Bird Banding Program (NABBP), which manages more than 77 million archived banding records and more than 5 million records of encounters. In addition, each year approximately 1 million bands are shipped from the BBL to banders in the United States and Canada, and nearly 100,000 band encounter reports are submitted into the BBL systems.

Learn more about the BBL:

Why do we band birds?
Bird Banding at Patuxent Wildlife Research Center
Bird Banding Laboratory: Recent Accomplishments
The U.S. Geological Survey Bird Banding Laboratory: An Integrated Scientific Program Supporting Research and Conservation of North American Birds By Gregory J. Smith (2013)
The U.S. Geological Survey Report of the Federal Advisory Committee on the Bird Banding Laboratory By Susan D. Haseltine et al. (2008)
The North American Bird Banding Program: Into the 21st Century Executive Summary By P.A. Buckley et al. (1995)
A History of the Bird Banding Laboratory: 1920-2002
Historical Banding Notes since 1922 (Memos to All Banders)