How to get into birding with $0 budget
While birdwatching, also known as birding, can be a hobby that can get pretty expensive (equipment and traveling), you need nothing to start with. Some of my favorite things for it are actually free!
eBird
eBird is a website and mobile app that many people use to track what birds they've seen. You can even share lists to other birders you were with on a trip! The data, if you allow it, helps with science, which is really neat. They also have identification quizzes to help you learn your birds! Using photos and audio that people submit, it will present you with different birds (photo, audio, or both) with some options of what it is
Merlin
Merlin is an app made by the same people as eBird! What it does is help you identify birds. It can do this 3 ways. It can guide you through a step-by-step ID where you put in info about the bird and it helps you narrow it down, photo ID where you take a photo and it can tell you from there, and my personal favorite, audio ID! It records audio and tells you what birds there are just from that! With all of them, they aren't 100% accurate, but it sure helped me learn my birds! But the best part has to be that it links with eBird to add to your lists of what birds you've seen, but you don't need to link them, the app works fine on its own
Audubon Bird Guide
Yay, another free app! However I'm pretty sure this one only works in the United States, but there are likely others for other places. Like eBird, you can track what birds you've seen, but I use it because I prefer the step-by-step ID to Merlin's. That's it really
American Birding Podcast
Hosted by the American Birding Association (ABA) is the American Birding Podcast, basically just a podcast where they talk about birding. It can be a bit confusing to beginners though. Also, I haven't been able to find newer episodes on YouTube, but it should all be available wherever you listen to podcasts
Articles and Documentaries
This is a lot more vague, but there are a lot of nice free articles and documentaries out there! Audubon has some nice articles, including not just birds, but also controversies within the community like the racist background behind the most known figure in birding
Now all you need to do is just go outside! You don't even need binoculars, just your eyes and/or ears (there are blind birders who just use audio to ID birds). Even in urban environments, you can find some really neat birds! And if you want to get into photography, most phones have good cameras now
