|
Hi Birding-aussers, I'll be posting a trip report
of the Southport pelagic in the next day or so but first let's see if we can
sort out Lauries dilemma. First of all Laurie, you frequent flyer you, you
should have realised by now that I don't use the general Aussie field guides at
sea & in fact discourage others from doing so. The plates from guide to
guide vary far too greatly and also generally are inaccurate. Secondly, all the
pelagic venues that I know of carry at least one experienced guide with a wealth
of knowledge borne of many years of field observations. It is the job of that
(those) guide(s) to answer any queries, in the course of a day at sea many
people do so but you Laurie rarely seem to & get yourself into a
bind.
Laurie sent me four images, from the trip, of
Providence Petrels and I explained to him that they were of fairly standard
appearence for this time of year, ie; in various stages of plumage wear. If he
had asked me this at the time I could have cleared this up for him. Thank
goodness a real white-bellied Providence or Great-winged Petrel didn't turn up.
Something else Laurie, quote "That the birds were pterodromas was obvious with
their white chins". Where on earth did you get that little gem from, surely not
from a field guide!
I now find Laurie, that you have sent two images to
people, some of whom would have very limited field experience with such birds,
if any, getting yourself further into a bind. The moral of the situation is that
Laurie had legitimate questions (queries) but chose (given his limited field
knowledge) to ignore a readily available resource at hand. I acknowledge Laurie,
that you are a scientist & have certain skills acquired from tertiary
studies & I also understand your concerns re; general field guides but I've
already broached that subject.
Pelagic organizers spend (waste ?) a
good deal of time (and money) both studying in the field & researching, so
don't waste 'em. I'll now get back to writing up a rather boring trip report for
Southport 17/7/04. Cheers - Paul W.
Ps. Edwin Vs excellent report from Sydney gives us
northeners up here some encouragement for next month, maybe!
--------------------------------------------------------
Birding-Aus is now on the Web at
--------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the
message
'unsubscribe birding-aus' (no quotes, no Subject
line)
to
| 