Joel and all —
I’m unaware of what specifically may have precipitated your initial posting,
Joel, but I, for one, have always valued your perspective and your
contributions on OBOL, so I certainly hope you’ll remain in our online
community! I also, like you, very much wish that more birders would devote
greater time and effort to help conserve the birds we all enjoy — this is
sorely needed. However, I think the wording of your message sets up a false
dichotomy by equating the word “birder” — a broad term rich and deep with
meaning(s) — with narrower conceptions like “lister” or “chaser”. Although
many of us enjoy chasing rarities and/or building lists, this is hardly the
only, or even primary, motivation for most birders I know. I think all of us —
including the most hardcore chasers — are motivated by some or all of the
following:
* getting outdoors to enjoy natural surroundings
* exploring new areas
* recreating with friends who enjoy the same pastime
* learning about bird behavior, distribution, and abundance
* building field skills and the ability to predict bird occurrence based on
knowledge of habitat and seasonality
* leading field trips and teaching others about birds and nature
* writing, illustrating, speaking, or otherwise communicating the wonders of
birds and nature to others
* researching and publishing on aspects of field ornithology that advance our
scientific understanding of birds
* enjoying the simple (or not-so-simple) act of observing birds
Every individual has his or her own skills, interests, priorities, and
constraints, so each of us will pursue different mixes of these approaches.
There many ways to be a “birder," and I think we’re all best served if we
retain a big-tent meaning for this term. There is nothing black-and-white
about how one pursues interests in birds. One can be a lister AND a
conservationist; a chaser AND a restorationist; a teacher AND a student; etc.,
etc. I predict that anyone attending the upcoming OBA meeting will witness a
full and rich mix of diverse approaches to birding within and among the
attendees.
Joel, I know you know all this already, but I feel it worthwhile to put in
writing for the sake of the many people on this listserv who may be newer to
the community. This is because I think it’s important to recognize that the
nature of communication on listservs such as OBOL tends to heighten the
perception of rarity-chasing as a component of birding. The rules, norms, and
expectations for posting messages on a listserv like OBOL tend to constrict and
weed out the majority of what each of us might think, feel, experience, and
wish to discuss with others from a day out birding. Instead they urge us to be
concise in our communication and to focus our reports on the surprising
occurrences, which are going to include the rare species and out-of-place
vagrants. This is necessary, or we would all be swimming in so much unsolicited
information that no one would read any of it. But it does end up having the
cumulative effect of portraying our collective birding efforts as being far
more focused on rarity-chasing than they truly are.
For instance, this past week on a free day I could have driven to the coast to
chase a Hudsonian Godwit that would have been bird #400 for my Oregon lifelist
and would have required an OBOL posting had I found it. Instead I chose to stay
closer to home and poke around the wilder stretches of Sauvie Island hoping to
find some September shorebirds myself. It was a poor migration day and I found
nothing notable — and so posted nothing on OBOL — yet I enjoyed plenty of
natural wonders that day that broadened my appreciation of nature in our region
just a bit more, and I also enjoyed running into a couple of birding friends in
the field and catching up and learning from them.
As for doing more for conservation, I’m with you 100%. But those birders who
choose to advance conservation efforts will naturally do so in different ways,
according to their own strengths, interests, abilities, and opportunities.
Engaging directly in habitat restoration is one excellent way, but there are
many others, ranging from education and introducing others to the wonders of
birds (see above) to lobbying and political advocacy to contributing money
and/or volunteer time to well-established conservation organizations. For
anyone wanting to know an easy way to help serve bird conservation efforts in
our region, I can tell you as a 7-year board member of Portland Audubon that I
continue to be impressed by this organization’s extraordinarily effective
efforts and programs. I also contribute to international organizations such as
the American Bird Conservancy and the Rainforest Trust.
OBOL was never intended to be an outlet for discussing bird conservation issues
in Oregon. BOO is currently such an outlet. It might be worth discussing why
BOO has not yet produced the traffic typical of OBOL. One possible reason —
informed by my observations of our hard-working Portland Audubon staff — may be
that many of the folks doing on-the-ground conservation work are simply too
busy to spend time on listservs! At any rate, I’m happy to help brainstorm
about better ways we can foster more communication regarding conservation
issues with birds in Oregon.
Jay Withgott
Portland
Msg: #8 in digest
Subject: [obol] Re: Not a birder anymore
From: Joel Geier <joel.geier@xxxxxxxx <mailto:joel.geier@xxxxxxxx>>
Date: Sun, 23 Sep 2018 10:54:58 -0700
Thanks Mark but no, it's not even a hobby for me at this stage.
To me a hobby implies something that you're putting time into for its
own sake. "Avid" birders are hobbyists who happen to be highly focused
on their hobby.
To clarify, I still plan to volunteer on BBS routes as a long-term
project that seems worthwhile for monitoring birds and their
conservation status. I'll keep doing CBCs for the same reason, plus I
like visiting those places and seeing the people who show up as
volunteers, year after year.
But as the years go by, I've found it harder and harder to identify with
hobbyists who can always find time to dash out to the local sewage ponds
if someone sees a bird that they "need" for their county year list, but
never seem to have time to help on habitat restoration. Or folks who can
point their scopes at birds right outside a prison fence without doing
anything to help those inside.
People are of course entitled to pursue their favorite hobby, whether
it's collecting stamps, building model railroads in your basement, or
traveling hundreds of miles to add one more species to your life list.
To each their own. This is a birding list and obviously there are a lot
of people here who are avid about birding, in varying degrees. I just
wish there was something similar for people who are avid about bird
conservation.
On Sun, 2018-09-23 at 06:06 -0700, Braz wrote:
I would proffer that you are now a hobby birder, no longer an avid
birder.
But I've been wrong before.
Mark Brazelton
Hobby Birder
Medford, Oregon
On Sat, Sep 22, 2018 at 10:00 PM Joel Geier <joel.geier@xxxxxxxx
<mailto:joel.geier@xxxxxxxx>>
wrote:
Friends,
It's been a good ride for the past twenty years or so. I thank
you for
the many things that I've learned along the way.
But I've reached the point where I no longer really care if
someone
finds a Louisiana Waterthrush or whatever in Benton County.
It's not
really meaningful even if it's real. It's just another stray
bird that
doesn't represent real conservation issues.
So no, I'm not a birder anymore. Please forgive me for that.
If you want to talk about bird conservation, I'm still here,
and I'm
listening.
