Bird Target Finder

Use this tool to build a list of target birds ranked by rarity and noteworthiness for your next birding trip. We make it easy to input a town or lodge you're traveling to and get all the neat birds you've never seen within a search radius. Happy birding!

How birds are ranked

Every bird gets a priority score that combines two factors: its global conservation status from the IUCN Red List and whether eBird has flagged it as a notably rare sighting in your search area within the last 7 days.

Status	Meaning	Base score
CR	Critically Endangered	1,000
EN	Endangered	700
VU	Vulnerable	400
NT	Near Threatened	200
LC	Least Concern	80
DD	Data Deficient	120
⭐ Recently Notable	eBird flagged as rare in this area this week	+50 bonus

Status

Meaning

Base score

Critically Endangered

1,000

Endangered

700

Vulnerable

400

Near Threatened

200

Least Concern

Data Deficient

120

⭐ Recently Notable

eBird flagged as rare in this area this week

+50 bonus

Birds are sorted by Spark Factor (highest first). Because the coolness and notable bonuses are capped well below the smallest IUCN gap, this automatically puts all CR birds above all EN birds, EN above VU, and so on — while within each conservation tier, cooler families and recently-notable sightings float to the top. The family coolness tiers are:

Tier 5 — Legendary: Owls, Falcons, Hawks/Eagles, Hummingbirds, Kingfishers, Trogons

Tier 4 — Very cool: Woodpeckers, Loons, Cranes, Puffins/Auks, Nightjars, Vultures, Cuckoos/Roadrunners, Frigatebirds, Albatrosses, Ibises, Osprey, Rails, Shrikes

Tier 3 — Solid: Herons/Egrets, Pelicans, Grouse/Quail, Shorebirds, Swifts, Tanagers, Blackbirds/Orioles, Seabirds, Corvids/Crows/Jays

Tier 2 — Fine: Ducks/Geese, Warblers, Swallows, Thrushes, Wrens, Flycatchers, Grebes, Cormorants, Gulls/Terns

Tier 1 — Common: Sparrows, Finches, Pigeons, Starlings, Kinglets, Bushtits, Waxwings

Why is a Short-eared Owl below a Virginia Rail? If the rail has a recent notable sighting it scores 80 + 48 (tier 4 rails) + 50 (notable) = 178, while a non-notable Short-eared Owl scores 80 + 65 (tier 5 owls) = 145. The rail edges it out because the notable bonus outweighs the coolness gap. A Near Threatened Pygmy-Owl will always appear above both, because its NT base of 200 puts it out of reach of any LC bonus.

Spark Factor is the score shown on every card. It starts with the IUCN base score (CR=1,000 · EN=700 · VU=400 · NT=200 · LC=80), then adds two sub-tier bonuses that differentiate birds within the same conservation category: up to +65 for family coolness (tier 5 owl = +65, tier 4 = +48, tier 3 = +32, tier 2 = +16, tier 1 sparrow = +0) and +50 if recently notable on eBird. These bonuses are deliberately capped so that no lower IUCN tier can ever outscore a higher one — the max possible bonus is 65 + 50 = 115, which is just under the smallest IUCN gap of 120 (NT to LC). So the highest possible EN (815) is always below the lowest CR (1,000). The badge colour follows an Olympic medal scheme — gold for CR territory (900+), fading through silver for VU/EN, down to bronze for LC birds.

The ranking is a starting point. Use the drag handle on each card to reorder by your own priorities, and remove birds you're not interested in chasing.