The Lincolnshire Bird Club

I am interested to find out how many of the LBC Forum members are not twitchers? I frequently see expressions on the Forum such as "stakeouts" and "suppresion" and have had to ask what they meant. Is there anyone else who, like me, wouldn't go 100 yards to see a "mega" rarity but would be quite content to look at all birds in the same light - one of natures marvels!

Hi Stuart.

We are definately NOT twitchers. We get as much pleasure out of seeing common birds as we do more scarce birds. It is nice to see something we havent seen before if a bird or creature presents itself, but not the be all and end all. Any view or observation of any wildlife, not just birds, we feel is a privelege and our enjoyment comes from being out in the fresh air, in wild beautiful places and seeing whatever is around. If a rarity is on our doorstep and we are free we would go and see it, but wouldnt travel miles from home just to add to a list. Nor do we strive to be experts, we are happy just to enjoy natures delights and learn from them.

Mandy & Mick

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I have a few caveats regarding 'twitching'.

1 - The rare bird must be located reasonably near to a regularly-serviced bus/train route.
2 - The rare bird must be no more than 1 bus/train change away.
3 - The rare bird must be on a bus/train journey that costs no more than £25
4 - If a rare bird has been spotted on any of the routes we use to visit relatives, then dad may be prepared to do a feasible, reasonable diversion but ONLY IF we're also on the way to the said relatives.

If Kirtland's Warbler has been sighted on Fair Isle and I'm in Boston, then I wouldn't go all that way just to see it. The only twitches I've been on since starting birdwatching were the Red-flanked Bluetail at Chapel Six Marshes last November. I was gripped off and dipped out on that one, but did get lucky on my other 'twitch'; seeing the Montagu's Harriers at Digby Fen in (correct me if wrong) 2007.

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I have stated before that I have no wish to be termed a twitcher. Sometimes a member of the public has asked me if am one and I've said no, I am a bird/wildlife watcher. Yesterday at Rimac I was lucky enough to see the Redstart a bird I've never seen before and I was very pleased.

As far as I can remember the only rarities I've made a special effort to see were the American Robin at Pyewipe and that was just before the Sprawk collared it and of late the GGS Shrike and pleased I did.

Like Mandy and Mick I'm just happy to be out in the fresh air and seeing whatever comes along.

Let's see if the twitchers give their views as well.

Kind regards

John/Max

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GETTING OLD HAS IT'S ADVANTAGES BUT I CAN'T REMEMBER WHAT THEY ARE lol

I can't speak for full-blooded twitchers but I can speak as a present day neutral who has flirted with their passion in the past. We are all different (as Professor Harrison would say) and different people take different pleasures from different passions without necessarily thereby claiming to occupy any pseudo moral high ground.
Most twitchers are also committed birders but they seem to achieve a narcotic high on connecting with a scarce/rare bird ..... something I myself find hard to fully empathise with but, as I say, we are all different and I respect their birding passion. Some of my best friends over the years have been avid twitchers and to them twitching wasn't just a matter of life and death - it was far more important and even so on a 24/7 basis.
As far as their vocabulary is concerned, as a professional linguist I am fascinated by it and hope to use it appropriately on occasions.
I personally have a very low boredom threshold and thankfully still being vertical and healthy (some might add 'senile' ) as of 14 April 2009, I'll be off from Bracebridge Heath at the drop of a hat, other passions and my long-suffering wife permitting, and be found engaging in one of the following :
visiting
- a good butterfly site
- an interesting Nature Reserve
- a vintage transport museum (there are several in the Midlands)
- a stamp exhibition/sale
- an 'open' house/garden at the weekend (or an RSPB Lincoln Branch trip)
- a good garden centre with scarce and unusual plants for sale
- an antiquarian book display/sale
- a rated pub/restaurant my wife and I haven't been to before or we like to revisit
plus
- keeping the garden looking reasonably attractive
- walking the dog over the BBH/Branston fields
- writing and posting web articles
- attending AGMs and writing 'thank-you' posts afterwards
- spending hours on the Internet, so I'm told
- planning and enjoying family holidays abroad (mainly sightseeing but including "a bit of birding")
- watching more or less NO Television unless it's something as gripping as Angel Cabrera's Master's victory .... yes Stuart, I used to be a fanatical golfer but times have changed
- and finally my real passion: reading and avidly absorbing anything on language use and language learning/teaching.
By listing the above 'passions' in detail one merely hopes to present facts relevant to this thread of free time twitching/birding and other activities and try to account for how one superannuated pensioner who has time on his hands and loves birding spends most of his waking hours doing something else.
Oh! I almost forgot! I also enjoy fitting in an occasional "spur of the moment", and usually therefore solo,trip to see rare and scarce birds ( eg. Red-rumped Swallow, Syston near Leicester Sun 12 April 09 - did that trip spark this thread, I wonder ), as much for the challenge of planning and fulfilling the road journeys and locating the new site (stake-out) and for the atmosphere and buzz that develops there (including renewing old acquaintances) as for connecting with the bird itself. But as for listing, since the end of the 20th Century ...NO; as for a narcotic high...definitely NO. I prefer to achieve that with a good bitter.. and no longer, I'm afraid, with Vodka/Martinis (they are too finicky!).

Regards,

Freddy

Max,
On Monday 13th April you challenged in your post:
"Let's see if the twitchers give their views as well."
Well, it looks as if you may have to wait a long time for committed twitchers to' take the bait ' and reply. Personally, I can't say I blame them for not rushing to put their heads over that particular parapet. The territory there as occupied by some of the posts does seem a tad alien to their activities, don't you think? Anyway, some volunteer might bravely step forward. We shall see. Another point of view would certainly be welcome so as to balance the thread, with the moral high ground not being an issue in any way.

Regards,

Freddy

Freddy,

I had a good idea none of the twitching brigade would come on they have better things to do with their time lol either that or they are on/at a big twitch and haven't had the time to come on here LOL

Toodle pip

Max

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Hi all,as a keen birder and twitcher on occasion i have not only twitched birds,but also Dragonflies,Butterflies and Plants,i think if you are keen to see a certain species,you sometimes have to put the miles in.Agreed, some twitchers will drive 3 million miles to see there subject then look at it for five minute and then go home or move on to the next one,for me, they might as well be stamp collecting,as surely they can't take in all the bird or Butterflies etc. features.For me personally,i have always taken time to take note's or photographs of the species i have been to see,in this way it is a learning process and i will know what that particular species looks like in the future and can go back in my notes or look up a photograph and say yes it is one of those,i might be differant to the other twitchers out there,but that is how i have always gone about my hobby.It will be interesting to see any other twitcher's comment.



Regards



Steve.

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Congratulations, Steve, on coming forward and giving details of how you pursue your interests in birding, etc. I'm sure even the pure non-twitchers appreciated your input and welcomed an alternative and well-balanced viewpoint.
My own approach to birding should be classified in the 'Twitcher or not' neutral section but it so happens of late (? a new surge of testerone or something ) that I've become less neutral than I used to be. I must own up to certain urges and confess to another " occasional trip out to see scarce or rare birds ."
It all began yesterday evening (Saturday) after reading the details on 'Birdguides' regarding the appearance of up to 11 Whiskered Terns at Willington Pits near Derby. The previous UK record was apparently 4. On waking up this morning (Sunday), I had an attack of 'convulsiones avianosae' - an affliction which, like Malaria, one might contract as a young man..... and then it can unexpectedly return in a milder form in later years. Some people are immune to it and have a strong resistance, in some cases going back hundreds of years , even to the Ancient Brittons. Anyway, my nurse - aka my long suffering wife, Inga, - suggested that the only solution was to take the fast track cure in the Derby area (which would also give her a clear day at home without me under her feet.) So off I went.
As previously mentioned, there had been up to 11 Whiskered Terns at Willington Gravel Pits these past few days but during my visit today (12.30 - 2 .30pm) only 2 had remained, mainly perched on posts in front of the 3rd platform from the Car Park. Great birds, and especially bringing back memories of birding in Spain. The info had said 'c 1 Km' walk from the Car Park to the viewing area - it felt more like 1 Mile plus (middle age must be setting in.) Quite a number of other birders had obviously been affected by the 'convulsions' - in all about 75 were around the Gravel Pits general area but never more than 15-20 viewing at the same time from the relatively small stake-out area. There were clear signs of the affliction with some birders wide-eyed with excitement and others with evidence of slight drooling at the corner of the mouth.
Now here's a bit of real twitcher gossip - if you're not interested in that sort of thing, log off now! .... but it is particularly relevant to 'Twitcher or not'. Anyway, for those still logged on, I hadn't been at the stake-out very long ,watching the 2 Whiskered Terns (mainly perched on posts), when who should turn up and plonk himself next to me with his Skua Stay -On cased telescope - with the nearest tripod leg almost on my right foot - but the UK Arch Twitcher- in Chief himself : Lee Evans. He mumbled something about 'where exactly are they?' and I mumbed something about 'straight ahead with 3 Common Terns' but I wisely held back about which 2 Terns were the Whiskered. I also managed to point out a fly-over Common Buzzard to him ... pity it wasn't a Rough-legged or a Honey. A few acolytes strolled over to say 'Hi' and I must say I found the ensuing cross- chat most interesting. Apparently, Lee had had Dotterel and Ring Ouzel on the way up from the Amersham area,BUCKS (I'd had Rook and Kestrel on the way from Lincoln) He'd managed to squeeze in half an hour yesterday (Saturday), I believe, at the Willington GPs but the Whiskered Terns hadn't shown .... hence his return today.
I hadn't met up with Lee for over 10 years, since he visited Inga and me in Folkestone with his partner - delivering a special bird-book (plus the attractions of lots and lots of Med. Gulls 'just around the corner' at Copt Point). One snippet of 'chat' I found quite incredible. Lee mentioned one of the years when birders in the Newcastle area were first hoping to trap Swinhoe's Petrel (at night). He did the return journey Amersham to Newcastle on 26 specific nights - with several hundred miles of A1 each night - and it was only on the 26th night that he connected with the Petrel. That's what I call 'real twitching'! not popping over from Lincoln to Derby for a couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon. I wish I could have introduced Lee to you, Stuart, and listened while you expounded about not travelling 100 yards, etc.
Apparently, 5 Whiskered Terns have now 'turned' up at Croxall GPs in Staffs and 1 at Long Eaton GPs, Derbys ..... so that's where some of the others went. But I shan't be turning up there myself - the urges have now gone (...... for the time being?). I feel much better now and haven't even needed a lie-down since returning to Lincoln

Regards,

Freddy

I hope some of these Whiskered Terns turn up at my local patch RSPB Middleton Lakes,not far from Croxall. I'll check it out in the next few days. I tried Huttoft Pit for terns tonight but no luck.
I used to be a twitcher before pagers etc. I'd go for the rare bird only to find the bird had left a week ago.

I have met Lee on several occasions and spoken to him at length, Freddie - he's a dedicated lister who puts the miles in. It's not my scene but good luck to him.

Talking of lists, can anyone help me get to 180 on my life list by the end of September?

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Geoff,
Good luck with the Whiskered Terns for your local patch! Since the break-up of the group of 11 at Willington GPs (with only 2 or 3 remaining), they've been reports as well from :
Cleveland (Saltholme Pools RSPB) - 2
Derbys (Long Eaton GPs) - 1
Staffs (Croxall Lakes ) - 5.
As they move around further, we could even get some turning up in Lincs.
I well recall those pre-pager days, Geoff. We had a relatively efficient telephone grapevine in Kent in the 70s and 80s, plus "Nancy's" telephone at Cley, of course. The main thing if you went to Cley, I remember, was NOT to sit near the 'phone - otherwise you would never stop answering it, and your tea would get stone cold. But, anyway, the telephone hotline services like"Birdline" and "Bird Information Service" and pagers with RBA, Birdguides etc. plus the World Wide Web eventually arrived - including 'Lincs Bird Chat'!

Regards,

Freddy

They are getting nearer to Lincs !
3 Whiskered Terns were reported at Rutland Water LEICS at midday today ( Mon ).
It looks as if 2 might have flown yesterday NE from Derbys to Cleveland. Could Toft or Covenham or a Lincs Gravel Pit be in line for a visit ? (ie NE from Rutland Water. )

Regards,

Freddy

Apparently not - one reported at Paxton Pits, Cambs circa 20 mins ago

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