Paul Chapman
Well-known member
Nate Swick, aba blog, 17 May 2016: ABA Area Big Years In Progress: May 2016 Update.
Good to see they have read the posts on here. 3
All the best
Nate Swick, aba blog, 17 May 2016: ABA Area Big Years In Progress: May 2016 Update.
Yeah...ABA big years are competitive, but typically they are some what friendly affairs. Olaf's blog post is sour grapes and petty. And there is absolutely zero reason to hold back sightings at this point, unless you yourself are planning to string if you need to bump things up. Other than Alaska (which is basically is not conducive to chasing anyway), it's not like these folks are going to find there own rarities. They are mostly running after stuff other people have found.
John secretive birding isn't really helping him though. There is really no reason to not share your sightings, if only on ebird or rarity list serves. Give back for god sakes if you are going to take advantage of everyone else's reporting. In the age of the internet there is really no reason not to keep an updated blog if you are performing this undertaking. Even the Global big year folks can pull it off, and some of them are hitting up places like Papua New Guinea! Seems like both people are not really engaging in terribly sportsman like behavior.
Man I totally rooted for Neil Hayward and John Vanderpoel, but at this point I really don't want either to win. Maybe Noah Stryker or someone else can swoop in next year and beat there records?
eh...I am skeptical keeping a blog is really that much of a time sink. I mean it doesn't need to be updated daily or even need to be that well written or long. There is a decent amount of down time that doesn't involve sleeping/driving/birding over the course of the week. And tablets and such are small enough they can pretty easily be packed and pulled out during random lulls. At the very least ebird and such could be done; hell there are phone apps that let you easily generate lists in the field.
I missed it if it has been discussed, but the Bahama Mockingbird has gone home again?
Niels
Bahama Mockingbird last recorded 10th May as per above - test of accuracy?
Looks like a return home did a lot for his spirits!
Finally (for now) ...
Haven't come across an ABA listing online of the birds recorded in the area this year ... is there a summary somewhere? What I did find was that you can see some (just about all?) of the coded birds recorded by looking at the current ABA ebird listing total 'last seen'
http://ebird.org/ebird/region/aba?yr=cur