Two interconnected products, bird and nest, form a sleek, easy-to-use, and functional tool for managing an institution’s electronic resources and communicating their value to stakeholders.
During my nearly two decades as an academic librarian, I have often found myself operating under budgetary constraints—whether a stagnant budget that does not allow for modest inflation cost increases or outright budget cuts. In an attempt to justify my library’s resource expenditures, I’ve tried to compare my library’s holdings and collections with those of peer or aspirant institutions, taking me down a rabbit hole of A-to-Z lists, EzProxy login pages, SSO prompts, and so on. We’re always being asked to do more with less—lower budgets, reduced staff, an increase in “other duties as assigned” to make up for staffing shortages. A deep dive on electronic resources tends to fall to the bottom of a to-do list.
Enter bird and nest from Paratext and Compendium Library Services. These two interconnected resources offer a top-down view of your institution’s electronic resources (bird) and a powerful comparison tool for evaluating your holdings against those of other institutions (nest), using data points such as IPEDS (Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System), full-time equivalent (FTE), and consortial membership.
Content specialists at bird continually update the database, which lists over 8,900 resources held at academic libraries across North America—even for institutions that are not bird subscribers. After experimenting with various automatic harvesting methods that proved ineffective, Paratext has adopted a process in which research librarians manually compile and maintain library holdings records by scouring A-to-Z listings, discovery layers or catalogs, or library webpages. Subscribers can also add or remove resources or request new or custom resources not yet listed, provided they meet the requirements of Paratext’s content policy. These selection criteria are straightforward: a resource must come from a reputable publisher/think tank/government agency, must be accessible via the Internet, have indexing and/or other search aids for users, and so on.
Bird has a sleek, intuitive search interface. Below the search box are links to browse Departments, Format Types, and Publishers (Figure 1).
The product’s greatest strength is, arguably, the ability it offers users to compare and contrast the holdings of a wide range of university libraries.
For example, a librarian who wants to identify resources to support a new or growing academic program might start with the “Browse by Academic Department” feature, which lists academic disciplines from accounting to zoology, along with the number of pertinent resources available for each (Figure 2).
Selecting one department—for instance, “Photonic Science and Engineering”—filters down to the relevant resources. Icons indicate whether a resource is fee-based or open access, and a green checkmark denotes that your institution currently subscribes (Figure 3).
In addition to a basic description from the publishers, some entries include additional details about the resource provided by bird’s editors. For example, the entry for “Electronics & Communications Abstracts (CSA)” includes an explanation of how ProQuest’s acquisition of CSA in 2007 led to the integration of certain content into other ProQuest products, with internal bird ID links to those resources. If the resource has previously been known by any other names, those are listed (Figure 4).
Several output options are available, depending on the resource. Visual learners will appreciate the pie chart display. The hamburger menu offers downloads in graphical or spreadsheet formats—ideal for sharing with colleagues and administrators when evaluating resources (Figure 5).
One known browser issue: when I searched for another library, the autofill search box did not populate, causing a client-side error. But manually selecting the library worked, and Paratext engineers are aware of the issue and working on a fix.
From the bird homepage, users can navigate to nest, which opens into a similarly clean, sleek interface. Nest is where this suite truly shines.
Instead of a search box, users select from six options to begin their analysis: Consortia Members, Our Nest, IPEDS Peers, Similar FTE, Similar Carnegie Classification, and Compare Institutions.
For example, clicking on “Similar FTE” opens a page with charts that compare a breakdown of the user’s institution’s holdings to those of the comparison group by department, format, and access type (fee-based, open access, or both) (Figure 6). Again, users can download these charts in multiple formats. A list of group members is also included for use in comparisons elsewhere in nest.
The Consortia Members view includes two consortia in which my home institution, Coastal Carolina University Libraries, is a member: Lyrasis and the Carolina Consortium. Lyrasis includes members nationwide, which made for a broad (but less helpful) dataset. Only 12 members appeared in the dataset for the Carolina Consortium, a group of mostly academic libraries in North and South Carolina—well below the 186 member libraries it had as of June 2025. Several Carolina Consortium libraries that don’t appear in the dataset are available for comparison, so this likely reflects a matching issue. Curiously, the South Carolina Academic Library Consortium (PASCAL) was not initially available, but Paratext added it upon my request.
Another very helpful nest feature is Our Nest, which allows users to build custom groups of libraries for comparison. Smaller custom lists are often more useful than large consortia groups, especially for my medium-sized academic institution.
Creating a custom group is simple: name the group, choose an acronym and description, then add members (Figure 7). Currently, due to the autofill bug mentioned above, individual libraries must be selected one at a time from a list using browser-based searching (Ctrl/Command+F). But when the autofill bug is resolved, users will be able to use the regular search function.
Paratext has not made a VPAT available for bird or nest; however, the accessibility compliance section of its website affirms a commitment to adhering to WCAG and Section 508 standards. Both platforms offer low contrast mode via a toggle button in the top navigation bar.
Bird/nest has an interesting pricing and licensing model. Both products are available, bundled, as a one-time purchase, with prices ranging from $10,000–20,000, based on FTE and/or Carnegie Classification status. After the first year, a library can choose to only retain access to the bird inventory (which will receive updates) or to subscribe to the entire nest analytics suite. An annual software/content license runs between $1,250–$3,999 per year, depending on whether the library elects to retain nest. Consortial discounts are available but require a minimum number of subscribers. Each institution can designate up to seven managers who can edit or add resources. There is no concurrent user limit, though the product is not intended for public-facing use by students or faculty.
Bird/nest offers IP, OpenAthens, and EzProxy authentication for users.
Green Glass from OCLC, a print resource comparison tool, is in some ways similar to bird/nest. Gold Rush, from the Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries, is a competitive electronic resources management tool that serves both individual institutions and consortia.
Bird/nest is sleek, easy-to-use, and functional.
As higher education moves through turbulent times, many libraries will need to add resources to support new academic programs or cut redundant resources to address budget shortfalls, and data-driven decision-making and clear communication with campus leadership are more critical than ever. Bird/nest’s ability to generate visually compelling, easily shareable infographics that clearly demonstrate resource value, alignment with academic programs, and comparative benchmarks make it a particularly useful tool.
Like many new resources, bird/nest has some minor technical issues to work out; but Paratext has been responsive and actively engaged in addressing feedback during testing.
Bird/nest could be useful for collection development librarians and staff at a variety of academic libraries, from small private liberal arts colleges to R1 research libraries. I particularly recommend it to medium-to-large academic libraries and regional consortia seeking to strengthen their strategic collection development practices, benchmark their holdings against peer institutions, and communicate resource value to internal and external stakeholders. For libraries supporting emerging academic programs or undergoing resource realignment, bird/nest offers a powerful means to inform evidence-based decisions. While smaller academic libraries may also find significant value in the platform—particularly those navigating accreditation, program expansion, or consortial partnerships—tight budgets may make it challenging to justify investment in an analytics-focused tool over resources with more immediate, visible impact on teaching and learning.
International Coalition of Library Consortia. (n.d.). Carolina Consortium. Retrieved July 17, 2025, from https://icolc.net/participating-consortia/carolina-consortium
Paratext. (n.d.-a). Accessibility Compliance. Retrieved July 17, 2025, from https://public.paratext.com/customer/accessibility.php
Paratext. (n.d.-b). Bird by Paratext content policy. Retrieved July 21, 2025, from https://bird.paratext.com/page_content_guidelines
10.1146/katina-092525-1
