Red America Vs. Blue America, Who Has Better Birding?

The year is 2019, the month is any month, and that means it's Politics Season! Yes, that's right, Politics, the thing that we all love to hear and talk about. Take a deep breath, that's politics on the wind. What else is on the wind? Birds of course, which is another thing we all love, except unironically this time. What if birds and politics were... combined? Is there any quicker way to get a bunch of negative comments on my blog? Let's harvest those hate-clicks and talk some politics!

Bald Eagle, also known as "The Politics Bird"

Friends, in our modern era, sometimes it can feel like we live in two different countries, increasingly in our own sectarian bubbles- Red America or Blue America. Sure this is a big problem for us as a culture and has led to increased radicalization and feelings of hopelessness and isolation. But also, it would be fun to pretend those countries were real places, and try to bird in them, right? That's the premise of today's blog, at least. We're going to solve the political debate once and for all by determining which 'side' has the best birding.

METHODOLOGY: I determined which states were Red and Blue by looking at the last 4 elections (conveniently, 2 of which were won by Democrats and 2 by Republicans). If your state voted the same way in all 4 elections it was determined to fall into one of those categories. We want current data, right? So no reason to go back to 1972 or whatever. In terms of the birds, I have to issue a massive thank you once again to the powerful data engine at ebird.org, where most of this information was gleaned from. In order to get combined checklists of specific combinations of states I had the manually 'hack' the URL, because there was no other way to select that many locations at once. I also used the last 16 years of reports for this, to make sure that all the birds being reported were from a state that was the 'right color' at the time the report was made.

Blue America

An unknown politician with a House Finch

Is made up of, in no particular order: Washington, California, Oregon, Hawaii, Minnesota, Illinois, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Washington DC, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine*

*-Maine, and Nebraska below, have proportional electoral college votes, meaning they can 'split' their votes between both sides. In each case, the state in question has offered exactly 1 (one) electoral college vote to the other side in the past 16 years, so I decided to count them in their respective blocks. You could probably strike both of these states if you wanted to and have it not effect the totals, but go for it if you really wanna crunch the numbers.

The Data
Number of States: 17

Total Square Miles to Bird in: 639,050

Bird Species to be Found: 849
Biggest Contributor: California, with 660 bird species

California Quail, State Bird, California

An impressive showing! You can see around 85% of the United State's approximately 1000 birds in the Liberal States of America. Leading the charge, both politically and birdually is the Amateurnithologist's adoptive home state of California! California has the most bird species of any state in the nation, but honestly it makes sense. Birds flock to California because 1) it's enormous, 2) has a long stretch of coast line, 3) it borders Mexico [always good for species diversity], 4) it's got a tremendous array of climates and habitats, and 5) great quality of life. We also pick up some notable endemic species from Hawaii, America's asterisk.

Red America 

Funny, sure, but you'd be flinching too

Is made up of: Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, South Carolina, West Virginia, Tennessee, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska*, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, and Alaska

The Data
Number of States: 22
Square Miles of Birding: 2,281,021
Species of Birds: 888
Heaviest Hitter: Texas, with 640 bird species

Greater Roadrunner, State Bird, Texas

In some ways it's shocking to me that the numbers are so close, but I guess that's to be expected. While Red America dominates in number of states and sheer size, the amount of birds you could potentially tick in each 'country' is really comparable. Still, it's right there in black and white, Red America has more birds. A lot of this has to do with its massive size, but Texas does a lot of the heavy lifting, mostly by (ironic?) virtue of being practically part of Central American. Birds don't know politics, so you'll find plenty of species you'd normally only find in Mexico and south along the border. Alaska also contributes many West Coast, Asian, and Canadian birds that would otherwise be missed.

So there you have it, the case for Red America as the better birding destination

Unless we consider....

Bird Density


So where is it actually better to go birding in? Like, where is the best bang for your buck? Which place is densest with bird species? Well, the numbers below don't lie

Blue State Species/Square Mile .00133
Red State Species/Square Mile .0000417

Because the blue states are so concentrated on the coasts (major flyways), and their states are relatively small, they are much denser with bird species. Sure, if you had unlimited time you might see more birds in Red America, but Blue America is going give you your best odds for a big day.

So one point red, one point blue. Where does that leave us?

Well, not exactly.

Bird Enthusiasm


You see, here at Five-Bird-y-Eight, we've developed an advanced formula to determine bird enthusiasm, which we'll use as our tie-breaker. Our team of bored scientists has taken the number of e-bird lists submitted from these states this year and divided them by the quality of their state birds (using our irrefutable and indispensable State Bird power rankings). The number yielded by this operation makes up the Best Bird Quotient (or BBQ), which is then multiplied by a thousand, to make it a more parsable number.

Red State Bird Enthusiasm: 10.45
Blue State Bird Enthusiasm: 19.45

Texas may have the best in the nation State Bird, but quantity of E-bird lists is what really sealed the deal here, led by extremely enthusiastic California and New York. It turns out that Blue America just cares more about birds, at a nearly 2 to 1 rate, and really, shouldn't that determine the winner?



Ok, ok, ok, one more thing. If you're like me, you're probably wondering how the Independent states fared. Those brave 12 states that go their own way, or, depending on your interpretation, just absolutely cannot figure it out, year after year. Those states have a total of 766 species in them.They boast, if nothing else by far the greatest bird species density per state at an impressive 63.8. Blue comes in at 49.9, Red at 40.36. Wow. I think if there's one thing we learned today, it's that depending on how you look at things, you could make the case that your chosen political bubble is the best one. I'll also point out that the only way you're going to get all the birds in America is by taking it all in, Red, Blue, and all the colors in between. And isn't that a message we could all learn a little something from? Birding-wise, I mean. This is just about birding.

PPS- The Red States are really in trouble if Puerto Rico is granted statehood, since they have 17 endemic species and really high bird diversity (342 species across 3515 square miles). If I were a congressional Democrat, this would be a real priority for me. Again, only for bird reasons.