It is amusing to follow the link to the original article to read people’s comments on it. They range from reasonably positive to “terrible” and “egregiously bad” .
Martin
On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 11:46 AM, Tony Lawson wrote:
> By Nathan HellerPosted Friday, Jan. 14, 2011, at 2:07 PM ET > > http://www.slate.com/id/2280958/For a few days this month, America > became a nation of bird-watchers. More than 3,000 dead black birds started raining > from the skyshortly before the new year broke in Beebe, Ark., prompting widespread > concern about ecological disaster, > government conspiracy, > and the Rapture. > This was not the first time feathered creatures landed recently in public > life. Birding, these days, is everywhere. In Jonathan Franzen’s best-selling > novel, *Freedom*, > paterfamilias Walter Berglund becomes a bird fanatic to conjure meaning in > his drifting life. (*Freedom*’s* *cover—maybe you have seen it?—sports a > large, teed-off-looking cerulean warbler.) Annie Proulx’s new memoir, *Bird > Cloud*, > flatlines “into long descriptions of bird watching,” wrotethe critic Dwight Garner. These next months, meanwhile, Princeton will > publish three > separate bird > guides; > Steve Martin will starin a screen version of > *The Big Year*(a tale of pan-continental birding); and the nation’s leading > bird-art exhibition http://www.lywam.org/birdsinart/ will turn 35. If > American life is, as some people like to say, a tree of many branches, it is > starting to seem a good idea not to stand beneath it. > > What are we to make of the renascent birder? To the uninitiated, a > bird-watcher’s motives can seem puzzling, if not downright suspect. Rising > at vampiric hours, these people leave polite society behind to spend long > stretches staring not at dazzling vistas or strange beasts but at birds—and > often unexotic ones at that. They pack enough high-end equipment and field > expertise to undertake a hunt but never touch their prey; the consummating > act of birding is, at most, a picture snapped for private use and from a > distance, in the manner of a pervert with a beach pass. Birding is the sort > of hobby that seems like a front for something. Occasionally, it is. > (Nathan Leopold, of Leopold and Loeb, famously claimed to be watching a Wilson’s > phalarope http://birdweb.org/birdweb/bird_details.aspx?id=184 instead of > slaying a 14-year-old child.) Franzen links the rise of his bird-watching > interest to his mother’s death and goes on to describe“a creeping sense of shame about what I was doing.” Proulx scoffs at other > birders’ eagerness to keep “a list of birds sighted.” There’s a sense, amid > these judgments, that to bird intensely is to dwell on something totally > beside the point. > > In fact, the re-emergence of bird-watching in the culture’s limelight is an > ominous thing—though not because of anything the birder does. The hobby rose > to popularity in the unrest of the nuclear era, and it points toward a > looming fear of ecological apocalypse. This makes sense. For bird-watchers, > who are trying to keep track of the natural world without leaving a trace—to > conquer nature without smothering it—the struggle not to uncoil one’s > strength destructively is constant. Birding is a steam valve for anxiety > about nuclear-age strength and habits. Its prominence today can be seen as a > measure of quiet alarm. > > To bird seems ancient, but it was a product of industrial modernity. The > first birders—as opposed to hunters or scientists—appeared in the late 19 > th century, partly as a result of a boom in the natural sciences (which > helped flesh out the field of ornithology) and partly as a reaction against > the new effects of manufacturing. In America, early on, Harriet Hemenway > founded the Massachusetts Audubon Society to fight the industrial slaughter > of local birds for hat feathers. But it wasn’t until Roger Tory Peterson, an > American illustrator and bird enthusiast, published his *Field Guide to > the Birds*in 1934 that modern birding came into being. Peterson’s work was > comprehensive and accessible, and it offered enthusiasts an approach that > didn’t require trapping or felling birds for close comparative study, as > much previous work had. The book instead used visual, auditory, and habitat > cues to distinguish species, letting the untrained birder work with > precision from a distance. Birding became a popular science that left no > trace—and that was seen to be a good thing. In one of the most quietly > influential passages of his book, Peterson referred to birds as “sensitive > indicators of the environment, a sort of ‘ecological litmus paper.’ ” This > was the idea that made birding the great hobby, and alarm bell, of the > nuclear age. > > Birding took wing as a mainstream pursuit in the ’60s by playing into that > era’s anxieties. In 1962, Rachel Carson published *Silent Spring*, > a landmark best-seller arguing elegantly and at length that DDT was > ecologically lethal. She opened with the image of a lifeless world, marked > chiefly by the absence of our feathered friends. (“The birds—where had they > gone?” she wrote. “It was a spring without voices.”) Birds throughout > heralded apocalypse: The death of western grebes marked eco-disaster at > Clear Lake; sick birds in Detroit gave the first sign of environmental > poison. The book made this de-birded world look like nuclear cataclysm. If > something terrible was going to happen, birds seemed poised to give the > first cry. In 1963, Alfred Hitchcock released *The Birds*, > the paranoid tale of a small Bay Area town savaged by murderous flocks. Some > viewers see it as an appeal to the same nuclear-age terror, with the birds > now serving as antagonists. Bird-watching increased nearly 300 percent in > the two decades after 1960, according to data from the U.S. Department of > the Interior. In 1967, Britain’s John Gooders published a servicey book > called *Where To Watch Birds*, > and it sold almost 250,000 copies. > > Birding was also a hobby suited to the new American middle > class—peripatetic, self-possessed, given to prelapsarian wistfulness. One of > the most beloved birding memoirs of all time is Kenn Kaufman’s *Kingbird > Highway*(1997), a seductive account of his time hitchhiking around the country as a > teenager in the early ’70s, exceeding the sighting record for a “big year” > with 671 kinds of birds. The book is written in the errant episodic form of > *On the Road*or > *Easy Rider*, > and, like them, it’s based on an idea of the American continent as a large, > unharvested field of experience (in this case, experience of birds). But it > also shows how birders’ competitive and broadening ambitions relied on > transportation and technological growth. That trend continues. Today, there > are crowd-sourced bird-mapping tools, > birding packages that double as vacation getaways, birding blogs, birding iPhone > apps http://www.ibirdexplorer.com/, and remote-birdingWeb sites that don’t require watchers to be present in the landscape at all. > A few old-fashioned birders may still practice their hobby in isolation with > binoculars and field guides, but the birding community, these days, has > moved on to gather, check, and share sightings across great distances using > the fruits of technological industry and the jumbo jet. > > A few days ago, I set out before dawn to watch birders practice their art > in the middle of New York. Van Cortlandt Park is a 1,100-acre stretch of > green land in the Bronx, and with its mixed terrain—open fields, wide > groves, and wetlands cast among the footpaths and tussocks—it’s become > something of a birder’s urban Mecca. Winter is a quiet time. A snow had come > through recently when I arrived that morning, capping the branches white and > smoothing out the fields. I passed two men running a black dog near the > entrance. Then, until I met my guides, I was the only human being in sight. > > A birder is a person who enjoys privileged aloneness—someone who, in other > circumstances, might relish the idea of returning from a jog while you are > still in bed. “If I weren’t doing this walk here, I would already have > mapped my morning,” Andrew Baksh, my guide, said as we trotted down an icy > path toward prime birding ground. He wore a navy-blue stocking cap pulled > over his ears, a heavy parka, and an orange hiking backpack, and he lugged > his spotting scope and tripod over one shoulder. It was barely 8 o’clock. > Baksh’s profession is information technology, but since falling in love with > the birds in his Queens backyard, he’s worked up both his expertise and his > investment in the birding community. These days, he maintains a bird blogand does work for the New York City Audubon. He is interested, especially, > in birding etiquette, the underlying tenet of which is to be as unobtrusive > as possible. “This is a serious, serious hobby,” he said. “Some people don’t > like to call it a hobby at all.” > > I was out with Baksh and one of the park’s bird-loving rangers, Katy Boula, > in pursuit of something known as the American coot. A birder in the park had > first spotted the coot http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Coot, a new > bird for Van Cortlandt, on New Year’s Day. Since then, it had been observed > in various locales. We’d hardly left to search for it when Boula whirled > around midsentence and pointed excitedly toward the sky. “Oh, *hawk*!” she > cried. “That was a red-tailed hawk!” A large bird banked and perched up in > an empty tree. A bit later, we headed east, out to a pond. “Coots are a good > bird for this time year,” Baksh said as we drew near. “That would have been > very sought-after for the Christmas count. Of course, a greater > white-fronted goose would have beaten everything.” He grinned as if this > were a joke. I did, too. Then he nodded toward the water. “There go the > Canadas.” > > A large group of geese were out on the icy pond, beyond some trees, and we > stopped on the trail to watch them. Baksh set up his tripod and spent > several minutes peering through it, saying nothing. He was staring at the > geese. I wanted to ask a question, but I talked instead with Boula, who > showed me some pictures of coots in her *Sibley Guide*. > Finally, Baksh spoke. “Yeah,” he said. “Nothing there.” I took a look > through his scope. Through the lens, the geese looked strangely cinematic, > sitting on the ice, vivid and near, with feathers flickering in the icy > wind. I pulled back, and a bird cried out over the water. > > “Wow, strong call.” Boula said. “Is that the Carolina wren?” > > Baksh nodded. “It’s the Carolina wren.” > > Boula showed me a picture of the Carolina wren. > “Sometimes, you’re not going to see the bird. You’re only going to hear it,” > she said. “With birding, it’s all in the little details.” > > Generally speaking, there are four species of birder at large in the world. > The first and least intimidating group includes those who see bird-watching > as an endeavor roughly equivalent to Tuesday-night poker, volunteer > gardening, or mah-jongg—an open-access hobby and a chance to connect > regularly with friends. These people are frequently novices, and they tend > to be extremely chatty in the field. (This seems eccentric if you are a > birder.) Baksh counts himself among a second group, an autonomous cadre of > enthusiasts who set their own schedules and often dwell on single bird > groups or locales for stretches, like a book critic taking a month to read > an author’s full oeuvre. Then there are the specialists. These people focus > on one kind of bird obsessively and always, often with accompanying Web > sites. Fourth are the listers, who chase birds to check them off a list. > Some keep life lists (birds they’ve seen in their lives);*some keep year lists (starting anew every January); and others make up to-do > lists by country, state, and so forth (certain New York City listers work by > borough). There is, possibly, something compulsive in this approach. And yet > the listers are the sexy ones, the intrepid jet-setters you may spy fleeing > across the tarmac toting bags of optical equipment, trying to nail those > last few birds, a continent away, before their deadline falls. > > Baksh once got a taste of this excitement when a rare hermit warbler turned > up in the area. “I was at Jones Beach, studying gulls, when I got word,” he > said. He rushed to his car and tore across Long Island, only to recognize > other watchers doing the same. “There was a convoy leading there, and we all > knew each other,” he told me. “You could see people with clenched fists on > the wheel.” When he arrived at the northern park, a group of birders were > already set up with their scopes, like “paparazzi.” Also, there were actual > bird photographers, a group of mercenary commercialists Baksh doesn’t much > care for. “They want to get the picture, and they’ll do it at all costs,” he > said—even “flushing,” or stirring, the prize. Birders who become bird > photographers are sometimes said to be “going over to the dark side.” > > This is an underlying terror of the pursuit: the fear that all the skill, > knowledge, and tech a birder carries will be turned to other ends until, > finally, a rare marvel is flushed. It does not take a novelist to see the > broader resonance of this concern. Despite their reputation as quirky > hobbyists, birders are on the front line of our problematic efforts to defy > nature—to travel faster, reach farther, outsmart it—without encroaching on > its habits. Their worries are the worries of a nuclear power writ small, and > we could do much worse than let them lead us through the forest ahead as > they watch the sky. > > http://www.slate.com/id/2280960/pagenum/all/ > ============================== To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message: unsubscribe (in the body of the message, with no Subject line) to: birding-aus-request@vicnet.net.au
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