[orebird] Re: Craig Miller will be the new Lake County reviewer
- From: David Irons <llsdirons@xxxxxxx>
- To: "orebird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <orebird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 1 Mar 2015 21:42:30 +0000
Greetings all,
I know Tim Blount only via a few emails exchanges. I've never met him in
person, or birded in his company. Perhaps someone in this group knows him well
enough to approach him about this "opportunity." Even if we could enlist him
for peak season support, Shawneen and I could probably handle the rest of the
load for the off season. Right now, managing the Harney County review queue is
a piece of cake, but come mid-May it goes nuts. I think it would be valuable to
have someone in the fold who can perhaps verify some of the local rarities
first-hand.
Often just the opportunity to talk face to face with folks who think they have
seen something unusual is enlightening. We had this experience recently in NE
Oregon. Had we not been there to see for ourselves and talk to folks who
thought they had seen a large flock of Snow Buntings and the Cape May Warbler
after it had disappeared, we might have been inclined to validate their
reports, which ultimately were in error. Tim is in contact with the "players"
during the Malheur vagrant seasons, making him a potentially valuable resource
as a local (even if only seasonal) reviewer.
Dave Irons
Date: Sun, 1 Mar 2015 13:08:26 -0800
Subject: [orebird] Re: Craig Miller will be the new Lake County reviewer
From: matthewghunter@xxxxxxxxx
To: orebird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Alan has been a very good friend of mine for 35 years. Dave is right. I could
fill pages with praise and descriptions of Alan's talents and accomplishments
(many of which are not known to Oregon birders), but I don't think this "job"
would interest him in the least. Keep looking....
Matt
On Sat, Feb 28, 2015 at 9:54 PM, David Irons <llsdirons@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Greetings All,
On the surface Alan may seem like a logical choice. In practice I suspect he
wouldn't be a very good reviewer for the following reasons.
1. He is not a user of eBird per se. He has at times paid his young birding
friends to enter checklists going back several years, but he has rarely input
his own checklists and it is not a normal part of his birding regimen to do so.
2. For years he has told anyone who will listen that he is no longer interested
in being the "East Coast Distributor of Involved" (see "Field of Dreams"). He
wants to be left alone and to not be bothered by forced interactions with other
birders. His participation in ancillary birding activities is fairly limited
these days and I'm sure he would readily dump all of the few responsibilities
that he currently has.
3. Think about his responses to ID questions etc. on OBOL. They are generally
exceedingly short, glib, and rarely include nuggets of information that educate
the masses. In his mind he has served his term and he doesn't owe the Oregon
birding community any more of his time. If he were to somehow be talked into
taking on this responsibility, he would likely take a rather casual approach to
contacting and interacting with users whose reports had been flagged. This duty
takes a commitment to rolling up your sleeves and getting into exchanges with
users and hopefully teaching them to be better eBirders as you go. Alan, whom I
consider a good friend, is not that guy.
Dave Irons
From: withgott@xxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [orebird] Re: Craig Miller will be the new Lake County reviewer
Date: Sat, 28 Feb 2015 21:35:25 -0800
To: orebird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Maybe Alan Contreras for Harney & Malheur?
On Feb 28, 2015, at 9:21 PM, David Irons wrote:
Greetings All,
Craig Miller has agreed to take on the responsibility of being the local
reviewer for Lake County as soon as we can get him set up with admin access.
Also, does he then need to subscribe to this list to start receiving our
various communications. I can't remember how this is set up.
Craig begged off on the idea of taking on all three southeastern Oregon
counties, thus we still need to find reviewers for Malheur and Harney counties.
I can certainly handle Malheur on an interim basis, but it would probably be
best to have someone more familiar with the county than me doing this job.
Harney is not too bad most of the year, but once May hits it gets crazy. I
still think that Tim Blount would be a good option, but I'm not sure how active
he is as eBird user. It appears not very.
Dave Irons
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