Name: eBird MCP Server
Author: birdingkit

LABSCO SUMMARY

Turns a rigid regional API into a question you can just ask.

eBird's own endpoints want region codes and species codes; here you name the place and the bird. The documented examples lean on Taiwanese locations, but nothing in the setup is region-specific — the key and the API cover everywhere eBird does.

What it is

A bridge to the eBird API, the citizen-science database of bird observations. You ask where a species has been seen lately or what has turned up in a region, and the server turns that into the right eBird query.

What you get

Recent observations for a place, recent records of one species in a place, and notable or rare sightings for a region
Checklists: the top contributors in an area on a date, every checklist submitted somewhere on a given day, the most recent submissions, summary statistics, and the detail of one checklist by its ID
Hotspots for a region, and birding hotspots within a radius of a point
Taxonomy lookups for a species, including its subspecies

Requirements

An eBird API key, requested from ebird.org after creating an account, passed as EBIRD_API_KEY. Python, then clone the repository, install from requirements.txt and point the client at server.py with an absolute path to your Python executable. Published on PyPI as ebird-mcp-server, version 0.1.0.

Setup effort

Build from source — git clone https://github.com/birdingkit/ebird-mcp-server.git

See installation options

USE CASES

01

Deciding where to go birding this weekend

Ask what has been reported nearby in the last few days and which hotspots are within driving distance.

02

Chasing a specific species

Ask for recent records of one bird in a region rather than scanning a general sightings list.

03

Checking whether something unusual has turned up

Pull the notable sightings for an area — the reports flagged as rare rather than the routine ones.

04

Summarising a day's activity in a county

Ask for all checklists submitted on a date and get the aggregate rather than opening them one by one.

BEFORE YOU INSTALL

What to know first

Requires

EBIRD_API_KEY in your environment

Where it runs

The documented client runs the server on your machine.

INSTALLATION

Connect your client

Server setup

TERMINAL

git clone https://github.com/birdingkit/ebird-mcp-server.git
cd ebird-mcp-server
pip install -r requirements.txt

MCP Clients

Claude Desktop

CLAUDE DESKTOP · JSON

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ebird-api": {
      "command": "<YOUR_PATH_TO_PYTHON>",
      "args": [
        "<YOUR_PATH_TO_EBIRD_MCP_SERVER>/server.py"
      ],
      "env": {
        "EBIRD_API_KEY": "<YOUR_EBIRD_API_KEY>"
      }
    }
  }
}

eBird MCP Server