Tuesday 10 August 2010

Farcical Birding

No news from me today but I just wanted to pass comment on how the local birding scene in my corner of the world has been reduced to a farce. Since the local bird club has instigated an annual competition called a 'Year List Challenge' you have to be very careful what information you put out as you might cause a local 'mass' twitch over a common migrant. Desperation has now set in over migrant records for Ring Ouzel and Pied Flycatcher, to name but a few. This has certainly made me think twice now about putting any records of scarce or even common birds out! This is a shame and an utter disgrace.

There are certain sites that I bird and ring at that I now feel that I won't be able to put any records out for a fear of the 'mass' descending on these sites. Permission at some of these sites has been hard won and it has taken time to gain the trust of the land owners, so there is no way that I would jeopardise this for the sake of providing a 'tick' for some idiot desperate to gain a place in the 'Yearlist Challenge'! When you try and reason with these people and point out what a farce it has become you receive the reply that "it's only a bit of fun".

There also seems to be a 'flock' mentality that has developed in birding where everyone has to go and see a certain species if it shows well. According to the local websites there is a juvenile Cuckoo locally that it showing well and is showing great site fidelity at present before it decides it is time to up-sticks and head south. Every bugger and his dog has been to see this bird and of course now everyone has to photograph it. I can't believe that a Cuckoo could generate so much interest. I know they have declined rapidly in recent years, but come on...!

I bumped into a mate of mine recently who told me that he had returned his pager because he was fed up with receiving insane updates such as the presence of a Green Woodpecker in a cemetery. Why on earth would you need or want to receive regular updates as to whether a Green Woodpecker was showing! As I said before the local birding scene is descending in to a farce.

Anyway rant over. If I find or ring anything good in the future you'll hear about it here first!

I haven't used any of my mate Nigel's pictures for a while, so I have included a couple below, for no reason really and to be honest I don't need a reason.

Indigo Bunting

White-throated Sparrow

6 comments:

Lancashire and Lakeland Outback Adventure Wildlife Safaris said...

Hi Seumus, neither this bugger nor his dog has been to see the cuckoo - yet! Twitch a cuckoo - how very dare they - just hope when it decides to go south it lands on the seawall down here - bet it doesn't though

Cheers

Dave

Ghost of Stringer said...

Well said Seamus , a bit of that goes on over here too, it’s pathetic !!

People need to get a life, stop relying on stupid pager messages, get off their lazy arses and find their own birds.....

I am seriously considering holding back news of common migrants on the patch from now on...... way too many pager driven clowns about....

The Hairy Birder said...

'Pager driven clown'; I like that Gary. I quite agree, for some reason they are not capable of getting off their arses and finding their own birds.

Cheers,

Seumus

Craig Round said...

Hi Seumus,
I quite agree about the 'flock mentality' thing! On my patch it's Ring Ouzel! I've been working and most days flogging it seems, my patch for over 15 years and whilst i've never supressed anything i've found, it sometimes makes you think twice when you see some of the ungrateful and frankly clueless types that will come and twitch what you've found without a word of thanks to you as finder or any appreciation of what working a patch day in day out entails. By the way what happened to fieldcraft!

Cheers
Craig (lutley birder)

Unknown said...

As well as PDC's, we've got BDC's (Blog driven)! One bloke even keeps a monthly list, for heavens sake.
Well said; we're keeping shtoom about our catches and fly-pasts - don't want them trampling all over!

Always enjoy your blog, Seamus.

The Hairy Birder said...

Thanks for your comments everyone. I'm glad that there are some like minded folks out there that think the same as me.

Cheers,

Seumus