birding-aus

Cocos & Christmas Island Rarities

To: david taylor <>
Subject: Cocos & Christmas Island Rarities
From: Dave Torr <>
Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2011 13:02:17 +1100
I guess since the "official" list (whatever that means!) is C&B plus BARC
(and let us not re-open that discussion!) and they count these territories
then it is reasonable for Aussie birders to count the birds. And since most
birding software that I have seen is based on country lists if you go to
Christmas and do not deem it to be part of Australia how do you record the
sightings?

For better or worse the definitions of countries and territories are fairly
static (and the questionable boundaries are usually not ones that birders
would to choose to visit) whereas I have seen various definitions of faunal
regions and so we could then perhaps start a debate on which definition of
faunal regions we should use (please - no!) - and then I guess one gets
vagrants to a faunal region as well from the next region and people would go
to the boundaries of a region in the hope of vagrants :-)

On 9 January 2011 12:56, david taylor <> wrote:

> Another who agrees - I would love to bird Christmas Island and the Cocos
> Islands but this recent notion that they are part of the Australian bird
> list is in my opinion flawed - they may be Australian Territories but are
> vast distances from Australia,  Surley just because they are Australian
> territories does not make them Australian birds?
>
> I pose the scenario that if next year a country in South America became an
> Australian Territory that some of our twitchers would be adding Toucans to
> the Australian list - this may seem silly but in reality what is the
> difference in the two scenarios. I struggle too see how distance can form
> the basis of the argument? Cocos islands are 3600 kms due west of Darwin.
> Darwin to Thailand is less distance - if it became a territory would we be
> adding all of their birds?
>
> I would be interested to hear the attitude of those who do believe these
> birds are valid on the Australian list because they are Australian
> Territories and if so what would be the difference if indeed we gained a new
> territory in a place like Sth America or Asia?
>
> And as Tom points out - do the French birders add New Caledonia birds
> because its a territory of theirs?
>
> Seems its great sport for our twitchers (and absolutely nothing wrong with
> that) - but a long bow for mine that they form part of the Australian bird
> list.
>
> But each to his own and great birding all.
>
> cheers
>
> David Taylor
>
>
>
> On 09/01/2011, at 10:32 AM, Carl Clifford wrote:
>
> > Tom,
> >
> > I heartily agree. You could almost say that birding on Christmas and
> Cocos was SE Asian birding for xenophobes, except for the fact that the
> population of Cocos is mainly Malay and the population of Christmas is
> mainly Middle Eastern, albeit they are banged-up in a concentration camp
> >
> > Cheers,
> >
> > Carl Clifford
> >
> >
> > On 09/01/2011, at 7:38 AM, Tom Tarrant wrote:
> >
> > Hi Frank,
> >
> > I think you are missing the point regarding that comment, as exciting as
> > Christmas and Cocos sound (I would love to go birding there!) they are
> not
> > in the same faunal zone as Australia so many birders don't see the
> > relevance. You may as well go New Caledonia and add those species to your
> > 'French' list.
> >
> > Tom
> >
> >
> >
> >> And I remember there was a comment about the possible Short-toed Eagle
> in
> >> Victoria being better than the rarities reported on Cocos and Christmas
> in
> >> December.  Sorry.  Not even close!!!  I saw 11 new birds for my
> Australian
> >> list, and I dipped on two.  Even Mike Carter added 9 birds to his
> Australian
> >> list.
> >>
> >>
> > --
> > ********************************
> > Tom Tarrant
> > Kobble Creek, Qld
> >
> > http://kobble.aviceda.org
> >
> > http://picasaweb.google.com.au/aviceda/
> > ********************************
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>
> David Taylor
> Brisbane
> 
>
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