Enjoy living in a place with a low bird density? (1 Viewer)

[earlytorise]

Does anyone here enjoy living in a place with a low bird density?

Alternatively, if you do live in such a place but don't enjoy it, you can comment in order to rant about it.

I was talking about this with a birding acquaintance who gave me a lift. I was living in Oxford at the time.

Given that Oxfordshire is an unimpressive place for bird diversity, I said to him, wouldn't it be more interesting to live in a place with more migrants (East Yorkshire, Norfolk, the Isles of Scilly)?

He told me that if I were to live in a migration hotspot, I'd become less passionate about e.g. finding or looking at a scarce bird, because I'd be looking at scarce birds all the time. It's as if he wants to have a mediocre local patch or county, so that trips or twitches become something to look forward to.

 

[Richard Prior]

I see where your friend is coming from, though I’m sure nearly all of us never become less passionate about finding a scarce bird. But yes, living in a migration hotspot or a species diverse location could mean looking often at scarce birds found by others (or at birds that might be scarce in an inland county like Oxford but regular at coastal or bottleneck sites) which might prove less exciting.
For me, like your friend, I find living in a landlocked county/département makes me work harder on my birding and finding that scarce or rare bird is an enormous boost when it happens, the fact that it happens less often than if I lived on the coast or by well watched réserve makes it all the more rewarding.
Finding scarce or rare birds when Selsey Bill/ Pagham Harbour was on my doorstep (literally) was great, but finding two firsts for the département in my 17 years in Haute-Savoie, France tops all that.
So yes, I do enjoy living in a place with low(er) species density for that sense of challenge that comes with it ( though it would be nice to see a duck or wader occasionally ).

 

[KenM]

Agree totally with Richard’s sentiments on abode location.
When you find something on your patch/garden in what might be regarded on paper as a “low density” area, with the time and patience (obsession even 😮) you can turn “low density” into a higher yield site!
Does take months and months (sometimes years) of nowt!….but when you score, it’s like nothing else.🤩
No headland…offshore island, “shooting fish in a barrel” for me!
I like to feel as though I’ve earned it…..now where are those return tickets to FTV?🤣

 

[Richard Prior]

Bon voyage!

 

[DMW]

These responses all seem like a massive cope to me 😔

 

[Richard Prior]

These responses all seem like a massive cope to me 😔

You’ve lost me there DMW, what’s a cope?

 

[KenM]

You’ve lost me there DMW, what’s a cope?

I can only reason that he means “coping” with where you’re at, implying that one might wish to be elsewhere? 😩……perish the thought.😮

 

[DMW]

You’ve lost me there DMW, what’s a cope?

Trying to put a brave face on a bad situation and kid yourself that you are happy about it.

 

[Richard Prior]

Trying to put a brave face on a bad situation and kid yourself that you are happy about it.

OK thanks, I’ve clearly lost the ability to correctly express myself in English since leaving UK nearly 20 years ago.

 

[KenM]

Trying to put a brave face on a bad situation and kid yourself that you are happy about it.

Nothing could be further from the truth DMW! We might compare lists between abodes, (my 40 years radiating to St Paul’s,10 miles).😉

 

[DMW]

Nothing could be further from the truth DMW! We might compare lists between abodes, (my 40 years radiating to St Paul’s,10 miles).😉

Well if you are bragging about the size of your list, doesn't that by definition disqualify you from living in an area with low bird diversity?

 

[KenM]

Well if you are bragging about the size of your list, doesn't that by definition disqualify you from living in an area with low bird diversity?

No we’re not talking about list size,(mines not big, c448…I think, relative to my years in the saddle so to speak, it should be somewhat bigger). We’re talking about “finds” within what might be considered a low yield inland urban area. 😊

 

[KC Foggin]

Who could not love being surrounded by nature?

 

[William Lewis]

I'm in Bedfordshire, it's got one of the lowest annual species counts in the UK. I can walk for hours and hours around my local area and rarely will my species list get above around 35 for the day. I went to titchwell for 3 hours and got 60 without a great deal of effort a few months back.

I enjoy doing my birding here, i honestly think it's all relative. I know I've done very well if I get above 40 and take satisfaction from that just as much as if I get many more in a different area on holiday.

There's a variety of habitat locally, woodland, farmland, a river and a small lake on my regular route. I know which individual tree a greater spotted woodpecker likes to sit in, the route the jay's take from the oak trees to bury their acorns, where the stoats nest and can watch how different species come and go depending on the water levels of the river and lake. It all changes daily and I enjoy really getting to know it. I've said it before but there is so much more to anyone's local eco system than they'll ever understand but I enjoy scratching the surface immensely.

Will

 

[opisska]

For five years I lived in Warsaw. At first I was not thinking much about it as the birds there are in principle quite similar to those in the Czech Republic, there are a few specialties, but not a long list. The landscape doesn't look particularly exotic, just some meadows, rivers, forests, quite a lot of habitation around the city. Of course, having Biebrza not that far seemed to be nice, but even there the list of what can be seen got quickly exhausted.
And then I slowly begun realizing the difference. There were birds (and mammals, and later amphibians, and then insects ...) everywhere. There was so much random wild habitat, so much room. And while the species were not groundbreaking (except for the fantastic twitching opportunities), there was just this constant onslaught of nature.

Then I moved back to Prague and now I see the stark contrast. Here, the landscape is utterly devastated by intensive agriculture and development. Such a little area gets left to nature - and even that which does is lifeless compared to NE Poland. On the map - and on the surface - the countries are so similar, but the reality can't be more different. Now I am suffering the life back here and missing my Warsaw living deeply. Yes, I cope with that by traveling near and far, including Poland, but it's simply a big difference to having all the nature at my doorstep.

 

[Larry Sweetland]

It's all relative. Some people might think that living somewhere where less than 300 species are possible in a day is low density.

 

[Dave Ball]

“Cope” as a noun seems to be a recent neologism amongst those ‘down with the kids’, I’ve frequently seen it used, as ‘copium’ (cf. opium) of Russian attempts to polish the turd that is the performance of their armed forces.

As a more-or-less retired Bedfordshire birder my sympathies are with William (you could have a life sentence there, lad), and I find myself in full agreement with Richard and Ken.

Dave Ball
Bedfordshire finds include: Wilson’s and Grey Phalaropes, American Golden Plover*, Ferruginous Duck, Ring-necked Duck, Great, Arctic* and Long-tailed* Skuas, Eider*, Velvet Scoter, Red Kite (pre-reintroduction), Gannet, Temminck’s Stint, Monty’s Harrier, and probably a few more I’ve forgotten and several I missed/cocked up/didn’t get accepted (Bee Eater grrr, Black Kite grrr)
*Firsts for county. Doubtless soon to be outstripped by Steve Blain 😡

 

[Trilogy82]

There's a variety of habitat locally, woodland, farmland, a river and a small lake on my regular route. I know which individual tree a greater spotted woodpecker likes to sit in, the route the jay's take from the oak trees to bury their acorns, where the stoats nest and can watch how different species come and go depending on the water levels of the river and lake. It all changes daily and I enjoy really getting to know it. I've said it before but there is so much more to anyone's local eco system than they'll ever understand but I enjoy scratching the surface immensely.

Totally agree. I get as much relaxation and enjoyment watching the common garden birds at the feeder as I do seeking out the less common species to add the the years list.

 

[lockbreeze926]

Enjoying scarcity, self-denial and finding something positive in meagre rations is the job of a medieval monk.

That will be a bus with few passengers.

 

[jurek]

I used to live in the Netherlands, where rarities just happen. its the coast. Then I moved to inland Europe. And, strangely, I realized that my happiness level during birding is similar. You just get accustomed to the lower baseline level. Only I don't get excited about local rarities, because I saw all of them before elsewhere.