David Geering wrote on 22/10/98
>Alan, a man of your advanced years really should get a good nights
sleep. Is it really worth staying up all night squinting into a beam of
light knowing that the mighty Hunter Thickheads are already tucked up in
their sleeping bags with a swag of birds already safely ticked off!
>
>David also wrote on 26/10/98 Any news of the twitchathon?
>
Well David do I have news for you!
Despite having 4 hours sleep at Coonabarabran, the Central Coast
Champions soundly trounced the Hunter Thickheads in the numbers game,
sharing the first prize with the Wollongong team with 178 species! As
numbers appeared to be down all over eastern Australia, even if you had
not been shackled in Victoria I am sure that your presence would have
made no to difference to the Hunter Thickhead's final total (but we will
never know). As one of the oldest NSW participants in the main race it
is good to know that good looks, an all male crew and a determination to
overcome the hurtful sneers on birding-aus, can win the day! Like Laurie
Conole the win overwhelmed the whole team (Stephen Edwards 21 y, Craig
Arms 28 y and Alan Morris 50+), so that it will be some days before we
can put our winning list together, we have to sleep it off first!
However I can say that some of our best birds were a Koel Cuckoo calling
in the Warrumbungles, Blue Bonnets at Gumin Gumin, Turquoise Parrots at
the Woolshed, and a very co-operative Mangrove Gerygone at Swansea, one
of the last birds of the day, and the Little Grassbird and Intermediate
Egrets that we found 5 minutes before finish at the Shortland Wetland
centre!
Don't forget if you need a few tax deductions, get with the winners and
make your twitchathon donation through the Central Coast Champions.
Alan Morris
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