Agreed to a lot of points, and the reason that I started this thread,(Aside from abject frustration! ) was not to alienate anybody or not let anyone play! but to highlight the fact that there are primarily 3 types of posts happening here - Absolute beginners or indeed photographers who literally have no idea and no inclination to investigate what they have seen (and quite rightly so in some cases), People that have visited foreign climes and have no idea what bird a is etc, and lastly tricky ID situations from Birders who have already had a genuine stab at an ID.
I am happy for 2 and 3 to co exist , but when you are getting Joe Bloggs from London asking for an ID of a Blackbird , then a Wren , then a Dunnock , you have to wonder if there is any point in his posting , especially when he says " I cant find this in any book" Where is he looking ??? A dictionary!
I propose that the ID Forum gets split into a minimum of two sub categories (possibly three)
1) I have little Idea about birds, but would like someone to tell me what this is
2) Birds I took on my Holidays - local experts please
3) Experienced and tricky ID conundrums
You can then choose as to where your true destiny lies
I can see where you are coming from. Many of us birders who spend a lot of time searching out rare or new birds and seeking to identify them see a natural progression in the evolution of what it means to be a birder. Specifically, we get better and better at sorting out the trickier identifications, perhaps to the point where we know how best to sort out most of them and which ones can't be sorted out at all. We pride ourselves on what we know and our abilities to avoid as many pitfalls as possible. The reality is though, for a vast number of birders, the need to identify everything and continually improve their birding skills is not part of their birding experience. Sure, they might like to see new things and know what they are, but they're more excited about seeing a new behavior, enjoying the color of a Vermilion Flycatcher, or seeing an exciting Great Blue Heron. It may be all about getting that great photograph, getting a wonderful video or sound recording, or perhaps discovering a new nest, whatever. It may be the simple pleasure of being outdoors and getting away from the stresses of life. As a guide, I travel with lots of clients of varying identification skills. A few of them might be considered perpetual beginners even though they own field guides and regularly ask good questions. But that doesn't stop them from having a great time out birding - yes birding.
Warning: the following statement is blasphemous. Somewhere in this thread, comments were made about how incredulous it was that birders were counting birds that had been identified for them on birdforum. I would
never be able to count something like that myself. But not everyone is like me. Folks will count whatever they want, whether it be the number of yellow cars they see on their way to work, the number of pies they ate in a week, or the number of bird species they've photographed. They're not in competition with ID oriented twitchers, nor are they working on a competitive country list. So should it really bug us what they count?
The biggest drawback to splitting the forum, in my mind, is that there is a continuum between complete novice and whomever the most skilled birder on Earth is. Even among experts, there are strengths and weaknesses, depending on experience, book knowledge, and interest. Where do we draw the lines? Is separating Song from Savannah sparrow a challenge? What about telling a pewee from a phoebe, or an
Empidonax from a pewee (sorry John
)? Not for a lot birders I know, yet clearly it is for many who own field guides, based on the number of posts struggling with these (even skilled birders like John :t
. What about Meadow vs Tree pipit? Stonechat vs Whinchat? These are birds that a lot of folks struggle with sorting out, yet there is no doubt a contingent of European birders for which these are "no brainers." What if Killian Mullarney and David Sibley set the bar for us? :eek!: Would we all be relegated to the "I have little Idea about birds, but would like someone to tell me what this is" category because we can't consistently differentiate between
argentatus and
smithsonianus Herring Gulls, or because we can't consistently tell the difference between a Least Flycatcher and an Alder Flycatcher? As a challenge, grab a field guide to a part of the world you have never been, then find a post in the ID forum from that region. Use the field guide to try to sort out the ID. Depending on how much you know already about bird families, it can be a little tricky knowing where to begin to find that bird in the book.
Okay, enough of my hyperbole. I think
everyone could stand to lighten up a bit. It really boils down to the fact that I like teaching folks about birds and have infinite patience when it comes to perpetual beginners. Not that I might not roll my eyes at times...but I like looking at great pictures of birds, coming across threads with birds I find personally challenging, and perhaps most of all, helping out others. Dividing up the forum would make it that much harder for me to keep up on the threads. It would also create an unnecessary "us versus them" mentality. "When have I learned enough that I can start posting in the real birder category?" It seems simpler to just ignore the ones that seem trivial or irrelevant.
If I were going to propose any changes to the forum, I would encourage more posts that are really informative, even if the poster knows the answer ahead of time. I'm not talking about quizzes with blurry shots or pieces of birds, but clear images that further our understanding of a particular identification topic.
Chris