Understanding Birding

Few months back when I informed my practice leader Madhav Kulkarni that I have a hobby of “Birding”, he asked me …

What is Birding? What does it mean?

This post is my attempt to give some clarity on what “I think” is birding. Others may differ and would welcome them to share their views in comments.

Birding is getting to know the birds by studying them, observing them (preferably through a binocular), Identifying them, understanding their habitats & food habits, watching how they behave (walk, fly, eat, mate, fight etc), documenting the experience and (often) capturing it in still picture or video format.

Let’s elaborate these points

Studying birds means learning everything that is described above. Ornithologists (those who study birds) and other bird enthusiasts have gathered a lot of information based on their experience & research. These are documented in books, sites & journals and help us understand how a bird looks (physical appearance), it’s Scientific classification (Family, Genus, Species), where to find it, where does it breed & when, what is its migration pattern & time (if any), what type of food it eats (seeds/insects/snakes etc), how does it call or sing and so many other things. This way a birder hits the field knowing what/where/when to look for during a trip. Want to see Great Indian Bustard (the bird that came second after Peacock in national bird selection)? One may refer to books to see we need to travel to desert national park near Jaisalmer, Rajasthan. We will know how it looks so that we can spot it on the field. We will also know that it is a shy bird and will fly away if it sees us. So we need to stay far (also we shouldn’t be disturbing its nesting grounds as they are critically endangered). To find Jacobian/Pied Cuckoo in West Bengal, we need to search only during/right after Monsoon as they migrates from south that time. If one tries that in winter, it will only be a wastage of time.

Observing birds is the best part of birding. Generally, most birders fell in love by just watching them in nature. In my case I have been watching bird for two plus decades but got serious in December 2017 after I went to Keoladeo Ghana National park at Bharatpur, Rajasthan which is paradise for birdwatchers. Binocular is an essential tool to watch birds as they typically stay far away. Approaching too close will scare them to fly away. With digital cameras available in varieties now, most take snaps as well.

Next & most tricky is identifying the birds. There are field guides to help birder ID a bird (Birds of the Indian Subcontinent by Carol Inskipp, Richard Grimmett, Tim Inskipp being the most famous for Indian birds). There are also mobile apps like Merlin Bird ID. There is an excellent Facebook forum called “Ask IDs of Indian birds” where one can post the picture with location details and SMEs can help with ID & (often) pointers.

One must keep track of the birds he/she saw or heard. ebird.org (a project by Cornell University) is the most popular place to do that while there are other ways too (e.g. capture in Excel). ebird checklists show what we have seen, in how many counts, who else was there with us, how far we walked/moved, when we started & ended the birding etc and allow to upload media like pictures. We can look back these records and re-live the experience and also track how many birds we have seen & snapped in different regions.

A day in a life of a birder is as follows – We decide to go to a place (forest, marshland, water body etc). We check in ebird if there is any birding place there (i.e. hotspot) and what kinds of birds are seen. This can be filtered by months also to see what to expect now. Then see what are the birds we haven’t seen before (i.e. this becomes our target bird list). Study the appearance, identifier and other details about the bird. You can check their calls in ebird or .xeno-canto.org so that we can recognize their existence through their call while they are hidden in forest. If we are lucky and do see the bird in field, we observe them move & act. We take pictures & videos and record their calls if it gives opportunity. We submit ebird checklist reporting all birds we have seen that day. My total count of bird species seen goes up by new birds I saw that day. Each bird we saw for the first time in our life in wild is called a “Lifer”.

Now there are two broad types of birders (though there can be folks who show both characteristics).

1.      “Bird Watcher” whose primary aim is to see as many birds as possible and with added varieties like age (adult, juvenile), sex (male, female), plumage (breeding, non-breeding), action (flying, hunting, eating, mating etc). They observe the birds through bare eyes or binoculars and take note of the experience. They may or may not take pictures. They study birds through various means and put that to test on the field further enhancing their knowledge of birds. No of Lifer is an important priority for them.

2.      “Bird Photographer” whose primary aim is to take high quality pictures of the bird and/or capture unique moments (e.g. a bird with a catch). While in their pursuit they do see many more birds but their first priority is not increasing Lifer count but to get good pictures. Generally these are shared in photography sites & magazines and sometimes fetch awards. No of Awards is an important priority for them.

Bird watchers are also of different natures. Some are exploratory and try to go to new areas or in odd times and find new birds which were not reported in that region or time before. They are pioneers and help us identify new birding hotspots. While some others would stick to one area and keep going there again & again so that all birds in that area are identified and the list becomes comprehensive. These two set of people compliment each other and together takes birding to newer heights.

There is a third category also who are followers. They will see someone posted a new bird in an area. They will speak to someone who has seen the bird, find out exactly where the bird was seen and then just go & snap the bird and post it in social media. While first two categories spend a lot of time & sweat these followers take an easy route. Honestly these three categories are extreme examples and in reality we demonstrate attributes of all three with one being more dominant feature.

So if you need to start your journey of birding you should buy a binocular & a camera (doesn’t need to be costly) that supports tele/zoom lens 200mm or larger. Then buy a bird identification Book and study the birds in your locality. Then start making trips to local birding hotspots preferably with someone experienced (early morning being the best time). Once you are home, ID the birds you captured and submit a checklist in ebird. Subscribe to birding sites like SundayWatch in Facebook and follow the work of others & learn. Then join some birding trips arranged by guides/forums to try new areas and see new birds (e.g. Neora Valley NP, Bharatpur etc). Once you have done that you will know what’s next. Your birding friends whom you have met in fields will guide you thereafter.

Hope anyone who wasn’t clear on what is birding, will now have some idea about it and gain some interest. If this article makes one new birder, may be you or someone in your family, I would think my job is done. Happy birding!