The quote goes something this: by misidentifying a bird, you join Audubon,
Wilson and Sibley, all who have misidentified birds. Or it goes something like
this: the longer you've been a birder, the more birds you've misidentified.
I've blown plenty of ID's and continue to do so! Guess I'm in good company. :)
Scott Somershoe
Littleton CO
Sent from my iPhone
On Jan 18, 2017, at 7:27 PM, Randy Winstead <randywendy@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Thanks. This is encouraging. I have had biologist roots for ages past, but
have only been a semi-serious birder since January of 2016. I have tried to
be very conservative with my reports, but still opted to go back later and
delete one of my sightings, which I think that I got wrong. About four others
I had second thoughts about for weeks later. I finally decided that I got two
of the four right. (Really fuzzy pictures helped some.) The other two still
haunt me at times, even though they are not overly rare birds.
I used to keep my camera with me 98% of the time. I've now upped that to
about 99.9% of the time. I even take it with me when I go to the refrigerator
to make a sandwich. (Well, maybe that's an exaggeration.) I increased the
percentages after finding 17 white-rumped sandpipers at the Alcoa Duck Pond
in May of last year and me with no camera. Sigh...
I'm looking forward to my next sighting of something really unusual so that
better birders than me can flock to the site and help me identify some of
those obnoxious little brown flitty birds that don't wear name tags. Thanks
for the report. It's encouraging to know that long-time birders can have
second thoughts, too.
Randy Winstead
Maryville, Blount County
From: Jay S. <yourcatoliver@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: Tennessee Birding <tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, January 18, 2017 7:46 PM
Subject: [TN-Bird] Here goes it: 2 bird sighting retractions (Attn Rick
Knight)
Hi all,
As someone who feels strongly about the accuracy of one's personal sightings,
and thus the legitimacy of reports, I am taking this opportunity to formally
retract a couple of my past sightings. I do this for two reasons. One,
because it's the kind of birder I am. And two, I want to be sure these
sightings don't find their way into The Migrant.
First, as an experienced birder, I've seen how easy it can be for someone to
make a bird into something it's not. That's not really the case here. I shook
that behavior off long ago, if ever I had it at all. But what does happen on
rare occasions is truly believing myself 100% accurate at the time of
identification, only to be heavily nagged about it later on. I'm sure a few
of you understand this. And so that percentage of confidence slowly drops to
say, 99%. And 99, in my book, ain't a legit sighting.
So, with that said, I hereby retract the following sightings:
Friday, May 20, 2016: YELLOW-BELLIED FLYCATCHER at Seven Islands State
Birding Park, Knox Co. Of the two Yellow-bellied Flycatchers I reported last
year, this one started to feel off. I can't even remember the reasons why.
Probably had something to do with the lighting. Was it a YB? Probably. Almost
everything seemed right about it.
Tuesday, October 11, 2016: BREWER'S BLACKBIRD at Seven Islands State Birding
Park, Knox Co. For me, everything was right for male Brewer's at the time.
But not having ever seen Rusties in breeding plumage, I had to ask myself,
COULD it have been a male Rusty in lingering breeding plumage? At the time I
didn't think to look closely at the bill and other differentiating characters
between the species. All I knew was that it wasn't a grackle. So, my 100%
confidence dropped to 99% . Happily, on November 28, at another location in
Knox County, I did happen upon a pair of Brewer's, and that ID remains
certain.
There you have it. Judge me as you will! :)
Jay Sturner
Knoxville
Knox Co.
