The discussion about birding today brings up an issue that surfaces from
time to time, to wit, what is a birder?
I know people who can barely tell the difference between a blue jay and a
blue bird but really enjoy watching them. Others can tell you the color of
terciaries on a second year Iceland gull in winter and can successfully identify
every bird in North America.
There are people who travel to the ends of the earth to see different birds
and others who would not drive to the other side of Washington.
I have known people who have never had a list, yet love birds, and others
who are obsessive-compulsive about every kind of list, from year to yard, from
county to country, and presumably whether they have seen males, females and
juveniles of every species. For them, "closing out" a species in Maryland is
a feeling of accomplishment.
There are highly educated people who make their living from birds
(ornithologists), studying some very, very narrow aspects of one species of birds.
There are many others who never have, and never will, make a dime off of birds.
And don't care.
There are those who love going birding in groups for the social aspects and
others who are loners.
Some people have virtually no other interests, go birding every day, read
practically nothing but birding literature. And others who have far broader
interests and bird when time becomes available.
There are some folks who want to take the best possible photograph of a
bird, others who are content to have a blurry image that can identify the bird,
and still others who would not carry a camera into the field under any
circumstances.
Some birders are into the organizational aspects of birding and aspire to be
an officer in the ABA; others wouldn't join a birding organization on a bet.
I ran into some top listers from California years ago chasing a Fieldfare in
New Brunswick. Once they had seen it, ticked it off, they were ready to
drive back to the airport. I wanted to watch it, study it, photograph the bird.
Some people become so interested in one family for birds - gulls, sparrows,
hummingbirds, for example - that they concentrate most of their time on these
birds and become experts. Other folks want to see them all.
There are some people who want to identify subspecies to "bank it" for a
possible future split. Others just want to understand the distribution. Still
others are interested in the identification challenge. And some just don't
care about subspecies at all.
There are folks who are far more interested in the conservation aspects of
birds and making sure that habitat is protected. Others don't care much about
this and don't want to be involved in such activities.
There are folks who love birds and birding who can still laugh at themselves
and their colleagues and others who take birding so serioiusly that they
cannot even crack a smile about any of the compulsive behavior.
And of course, there is every combination and permutation of the above that
anyone can imagine. In short, there are as many kinds of birders as there
are of people. All of the above folks are birders, all are legitimate birders.
They are just different species.
Bob Mumford
Darnestown |