It would appear that blog apathy is prevalent among us birding bloggers at the moment. Either that or it's just shit everywhere. I suspect it's a bit of both. An indication of just how bad it's been is the fact that I've almost gone a whole year without a lifer. The last tick I had was the very splendid Brown Flycatcher at Flamborough. My chances of making it to 500 by the time I'm forty is looking slim. However if I follow the guidelines of the IQ 40 club then I made it to 500 yonks ago - hurrah I'll expect my certificate in the post Lee.
This weekend sees the dude fest that is the Bird Fair taking place at Rutland Water. However I will be in a field in Chav soaked Essex at the V Festival with lots of great music to enjoy, my personal highlight being Girls Aloud. Blurry photos to follow possibly.
Congratulations to Mr Fray on finding Britain's largest ever flock of Two-barred Crossbills last week at Sumburgh head. I rang to inform him that according to the one eyed prophet his sighting was a new record, only for Rob to be texted 2 minutes later with the joyous news of 9 on Fair Isle.
7 comments:
Following years of excessive splitting, the IQ40 Club has decided to lump several species. Your list is now therefore exactly the same as everyone else's: two (Passerine and Non-passerine).
Congratulations. Your certificate's in the post.
Nice one Andy, makes it all simple just like members of the IQ40 club. I forsee some problems with the sub-species though. Any idea what's going to be countable as a subby?
In response to Mark it is crap out there at the moment. Normally at this time of year if the birding is a bit crap I'll spend my time looking at Butterflies and Dragonflies but this August... forget it!
What? Everyone knows you can't count subspecies, John. Oh, apart from Lee of course. And Birding World...
Yeah but what about if that supspecies is readily identifiable on plumage, vocalisation and has a distinct non-overlapping breeding area?
I can see there's no sense in trying to identify Blue, Great and Coal Tit for example as all live quite happily in the garden. What about Carrion Crow (Passer passer carrion crowiusii) and American Crow (Passer passer americanii crowiusii)? Surely we should after due consideration split these?
If we are not to accept these splits then the IQ40 Club should be renamed British Birding Organisation/IQ40/2 Club.
Can I still get a certificate by the way for being such a twat... or do I get one just for being a twat. Do you get certificates for being a two-hat twat? I need to know my head is bursting with all these questions.
I think you're missing the point John. The whole idea of lumping everything into just two species is that there will be no need to identify anything any more, and everyone can go and take up trainspotting or something instead.
Your certificate is on its way...
No I wasn't missing the point. I want to reopen the lumping and splitting debate. With such arbitrary decisions you'd think this was the UK 4/500 Club come British Bridwatching Association.
The point is that there are no subspecies under IQ40 Club rules. The idea is to get people to lose interest in birding once they've seen both the new 'species'.
And before someone suggests it, I've already awarded myself a certificate for being a twat and starting all this nonsense!
Post a Comment