Worst thing to happen to you when Birding? (4 Viewers)

[Tero]

David, it's about a week of that. Franklin's gulls. Then a week of half of that. Then a liitle more.

My extreme birding was Big Bend Texas. I had a little breathing issues at the altitude and the climb in the heat. Heard the Colima. Went up another half mile. Saw the colima.

Then we came down. It was easy hiking, but the descent was too fast. A migraine/ heat stroke/ altitude sickness gave me a huge pounding headache and nausea. I was visualizing my swelled brain. I was not able to swallow even the migraine pill. Four hours later I was able to have a small meal to celebrate the Colima warbler.

 

[Maffong]

Wow, some of you really have stories to tell their children and grandchildren!
My story is less thrilling to tell, but I was so worried that i stopped taking pictures. In hindsight a bad idea, since I saw lots of cool birds that I have never seen again.
In 2010 I lived with a host family as an exchange student in Ecuador. One of my host brothers had to install some sanitary facilities in a small village called Tigüino in the amazonian lowlands. Unfortunately it was a place where oil companies were searching for oil, so there had been some problems between workers and local indigenous people and a few years before a worker had been killed by the indigenous.
To make sure I wouldn't wander into dangerous regions I accompanied two locals who were clearing some space for palm plantations (I think), but where they worked it was boring, so I wandered back towards the town, when an Ivory-billed Aracari caught my attention. When I tried to get better views I encountered a small (but clearly visible) path and had a look if something interesting lingered around. And to my astonishment I found an antswarm with dozens of good birds following it. I followed the birds, but soon realized that I wasn't on the trail anymore. When I tried to go back I just couldn't find it anymore! I had antbirds,antshrikes, manakins, woodcreepers, barbets and much more around me, but was too preoccupied with refinding the trail that couldn't be further away than 50-100m.
In the end I tried to walk a small stream up and down for each about a kilometer without success (but many bats and a Buff-tailed Sicklebill), before I decided to search for the highest point I could find. When I had finally climbed a small mountain, where I wanted to climb on top of a tree I relocated another (or was it maybe the same) trail clearly made by humans. I had just been like 50m away from it all the time!
When I finally made it out of the forest I had been lost for 4 hours and people were already searching for me!
I never admitted to my host-brother that I'd actually been lost

Greets
Maffong

 

[trw]

Watching incoming waders on Morecambe promenade I noticed the image through my scope was smudged.
I took it off the tripod and cleaned it up.
It was still blurred when I remounted it!
Repeated the process-same result.
The same day I noticed a shadowy curtain on my left eye-then flashes of light.
I retried the scope and noticed the same shadow.
The next day I woke up and the grey curtain was still hanging down over my eye and the flashes were going off like fireworks.
A quick check on Google revealed the cause:a detached retina.
Went to the doctors,and,long story short,I was rushed off the local hospital- then passed onto St Paul's Eye Hospital in Liverpool,pronto, for an emergency operation, to save the sight in that eye.
A few years on and my eyesight is fine-but I always sweat a little when I notice a smudge on my scope!

 

[Kratter]

After bustling days of frayed nerves in Lima, our group was relieved to get to Pullcallpa Peru on the Ucayali to gear up for what was to be the Scarlet-banded Barbet discovery trip in 1996. Wetlands and flooded grasslands were visible from the edge of open market so we were looking for birds. A haggard looking guy was hassling us for money and we ignored him. He ran at me and grabbed by digital wristwatch (which I had borrowed because mine had broke its band), and slowly ran off. I decided that he was far too slow and all I needed to do was grab my watch back. I grabbed his arm, but with his other arm he slashed at me with what turned out to be a box-cutter. Got me in the upper chest, an inch or so below my throat. I let him go, went to the hospital and got sewn up. A group of Peruvians with big sticks chased down the ladron and got my watch back. Ended up being a pretty good trip (understatement) despite that rocky start! Andy

 

[Jim M.]

A group of Peruvians with big sticks chased down the ladron and got my watch back.

Great story. But seems he got off rather light for what I reckon is felony class aggravated assault and battery! Unless of course the big sticks were put to good use.

 

[dalat]

Ended up being a pretty good trip (understatement) despite that rocky start! Andy

Wow! Is there somewhere something to read about this trip after that "rocky start"?

 

[Kratter]

Wow! Is there somewhere something to read about this trip after that "rocky start"?

Here are a few published papers

http://www.bioone.org/doi/pdf/10.1642/0004-8038(2000)117[0569:ASNSOB]2.0.CO;2

http://fm2.fmnh.org/rbi/pdfs/peru02/CAtechEN.pdf (birds starts on p 151)

We have another paper in the works that will describe another species.

Andy

 

[Farnboro John]

Thought of a better one than my first effort (though its nowhere near some of the foreign ones!)

Headed Oop North with Jungle Cat and Tringbirder for female Pine Bunting at Big Waters NR. Roy was writing a column in Birdwatching at the time and we were twitting him about all the namechecks for his Tringbirdingcompanions.

Some 20 miles short, early in the morning, Ms Cat lost control of the car on black ice (I would have too) and there was a mighty BANG as we hit the central reservation barrier. I switched off the ignition (to prevent ignition) and from the back seat came a deep rumble: "Is that Clare with or without an I?"

We were almost immediately chatting to another (non-birding) crew that had slid off the near-side of the carriageway and shortly after the coppers arrived and assumed we were that crew. Just to give you an idea of how slippery the road was, the cops parked on the hard shoulder and the one that came over to us took three steps and then slid on the ice across all three lanes to end up by our vehicle!

We were towed off, took a taxi to Big Waters and nailed the Pine Bunting, then got a lift from a birder back to the garage and were Relayed home by the AA. Simples! But waking up to feel the car snaking on the ice and then the crashing impact was not fun.

John

 

[Johann Sebastian Bach]

Salisbury Plain. Location of various rare ground-nesting birds.
A road runs across the plain which has big warning notices about not stopping and it being MOD land.

Salisbury Plain. Location of the British Army's tank firing grounds.
So we decide to ignore the "DON'T STOP" signs and start looking through bins and scopes.

Salisbury Plain. Location of two rather stupidly naive birders.
So an unmarked 4x4 screeched to a stop beside us and the uniformed PC inside started chatting into his radio. We could hear him doing a registration check on our car.

Salisbury Plain. Location of specially trained police and a large laboratory.
He got out of his 4x4 and shouted at us in a very aggressive, commanding voice. He was the most "no nonsense" PC I've ever heard.
GET..IN..YOUR..CAR..NOW..AND..LEAVE.. DON'T..EVER..STOP..HERE..AGAIN.

Salisbury Plain. Location of armed Special Branch police and Porton Down (Biological and Chemical Warfare - allegedly).

Peter :smoke:

 

[Larry Sweetland]

Leaving Jatun Sacha forest reserve in Ecuador on a local bus after a day's birding, the brakes failed and the bus ended up on it's roof. People died. I didn't.

 

[Torchepot]

Sadly not all birders escape their misadventures, in recent years there have been several birders, naturalists and conservationists who have not made it back alive.

It's inevitable that they will be in the frontline as the "lure of the new" takes them into difficult and dangerous places and they're often amongst the first to explore areas that "open up" and don't feature in the guide books.


http://blogs.crikey.com.au/northern...-death-hazard/?wpmp_switcher=mobile&wpmp_tp=0

I sympathize with the OP as there is nothing quite like looking down the wrong end of a gun to put looking for birds into perspective. Tragically there seem to more places that are just too dangerous these days (or maybe I'm just getting old!)

Spare a thought for the Dutch birder Elwold Horn who (as far as anyone knows) is still being held hostage in the Philippines after almost 4 years.

 

[stuartvine]

I sympathize with the OP as there is nothing quite like looking down the wrong end of a gun to put looking for birds into perspective. Tragically there seem to more places that are just too dangerous these days (or maybe I'm just getting old!)

Indeed. We have a kind of family rule. Despite any temptations, we don't go to places where the locals might regard us as shootable or sellable. Particularly those where we might end up starring in an ISIS snuff video. It's just common sense.

 

[Sharpbill]

Family holiday to Montenegro in 1987 and my first visit to a communist country at a time when Yugoslavia was still in post-Tito political upheaval. My allotted free birding day was going well, although I had to decline a local's offer of a boat loan at Lake Skadar in order to reach a Dalmatian Pelican colony, mindful that the Albanian border running through the middle of the lake was patrolled by a gunboat. I had all my targets under the belt bar one, Rock Partridge, but I had a site near Cetinje.
So there I was gently driving a rural road behind a Lada which slowed, pulled over onto the verge, then unexpectedly swung out in front of me. I hit it broadside. All the locals turned out and the only English I got was from one particular mountain gorilla who said "Fifty pounds, no problems". The police arrived, shook hands with everyone and said to me, "Passport". A cursory glance and it went into an inside pocket in his leather jacket. Back at the police station I was breathalised, completed paperwork and told to attend court next morning.
Back at the beach and passportless I found my wife and kids and I believe the first thing I said was, "You'll laugh about this one day". A girl from the hotel went with me next morning to act as translator and she explained the system. A fair hearing, then I would be found guilty and fined. But it didn't work out that way. After giving my statement sentence by translated sentence to an unexpectedly packed courtroom the other driver became so incensed he had to be restrained. On the final not guilty verdict I was whisked away to retrieve my passport and only later did I find out that I was threatened in court as he, "Wished he had beaten me up yesterday". Never have seen Rock Partridge.

 

[StevePreddy]

While guiding a Swiss birder on the Severn estuary in early 2013, we were just heading out to see the Purple Sandpipers on the point at Portishead, when I suddenly felt the worst abdominal pain I had ever experienced, called 999, and was taken by ambulance to Bristol Royal Infirmary. Scans showed that my small intestine had perforated, leading to peritonitis, which usually leads to sepsis then death within about 24 hours, so ... emergency surgery that evening, two weeks of very close monitoring in hospital, and a follow-up op later in the year to put everything back in working order, all courtesy of our wonderful National Health Service. Had it happened two months earlier when I was in northern India, the outcome may have been somewhat different. Do I win the thread?

 

[Gladiator96]

If I recall correctly on a similar thread a few years ago a guy said he was somewhere in Africa and the boat he was on capsized and his friends got eaten by crocodiles. He wins.

 

[dantheman]

While guiding ..., the outcome may have been somewhat different. Do I win the thread?

Nope, it happened whilst birding but was something that presumably would have happened anyway, whatever you were doing and not directly related to the rigours of birding per se ... so you have to deduct a large amount/percentage of the trauma concerned ...



Imo, sorry!

Amongst the worst things to happen to me was the loss of three biros on a solo birding trip to Turkey and Georgia in 2011.

 

[StevePreddy]

Nope, it happened whilst birding but was something that presumably would have happened anyway, whatever you were doing and not directly related to the rigours of birding per se ... so you have to deduct a large amount/percentage of the trauma concerned.

Oh well. maybe next time. Got to go, the washing machine has just finished doing another batch of lottery tickets.

 

[Maffong]

A while ago I read a trip report about a pelagic in Peru, where they had awesome sightings and when the tour leader turned around to talk with the crew one of them was suddenly missing never to be found again. That would kind of ruin my whole trip...

 

[Mysticete]

I don't have too many stories really...I am mostly a wuss who avoids even the hint of danger. However sometimes my caution doesn't quite counteract my curiosity.

One morning I decided to try this one feeder spot I had heard about, but never been to. This involved driving up to the end of a plowed road and scanning some feeders. Unfortunately I drove past this point and continued on a stretch of road that was less than paved. realizing that the snow was getting deeper and my little honda civic was not exactly designed to deal with the conditions, I tried to turn around in a drive way only to get stuck, without enough traction to make it out of the sloped driveway. After wandering around and trying to get a signal I finally got a tow some hours later. Given the distance we were from everything however it came to several hundred dollars. That was my first and last time I did any winter birding away from paved roads.

Another incident that comes to mind is trekking with some folks to look for newts in San Diego county. San Diego is pretty far south in their range and so they were extraordinarily local. Still my herper friend knew a spot. Unfortunately said spot was fairly remote, much of the hike was exposed and treeless, and parts of the "trail" were steep sandy slopes and in one case I rope was needed to make it down. This was all fine early on a summer morning, but when we went back midday the heat just about killed me, and I got a bad case of heatstroke.

The WORST however was:

We didn't get any newts

My friends continued up a rocky stream area which required far more bouldering than my out of shape and poorly coordinated body was used to. Said friends found a family of dippers, a bird that would have been a lifer at the time (Since seen in WY thankfully) and extraordinarily great county bird (again...we were near the southern coastal terminus of their range, much like the newts)

And of course, I passed the news on and birders looking for the dippers posted great images of newts!

ARRGGGHH

 

[Dog]

If I recall correctly on a similar thread a few years ago a guy said he was somewhere in Africa and the boat he was on capsized and his friends got eaten by crocodiles. He wins.

6 of us went out to the Gambia in 1984 & the 700 tonne boat did capsize, 4 people drowned out of 90 people on board but 3 of them were our group from Coventry but only 2 bodies were recovered in Crocodile infested waters. We did spend 6 hours on the upturned hull of the boat till we were rescued.

Mike.