Cloudy With a Chance of

-----Birds!-----

Understanding the Numbers

For each state, we collected three data frames: average temperature, average precipitation, and PDSI. Each dataframe has three columns: date, value, and anomaly (difference from the mean).

Date: Year between 1981-2010 when data was recorded

Value: Value of main statistic in each respective dataframe:

-Average Temperature = Average temperature recorded in the state per year (Fahrenheit)

-Average Precipitation = Average amount of precipitation in the state per year (inches)

-PDSI = Palmer Drought Severity Index, an index that estimates relative dryness (ranges from -10 to 10)

Song Sparrow Population: Collected from the North American Breeding Bird Survey, we have a data frame indexed by state, route, and year, with species of birds as columns. We decided to only focus on the Song Sparrow species. The values are in the form of average sightings per route per year.

All data is collected by citizen scientists on an individual basis managed by two organizations: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and United States Geological Survey.