Friday, November 03, 2006

Birder survey

From Patrick at The Hawk Owl's Nest:

Please copy and paste your responses in the comments or post this on your blog.

What state (or country) do you live in? NJ, USA
How long have you been birding? 10+ years
Are you a "lister"? Sort of, I keep a life list and a yard list, but I'm not obsessive about it.
ABA Life List: n/a (I don't know the difference between the two - told you I wasn't obsessive!)
Overall Life List: Let's see.... I'll have to count from the front of my Peterson's. 275.
3 Favorite Birding Spots: Sandy Hook, NJ, Cape May, NJ, Delaware Bayshore, NJ
Favorite birding spot outside your home country: n/a
Farthest you've traveled to chase a rare bird: The only bird I ever *chased* was my life Snowy Owl and it was just 15 minutes or so away at Sandy Hook. I searched for that bird in the freezing cold for hours though...
Nemesis bird: Golden Eagle
"Best" bird sighting: The next one!
Most wanted trip: North Dakota, Minnesota, Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas, etc - I want to see those prairie states!
Most wanted bird: Great Gray Owl
What model and brand of bins do you use?: Zeiss 7 X 42 B/GA
What model and brand of scope do you use?: Leica Televid 77
What was the last lifer you added to your list?: Wilson's Plover
Where did you see your last lifer?: Sandy Hook
What's the last bird you saw today?: Crow
Best bird song you've heard ever: Baltimore Oriole
Favorite birding moment: A long, leisurely look at a Peregrine Falcon perched on the rail of Old Barney during a field trip with Pete Dunne.
Least favorite thing about birding: Rain and bugs. And those birders who are always stepping in front of me and blocking the view!
Favorite thing about birding: Arriving at the *place* for the day, picking up the binoculars and heading out on the trail. ;-) It's all about the anticipation of what may come along.
Favorite field guide for the US: National Geographic
Favorite non-field guide bird book: All of them. ;-)
Who is your birder icon?: Don't have one.
Do you have a bird feeder(s)? Yes
Favorite feeder bird? Blue jay

11 comments:

Endment said...

Great survey and post!!!

Dave Dorsey said...

Nice, but prarie states?

LauraHinNJ said...

Endment: Would like to see your answers - hint, hint.

amarkonmywall said...

Great post! Makes me smile because after years of greating birding I'm now stuck with these #**!&!! sparrows in my urban courtyard. I don't suppose "rat" counts as the last bird I saw today?

Actually, this week I added house finchs at the feeder so now I have gold and house, juncos, a lone hairy woodpecker and a billion sparrows. My favorite feeder birds were titmice. Honduras was the best birding country, except all the eagles in Alaska. OK, I guess I'm supposed to go do this at my place...:-)

Lynne at Hasty Brook said...

Come on up to Minnesota this winter and find your Great Gray Owl! I was fortunate to see 50+ in one day during the erruption winter.

LauraHinNJ said...

Vicki: Sounds like you have a nice mix of feeder birds; they are always too many house sparrows. Even though I feed good seed I still have too many.

Lynne: Are you trying to make me jealous?

;-)

It's been interesting to read other's responses to this survey. I think my life list is pretty good, considering that all but 10 of them were seen in NJ. I really need to do some birding in other areas of the country and would love to come to your part of the world - though I'm not so sure I would like that much cold!

Endment said...

Got it done: My Version

Patrick B. said...

Laura - Thanks for filling it out. Did you see the Snowy at the Hook on your search?

LauraHinNJ said...

Thanks endment - impressive life list you've got!

Patrick: This was fun. Yep, I got the snowy that day, and then they started turning up everywhere. Forget what year that was.

I searched in the wind at North Beach forever it seemed!

John B. said...

Working up a list that high with mostly NJ birding is pretty impressive. It takes dedication to accomplish that.

LauraHinNJ said...

John: I used to bird almost every weekend, haven't been doing that lately.