BBC Twitching Documentary (1 Viewer)

[Big Phil]

Would you like to identify the relevant legislation and the alleged offence? I think you will struggle.

Cheers, alan

Mines and Quarries 1954 act? I think the owner is obliged to exclude the public from a site coming under this act?

 

[Garry Bagnell]

I get the hint, when I get a new stairs carpet fitted, I will chuck some pics on my website.
Using the phone whilst driving was not good and certainly out of charecter for me. I apologise for that and I hope it didn't effect your enjoyment of the documentary.

 

[black kite 1964]

I get the hint, when I get a new stairs carpet fitted, I will chuck some pics on my website.
Using the phone whilst driving was not good and certainly out of charecter for me. I apologise for that and I hope it didn't effect your enjoyment of the documentary.

Gary. I think some of my earlier comments were below the belt!! I think you have been a bloody good sport!!

Stick up for yourself a bit more!! You do have opinions of your own you know!!

Regards.

Mark

 

[The sniper]

garry,i like your choice of football team

 

[walshey]

Maybe twitchers are self obsessed and selfish, and many birders who don't twitch as well. But if you watch a programme called 'Twitchers - A Very British Obsession' you can hardly be surprised that the people in it are:

a) twitchers

and

b) obsessive

Stephen

Not surprised in the slighest. I was just trying to make the point that many people in modern society seem self obsessed now. Sorry for being so obtuse.

 

[WACCOE]

yep brett came cross as the most interesting person on the programme,a top bloke whenever ive talked to him

Met him for the first time on Sunday whilst watching the Pallas Warbler at Flamboro,only me and his wife there seem top bloke to me.

 

[dantheman]

(Wrt the container loads of dirty laundery requiring public airing, it does seem a little like we've moved on from the main thread topic IMO too - but that was always going to happen wasn't it?? A little bit of harmless name dropping always helps too, lol ...)

Back on track(ish?, ok, maybe not), and possibly on a lighter note - wondering what the producers would have made of various other birding themes? ... eg ...


Local Patchworking - Seams pretty quiet ...

Bird ringing at Dunge - A very british Obs session ...

Flushing Meadows and other Habitats

DSLRs - an idiots guide

Flushed with success - scoring American Bittern

Flushed with pride - using lions in modern birding

Fieldcraft for beginners - (please just stay at home instead)

Kidlisting woes - how 7 year olds can really get your goat.

 

[s. james]

Just watched on iPlayer. Not my type of birding at all but I found it an entertaining programme.

Extreme twitchers seem a bit mad but fair play to them, they could be doing worse.

How on earth do so many of them end up married though? Women must be madder than I thought, I'll bear that in mind!

 

[The blackbird]

Continuing the theme of birders filmed breaking the law, the Craig family (and others) were shown trespassing at a private quarry in Warwickshire where an Aquatic Warbler had been found. I was surprised that this twitch was picked to be broadcast when there are so many other rare birds found in the country at sites with proper public access.
However it was a really nice surprise to see a familiar, local birding site on the telly - generally I enjoyed the programme.



Off-topic perhaps, but all I'm gonna say is the county recorder who found the warbler was trying to get the quarry owners to retain an area used by Warwickshire’s largest Sand Martin colony, but since that twitch the owners have stopped communicating with him and the colony’s long-term future is now uncertain...

Matt[/QUOTE


Well said Matt but having seen what we have seen and read what has been written do you think that anyone gave a flying **** at the time or will in the future. Local birders everywhere are seriously changing their thoughts on releasing any news on the birds that they find. As the programme acknowledged it is they who find these birds and therefore, maybe, only maybe, it will force one of these ridiculous idiots to one day find a bird of their own.

I exclude Lee from this as I know that he certainly puts the time in finding local stuff. Well done to him for that.

On a local level well done to you Matt for becoming WWT Local Rep.

 

[HokkaidoStu]

Living outside the UK I can't watch this on BBC's iplayer and I can't find any torrents of it to download....................guess I'll have to wait a few months before someone uploads it to youtube then.

I've never really been a twitcher but I've met a few including one from England with a British list of over 500 who now comes over here with his wife every autumn to stay on a small vagrant hotspot in the sea between Japan and the Asian mainland. A very nice couple actually. I should have asked him 'so what is Lee Evans really like?'

 

[Jack Dawe]

Having spoken to Helena today, I really think some of you guys are well off track! Good parents (which Chris and Helena most definately are) want to give their children a range of experiences which which give them choices in later life. There is a strong argument, that the observation, recording and notebook skills aquired by young birders, can prove useful in education and later life.

Yes, but forcing things down kids' throats isn't necessarily very profitable. I watched the programme again this evening (and enjoyed it just as much the second time around). I don't know the Craigs and accept that the clips in the programme may have been selectively chosen, but I have to say that I could not detect the slightest hint anywhere that Mya-Rose was actually enjoying herself. Yes, she dutifully noted some Bean Goose bill features - at her parents' prompting - but was she really interested? She seems a lovely, charming and obedient kid in a mutually loving family, but, let's face it, she was basically being dragged around the country because her parents were putting their interests (i.e. their year list) first. How many days was she taken out of school and how is she going to catch up on the work missed? Given that she is in a loving environment, I dont suppose it will do her any long-term harm, but I'll lay my bottom dollar that, once she gets into her teens and begins to assert her own personality, she will want nothing to do with this sort of lifestyle. I suspect her parents are putting her off for good. Lee made some general remarks in the programme along these lines and he is spot on. I hope I'm wrong.

 

[Jaff]

.. under a friendship agreement I decided to offer you with.

ROTFL!!! I don't know if you've ever watched The Big Bang Theory Lee but as soon as I saw this I laughed my socks off! Forget that George Michael crap, you are the Sheldon Cooper of birding! :-O

Having now heard the 'behind the scenes' version of the programme from contributions on this thread I retract part of my earlier post and yes the BBC did do a devious number on the editing which I knew was the case anyway but just assumed that the stuff left out was loads of dipped birds or something, not any footage to do with these folk engaging in any traditional birding which seems may have been the case. If someone had just made some comment about how good it is to see all those Red Kites at the rubbish dump it would have made me a lot happier. Or maybe they did and it was cut?

However, I stand by the other stuff and after reading all this **** coming from some of Britain's supposed 'leading birders' I've decided that a) I'm so glad I'm not a part of that scene and b) if I were I think I'd go twitching with Mya as she's the most mature apparently.

The sequel will be titled "When Twitching turns to Bitching".

 

[John Hague]

I suppose one question does spring to mind as we all debate the programme - did anyone involved get paid for appearing in the documentary? If they did then I think they can hardly complain about being unfairly treated. So maybe Garry, Lee, Les, The Craigs et al could come on and either confirm or deny getting money for their part in the programme?

 

[antshrike69]

b) if I were I think I'd go twitching with Mya as she's the most mature apparently.

:-O:-O:-O

 

[scary-canary]

Do birders really want to know the truth about Britain's Top 50 birders - I don't think so - but I have all the evidence and one day, I may be so pushed over the edge that I spill the beans - and it will be far from pleasant.

This sounds like the thread we'd all really like to read.:t:

 

[Stephen Dunstan]

I suppose one question does spring to mind as we all debate the programme - did anyone involved get paid for appearing in the documentary? If they did then I think they can hardly complain about being unfairly treated. QUOTE]

Hi John,

Not sure about that. Just because you are being paid for your opinions doesn't mean you shouldn't have an issue if you are gravely misrepresented. I say gravely because how many stories in the media about birding have you seen that have been completely accurate, they usually aren't ('Twitchers flock to see first ever Feral Pigeon for Britain', 'Bird Spotters in a flap over Budgie from Australia').

Having said that from what I know of twitching and twitchers it seemed reasonably accurate. It basically let the twitchers speak for themselves, and they said the things you would expect twitchers to say. Nobody was ever going to offer a lucid explanation as to why seeing a Cowbird was more important than world peace, because it isn't.

Stephen.

 

[dbradnum]

How many days was she taken out of school and how is she going to catch up on the work missed?

Yet more unfounded assumptions... you can look up the dates of every bird they saw. It appears to be a neat list of weekends and school holidays. If you're so determined to undermine them, then maybe you can scour it more closely and find what you're looking for. Personally, I've got better things to do.

 

[MPG]

I'm old enough to remember a time when it was OK to be called a "Twitcher". and by the way I have never considered myself to be one The excitement of seeing a new bird in Britain was what caused you to twitch uncontrollably not the idea that some meaningless list would go up by one digit. Those who were involved during the early eighties were probably all fine birders. Nowadays it seems you don't even have to know what it is you're going for to have seen 450+ very sad indeed :-(

Most of these Guys aren't even Twitchers they are merely LISTERS and that is what this programme should have been called.


OK it may have been set up but I thought the final quote summed up the whole current scene. Guy on 498 in response to alleged pager message "Grey Phalarope, do I need that or not?" Laughable.

 

[Bowland Birders]

I hope it didn't effect your enjoyment of the documentary.

Nope, no-one is perfect. I shudder to think what an edited version of my days out would look like on TV. You were more entertaining than I was expecting.

I enjoyed the programme much more that I expected to. Brett was great and although it looks like the stars were stitched up by the edit it was a good watch and there were a lot of uncomfortable truths amongst Lee's (or should that be Dracula?) claims (as well as a few preposterous ones but I am guessing Lee was goaded into these). I have know Lee for many years, travelling with him in the mid 80's. He is basically a nice guy with an out of control obsession but the twitching scene would be much duller without characters like him.

Some gripes though. Although Barry was entertaining the lack of effort on Inshboffin was a disgrace!

If Lee has my list as higher than it actually is can I count the higher total under BBA rules?

'I'm hungry'...'Can I have my breakfast now'. I am often heard to say these things but 'what is bracken?' made me laugh the most. Never work with kids and animals...

Shame about the very poor footage of birds in the programme. I remember previous programmes (eg the 1984(?) Tony Ropey on Scilly) with some great clips. The ones on this programme looked like they were taken through a beer bottle.

I am coming round to thinking that it is not in twitchers' interests to make the hobby look attractive to others. There are too many of us as it is so if the programme puts people off then that's fine by me.

Br, Mike

 

[MPG]

"The ones on this programme looked like they were taken through a beer bottle."

Possibly because they weren't sure they were the birds in question and were trying to hide the fact! LOL