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non-birding partners phrases (1 Viewer)

Larry Sweetland

Larry Sweetland

Formerly 'Larry Wheatland'
Given the current lull, how about this:

Maybe some of you have partners who claim not to be birders, but they give themselves away as closet birders by some of the things you catch them saying? Maybe they'll say something that makes you think "That's my boy/gal", and they'll give themselves away, by accidentally identifying something difficult etc. Then of course they'll backtrack and pretend it was an accident..

My latest example is just one word from my "non-birding" girlfriend, when I told her that (a local observer) had seen a Silver-washed Fritillary in his urban garden yesterday. Her one word was: "Comma."

Any of you experienced this phenomenon?
 
My wife is now shocked that none of her friends can even identify Starlings and other common birds and loves to show off her knowledge.

She says she's no birder but she found and identified a Pallid Harrier a couple of years ago and can identify most butterfly and Dragonfly groups, and when we're out she'll find a wader and confidently opine, 'got some shanks' and all with a Russian accent.

She badgered me to buy her a trail came for her birthday and was delighted when we got a Pine Marten on it the other day. I'm very lucky that her love of photography, has provided a very convenient parallel interest which fits with birding.



A
 
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My wife Marion wears t-shirts with "I'm not Bovvered" to twitches and insists she doesn't "need" anything (when I forget to phrase it carefully i.e. I've said "You need X, don't you?" instead of "You haven't seen X yet, have you?")

However, when we accompanied my brother and his new Finnish wife to her native land, on arrival at Taru's parents' house Maz asked me what the bird that sounded like a Corncrake was! (It was a Corncrake.) I had to point out the only British non-birders who recognise that sound live in places like Balranald.

She also loudly insisted she preferred the shiny black bird with the long red bill to the dull black one with the white bill at South Stack RSPB, and knew perfectly well what she was doing, as the people ticking off the Black Lark looked at her in horror.

She's not really a birder. But she's a long way from being a non-birder! And she's on 435 in the British Isles, but she's "not bovvered". :t:

John
 
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My husband makes a good effort to be involved by telling me about birds he's seen or pointing things out and asking about them when we're together, though field marks and bird names don't seem to stick with him - after 12 years together he can still barely identify anything more than cardinals (he almost has Eastern Towhee down, but the females and juveniles still trip him up!). But he has a good memory for birds that make distinctive and funny noises - he still talks about the one time we heard American Bitterns pumping on migration in Missouri years ago. And he still remembers what antpittas are from our visits to Ecuador.
 
My wife and I have been together for six years - and try as I might I can't get her into birding - but some knowledge does absorb - she's just said, listening to a Collared Dove sing, "Is that one of those Circled Doves?"!
 
halftwo said:
My wife and I have been together for six years - and try as I might I can't get her into birding - but some knowledge does absorb - she's just said, listening to a Collared Dove sing, "Is that one of those Circled Doves?"!
Click to expand...

Whilst we were planning a South African trip a few years ago and having seen a few 'Capes' on the map, my wife asked 'where's Cape Gannet, I can't find it on this map anywhere'......



A
 
The UK400 Club magazine described my 1994 yearlist as a good effort with only my non-birding partner for company. It amused me greatly as I spent the second half of the year twitching with Julian Thomas.

My wife had a fear of things flying around her head when she met me and stayed in the chapel the first time that we sent to the Farnes. Last year she happily wandered around with me.

I was probably proudest when she had been cured sufficiently to help me with the moth traps in Tromiebridge meadows when I was up there trapping alone ast year. Last week she turned to me and told me that I had a Shieldbug on my shoulder and I did! The days of screaming at creepy crawlies now reduced to not liking spiders.

She is developing some knowledge on birds so will point out kites or buzzards as we travel along distinguishing between the two but anything is seen incidentally whether Raso Lark on a Cape Verde boat trip, Swinhoe's Petrel at Tynemouth because Franko made sure no one was asleep in the car park or Eastern Bonelli's on Shetland because I made a weekend of it rather than travel alone. She does like Owls though - Hawk, Brown Fish, Great Grey, Scops (in Britain), Tengmalm's and several others on her WP list.

She did get out of the car once at Radipole to point out the Bittern we were twitching when my friends and I were being incompetent.

I tell her that she's a very lucky woman but she really knows the truth.....

All the best
 
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Well, my wife is a birder, but our kids are not. (Last August we drove out to Nebraska to see the solar eclipse, and we gave them our extra bins to use, and one of them made a comment to the effect of 'Oh, no, we are all wearing binoculars!')

Anyway, the older one once told us that he had seen a Barred Owl in the neighborhood, and then reddened when he realized he should have just said "owl." He could tell we were proud of his identification skills and knowledge, that he had absorbed from us by osmosis.

Poor kid!
 
My "not really that interested in birds" OH and I were at a well known optics shop that overlooks a piece of wetland and suddenly asked "is that a purple sandpiper" out of the blue. Worse for me was that I hadn't spotted it at all.......
 
My OH also is a non-birder but with more than a passing interest in all things wildlife and natural history related and takes great pleasure in seeing a new bird for the first time when accompanying me on holidays etc. For certain things she just has a total mental block when it come to ID, hirundines being the classic case in point (a slight cataract in one eye does not help when looking at something high up in featureless sky) so she has her own unique style and names for certain birds.

The field guide according to Mrs L goes something like this:
Swifts go scree-scree, swallows go twitter-twitter and house martins go chip-chirrup. (she has not got one wrong for years, and even picked out a sand martin as being different recently)

When I tried to explain where stonechat (one of her favourite birds) got its name from she instantly declared that that was rubbish as it has a trill on the end and therefore they are now firmly known as clack-clack-oops birds.

In the same vein, chough are crows with red wellies and the list goes on.

Sometimes I think she does it just to wind me up like the time I went in search of a white wing black tern (a lifer for me at the time) at Rye harbour whilst on holiday on the south coast a few years back. After some time searching she told me (and the other assorted birders present) "you carry on i'm happy just staying here and watching this little seagull doing acrobatics over there!!

Another time whilst on holiday in Scotland, having just dismissed a distant raptor as a buzzard she calmly asked me "so why do buzzards in Scotland fly differently to those at home?" After a brief explanation of what she meant I looked again to see a sub adult Goldie approaching us. (my story is that it was a different bird and I am sticking to it!).

Despite all the above for a non-birder she has a pretty impressive list (if she kept one) and an eye for spotting the unusual.
 
My formerly non-birding partner (since I gave her my old Canon and long lens) is very keen on photographing birds and is much better at spotting them than I am (shamed). Her ID skills aren't highly developed yet, so if she wants to draw my attention to a largish bird she doesn't recognise, will just say "Bird, non-pigeon." We also have a Swedish friend who joined in the fun on one trip, but she'll just say "Bird".
 
Recently, while out for a meal, one of our friends declared their love of avocados. My OH said "you're like a resplendent quetzal" then quickly blushed when she realised this wasn't a normal comparison to make.
 
My very definitely non birding wife was very dismissive of my first ever Latham's Snipe in the mists in Hokkaido. Having carefully set up a scope-filling view of the head for her, my enthusiasm was dismissed with a "Huh - it looks like a tiramisu".

Given the chocolate and cream stripes it was irritatingly difficult to argue.
 
My girl isn't a birder but more and more she is asking me about birds she's seen.

She even followed a bird around a car park to be able to get a good description - it was flitting about too much for her to capture on her phone. It turned out to be a Pied Wagtail.

I have started to have an annoying habit now of saying what a bird is when it appears on a tv programme - no matter if it's a wildlife programme or a soap! And if I'm wrong then she doesn't realise anyway and it makes me look like I'm an expert ha ha

To this day my niece who swears that she saw a Pelican on the roof of a house in Liverpool - but maybe she did as there are 2 Liver birds on the waterfront.

:t:
 
MK90 said:
Recently, while out for a meal, one of our friends declared their love of avocados. My OH said "you're like a resplendent quetzal" then quickly blushed when she realised this wasn't a normal comparison to make.
Click to expand...
That is just too cool, I love it!

I consider myself normal; it's just that no one else does, not even my partner! |:D|
 
RichieTwitchy said:
I have started to have an annoying habit now of saying what a bird is when it appears on a tv programme - no matter if it's a wildlife programme or a soap!
Click to expand...
In some ways, it's worse when both of you do it, like my partner and I do.

We both dislike it when they use the wrong calls/vocalizations for the wrong animal. (Ferrets do not squeak.)(All birds of prey do not sound like eagles.)(That bird shouldn't be anywhere near that setting.)
 
My wife's no birder but unsuspecting birders are astonished that she is able to ID Lesser Kestrel by call which, in fact, is far easier than doing so by plumage.
 
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