Hi Myles
I reckon a good starting point would be "Bill Oddie's Little Black Bird
Book" with several particularly pertinent chapters such as:
Chapter 2 - What Am I? What are you? - which includes a glossary of
twitching terms;
Chapter 3 - Equipment & Clothing - A field Guide to bird-watchers;
[Most of us know just a few of our fellow-correspondents on birding-aus, but
have only our self-generated images of what might lie behind most of the
familiar names. However, pretty well everyone you'll correspond with through
this forum will be found described in this exposé - a lot of fun is to be
had trying to work out which is which!]
Chapter 5 - Covering the mistake (This chapter-heading paraphrased to avoid
rejection by anti-spam devices) - including the well-used "two-bird
theory";
Chapter 12 - On being a bird person - including "Dealing with jokers".
And more, such as Fooling the Committee, and so on.
Yes, I think 'birders' is probably the favoured word hereabouts. Some feel
that 'bird-watcher' can conjour an image of absent-minded tweedy people
nattering on about feathered-friends; Bill Oddie has a lot to say about
'bird-spotters'; there has been a lot of debate about whether 'twitcher' is
just a pejorative term used by the 'more serious birder' about the more
trivial collectors of ticks. As for ornithologist, that's described in the
book as 'dangerous'!
It was originally published by Eyre Methuen in 1980, but I've no doubt a
search will find more recent editions around the place.
If in doubt about anything, do please toss the occasional term up on the
list for everyone to have a gnaw at. We might discover that Queenslanders
and South Australians are talking a different language!
Welcome aboard!
Bill Jolly
"Abberton",
Lockyer Valley, Queensland.
Visit our website at http://www.abberton.org
Email:
Ph: (+61) 7 4697 6111 Fax: (+61) 7 4697 6056
---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.548 / Virus Database: 341 - Release Date: 5/12/2003
Birding-Aus is on the Web at
www.shc.melb.catholic.edu.au/home/birding/index.html
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message
"unsubscribe birding-aus" (no quotes, no Subject line)
to
|
