Date: Mon, 12 Feb 2001 23:47:04 EST Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Steve Huy Subject: Re: What "counts" on your life list? MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Set your standards and you decide what counts. What are your goals? To see as many birds as possible? To see only birds in the wild in natural activity? To count only birds you located and saw first, not pointed out or through the guidance of lists like this? Will birds attracted by baiting (feeders, tapes, pishing) be acceptable to you? Perhaps you want to list the last of a species before it goes extinct, even if its in a zoo. Birders keep many lists. What matters is what YOU want to include. I hope others will take this opinion and not impose upon you random rules and regulations to keep up with their standards. The only time the rules of another person/group would apply is if you expect them to consider your list valid. If you want a life list by ABA standards then you have to do it their way. If you're doing a Christmas count or county count, then do it their way. The important thing is to have fun. Enjoy what you're doing, feel confident that you've been 100% ethical in the list of birds that you've mashed with the grill of your car (which means you don't count those that were hit by other cars). That your list of bird sounds heard on daytime television in scenes which were not the proper habitat is only of birds you are absolutely certain you could identify by sound and not some that you weren't sure of but included to pad your list. I met a guy once that must keep a hundred lists. I'll just call him Jim S. so as not to embarrass anyone. It seems Jim has seen every bird to be expected in Maryland a minimum of six times each plus thirty-two exotics. A list by ABA standards is just boring to him. To liven things up he makes up various lists to provide him a challenge. He keeps a list of birds that have flown through smoke rings he blows from his cigarettes. I saw him once start a list of birds that a guy we'll call John C. missed for his list even though he really needed it to complete his county list, but Jim just didn't feel like letting this other person catch up to him. Then there was the list of northbound species when they should have been migrating south. Its all up to you and your creativity and level of insanity. I have even heard of prison birding clubs that list birds they see on TV. I started a list of birds that Jim misidentified (I must admit it isn't getting very large). Have fun! Steve Huy Project Owlnet Middletown, MD ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================