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Just yesterday, 3 July, I headed north out of the city by bus, met up with more birders in New Paltz, and continued all the way up to the town of Root in Montgomery County, New York, all in order to see my first-ever Mississippi Kite (Ictinia mississippiensis).  Present at the location, at the intersection [...]

I’m lucky enough to spend a great deal of time flying around the world finding unusual birds, but every so often I get lucky enough to find that something unusual has flown round the world to me. At about 15:30 an email popped up to say that a Franklin’s Gull had been found on [...]

Some days the milk of human kindness runneth over (etc etc), and I surprise even myself with my generosity. My arch-listing-rival Graham “the kitten botherer” Langley mailed to say that a mutual friend, Tommy Pedersen, a fellow birder who is a Captain with upmarket airline Emirates, was coming to the UK and really wanted to [...]

1st summer Franklin’s Gull Larus pipixcan
Devon, UK. 26 April 2006
 
“Hey buddy, d’you know which way North America’s at?”
 
Following hard on the heels of my trip to South Wales with Jo yesterday, I was obviously still in the mood to “go wild” and decided to go and see a 1st summer Franklin’s Gull Larus pipixcan [...]

The birding family tree bears many twisted branches from feederwatchers to world birders. Yet, few are considered as twisted as the slavering hordes of ‘listers’ and ‘twitchers’. As a card-carrying member, I should know. You probably already know that a lister is a birder who keeps track of birds spotted through the use of checklists [...]