Real birds?

Whilst we are on the subject of whether birds can be ticked after hearing 
them down the telephone etc., here's something of a dilemma that has always 
worried me;

When you look through a pair of binoculars or through a telescope at a bird
, what you actually see is a magnified VIRTUAL image, not a REAL image of 
the bird. Therefore you don't really SEE the bird through your optics. 
Whilst for the vast majority of birds this doesn't matter too much as 
normally you see them with your naked eye, although they are identified 
using binoculars, it does pose some serious problems about ticking birds 
only seen through your telescope on seawatches etc.

In a nutshell can you tick virtual not real birds?

Richard Thomas