Lifers

What birders mean when we say "lifer" is something you might be wondering. Ah, the phenomenon of the life bird can only be truly understood by someone who really loves birds. Now, don't get me wrong, I haven't always been obsessed with birds and I used to make fun of my parents when they talked about birds, and how many lifers they got on their trips, but the more you start to enjoy birding, the more you want to chart your progress, and keeping track of the "lifers" is a good way to do it. The lifer gives you a tingle in your stomach, a rush of adrenaline through your body, and a keen sense of achievement. Every lifer is earned (or should be) by learning the field marks, calls, habitat preferences, and behaviors of birds, and birds are very diverse in all of the above aspects.

You may have heard of people being referred to, disparagingly, as "listers". A common, but not necessarily accurate perception of people who keep track of their lifers is that all they are trying to do is rack up a big lifelist. This in and of itself is not a bad thing, but there are certainly a few listers out there, who may engage in a little bit of bird sandbagging. There are those in the birding world who love birds, but would prefer to have someone else find, point out, enumerate the various field marks and call variations, point to the bird, and raise their binoculars to behold the lifer, tick it off their checklist, and move on down the trail to have the next lifer found for them. Some of us who work very hard to find and ID the birds on our own may have trouble accepting this as true birding, but to each his own. And hey, if I had the money, I might spend it on a bird guide who could find some of the more elusive species for me. But alas, I will never find myself in that quandary...no worries.

I don't care how big my lifelist is, but I do keep track of it, because one of my goals in life is to see as many species of North American birds as I can, and maybe one day I will branch out to the rest of the world. Recently I was treated to a new lifers, with the help of a birding friend with whom I hardly ever get the chance to bird, but who has helped me get numerous lifers. One September day this fall, I had the day off from school so I went out to bird. I found some early Purple Finches and I knew that my friend needed them for his year list, so I let him know where they were. So he arrived and we birded a bit, he got his Purple Finches, and then we decided to hit a little-birded place in the area.

We ended up in a cemetery of all places and the birding was a bit slow and we were getting ready to pack it in. We moseyed along the edge of the property and a bird landed on a sumac branch just in front of us, at eye level. We both held our breath and noted the field marks: greyish/brown hood extending onto the breast, bold (complete, not broken) white eye ring, pale yellow underparts...it couldn't be...one of the most coveted birds on the East Coast of North America: a Connecticut Warbler!!

This bird is a difficult one to find although people tell me they turn up regularly in NYC parks like Forest Park in Queens. They are the kind of bird you just have to be lucky to see. This was only the second on seen in Orange County NY since they started keeping records, about 50 years! Needless to say, it was an exciting bird and I was psyched to add it to my list. Yahooooooo!