"Virtually everybody watches birds at times," a website on ornithology informed me, "but not everybody is a birdwatcher." Birdwatchers are more interested in identifying birds, so I suppose that puts me in that category. "Birders," however, are an entirely different species, "more intense, more dedicated, more serious about the hobby and . . . sometimes offended by being called a birdwatcher." We realized immediately that we were in the midst of this more passionate category as we began our walk, past the bird feeders and into the swampy area behind the Fort.
"There's a red-winged blackbird," Randy suddenly said, and immediately lifted his binoculars to his eyes. He had a real talent for this, as did the others, whereas I was shifting mine back and forth, in and out of focus, thinking, "Where? Where?" The same area we had hiked in yesterday suddenly came alive as we stood silently, watching all kinds of previously nondescript birds being identified! There were swallows and mockingbirds and catbirds, to be sure, but also yellow rumped warblers (Yes, they do have little yellow rumps!) and grackles, and one huge black crowned night heron that arose out of a thicket and soared away over the Coast Guard Station.
Randy was good at "calling" them, two - I think he had as large a vocabulary as a mockingbird, as he made little twittering and tweaking sounds, patiently waiting to see what might fly up out of the bushes. And he knew their personalities well, too. "Plovers don't want to be seen at all," he said. "But mockingbirds like to show off."
Linda, less experienced than Dan and Randy, had already learned to disparage the "common" birds like robins and the pine warblers that I had been admiring all week. "I have a things with pine warblers," she said. "They get in the way and scare off some of the other birds." Even the beautiful red cardinals she referred to as ordinary. Meanwhile, I found myself watching some of the ordinary sparrows and mockingbirds with fascination as they perched and then disappeared and then re-appeared on another limb.
Randy was good at pulling his bird guide out in seconds and immediately flipping open the right page. How did he do it? Martha noticed it, too. But he was a likeable enough expert, not at all arrogant, merely rattling off one interesting bit of knowledge after another. We crossed over to the ocean side and started seeing brown pelicans and loons, and one very impressive great cormorant winging his way over the channel. I pointed to what I thought was a sandpiper playing in the surf. "Most people make that same mistake," he said, "But those are actually sanderlings, and the larger ones are willets." Dan got excited about a Bonaparte's gull; he had not seen one this year.
What simple joy this small group took in merely looking at these birds, spotting them and learning their names and their habits, watching a loon dive underwater and swim for a long time up the channel, bob his head up, and then turn around. "Realized there weren't any fish up the channel," Randy explained, "So he's heading back." These birders were true naturalists, not limiting themselves merely to birds but aware of the environment around them in an intense and knowledgeable way that I admired. I felt that I had been speed-reading nature; these people were savoring every word. I would have used the word "worship," perhaps.
The fog cleared a little and then fine rain began falling as we neared the Fort. "One more trip to the bird feeders and that will make a good day," Randy said. Suddenly a beautiful little bright green bird appeared. "There! There!" Randy said, pointing to the center feeder. Linda spotted it eventually, and so did the rest of us, and she let out a whoop of joy - a painted bunting, which she had never seen before. For her list.
"Look
at the birds of the air,
for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into
barns;
yet your heavenly Father feeds them.
Are you not of more value
than they?"
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