Life Birds Are Where Your Find Them

Birds Etcetera—Birds, Birding, Birders, and Birdwatching: Life Birds Are Where Your Find Them:

Still, I managed to tally four life birds, a benefit of having spent little time in coastal California. These included two parids—Oak [=Plain] Titmouse (Baeolophus inornatus) and Bushtit (Psaltriparus minimus)—seen in the neighborhood while walking the dog, a pair a California Towhees (Pipilo crissalis) that awaited us on the front porch when we returned from Sunday brunch, and a Brewer’s Blackbird (Euphagus cyanocephalus) foraging for food on the sidewalk at the Oakland International Airport. I guess the moral of this story is, always keep your eyes open and your binoculars handy.

This one caught my eye, because it’s a great reminder (not just in birdwatching) that “common” and “rare” and “new” are all in the eyes of the beholder. Here in the bay area, birds like Bushtit and California Towhees are basically ignored by birders because they’re so common, and even the Titmouse wouldn’t cause a birder to get up off of a bench.

Yet here they are, special to someone else. Wonderful.

Reminds me of one of my favorite birding trips this year… I was during a time when I was trying to figure out just how serious I wanted to be about birding and in what ways (that’s another posting, for one of these days), and feeling a bit down and overwhelmed and still pretty damn sucky at ID (now, months later, I”m finally starting to not only feel comfortable with what I’m doing, but understanding where my limitations are and what NOT to try…. Like freaking third cycle moulting to adult hybrid gulls….)

So I was out at shoreline and heading out to look for things to photograph, when a couple of women who were also arriving to bird said hello. It turns out they were from out of state for a short visit and checking out the area — from Washington, where one was a senior birder.

Since they didn’t know the area, I offered to tour guide, and we wandered about for about 90 minutes, showing them some of the places where I know the birds tend to be. Not only was it a lot of fun spending the time — here I was with an experienced birder helping them figure out the locals and find some of the unusual birds — best was a Sora down in the reeds — but even birds like Snowy Egrets and Cinnamon teals made their day, not to mention spending a chunk of time with the shorebirds and making sure they saw the black skimmers.

And it really kind of put the whole thing into perspective for me, and helped me realize there are ways to contribute even while you’re learning — as well as understanding that you never stop learning, either. but mostly it reminded me more that it’s about enjoying what you do and taking on the challenge of being good at it, not who knows the most birds and how long your list is.

Hell, I still don’t know how long my life list is. It’s something I should really compile, but it just hasn’t been a priority… Early on, I didn’t by design because I wanted to avoid the competitiveness of chasing a life list; today, I’m still not all that interested in chasing rarities for the sake of ticking a checkbox, but I’m curious about what I’ve seen and what I haven’t, and it’s really gone beyond keeping a mental list in my head for the most part. So, one of these days…

(speaking of, this pretty much sums up my view of things…)

Mike’s Birding & Digiscoping Blog: Closing 2007:

I’ll probably never have an annual list of 300 or more and that’s alright. There are Wisconsin birders who meet or exceed this tally every year and I think I might understand what motivates them, but I don’t know if it’s the love of birds, science of ornithology, addiction, compulsion, the chase or some combination thereof. Speaking only for myself, when I did a Wisconsin Big Year in 2004, it was sort of like a crazed obsession. After awhile, whenever a rarity was posted to the Wisconsin Birding Network, I would experience a kind of unease and obligation toward my list. If I didn’t chase the most recently reported rare bird, I would have to make it up somewhere else along the line in order to keep “300″ as a realistic possibility before year end. It created a kind of anxiety toward achieving that goal.

I began to reduce the “chase factor” in 2005 and my birding endeavors are now much more relaxed, focusing on quality experiences rather than quantity. When I didn’t chase the Green-breasted Mango in Beloit and felt no guilt, I knew I was cured! This present birding pace is a comfortable one that keeps the gasoline budget more reasonable and opens up a lot more time for doing other things I’ve lapsed with; things like bicycling and reading. Birding locally and recording observations into eBird is how I plan to continue with this rewarding hobby.

I never did go after the Booby that’s been living on the salt ponds this fall, or the Indigo Buntings in the hills this spring. To be honest, I’m more curious about understanding the birds and their environments and how these change over the year — and the excuse it gives me to get outside, away from computers and even (horrors) a bit of exercise. That’s going to be a much bigger aspect of things in the new year, knees willing…

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