I have only two ways of “logging” birds. One is the checkmark in my Peterson guide for a lifer. I do this separately for the Eastern and Western guides, so, for example, my first Robin in Washington counted as a Western lifer, even though I had already checked it off in my Eastern guide.
The other is the narrative of field days in my Grinnell journal, in which a given taxon is mentioned at each point in the excursion where it appears. The ones that interest me enough also get a species account in another section of the Grinnell journal; this means that all observations of that taxon throughout the year are collated, with usually more detailed behavioral notes than in the main journal narrative.
Since I don’t work with telephoto or tripods, I don’t concern myself with photos of birds unless I can easily get a clear shot. I would rather tell their story in words.
Cannot praise eBird enough for it’s utility in keeping track of bird lists! My only quibble with them is that now certain species are automatically shunted into the “exotics” category and don’t contribute to list totals. This is all well and good if you subscribe to the ABA listing rules, but I’m personally willing to count the occasional Monk Parakeet or European Goldfinch that pops up in my area for the life list. It’s a very small quibble as my region has almost no exotics.
As for other listing rules, I originally required myself to see a bird in order to count it on my life list. This was more a result of my initial inexperience with bird sound ID than anything else. Ultimately, I’ve abandoned this restriction, as my ability to be confident of sound ID has grown. What triggered the departure was taking a job surveying for Black Rails (Laterallus jamaicensis), during which I heard but never saw the little buggers, and decided I wanted to be able to count them. Since then, I’ve seen some, and today this distinction would only result in a loss of a single bird from my life list.
It took me three years of working with the species to finally see one in situ (i.e., not trapped for research purposes). Been working with them 5+ years now and still have only seen them in situ twice.
When I was first getting a bit more serious about birds I went to a wildlife reserve with my wife to see if we could spot anything a bit more unusual. It’s an odd place because it has captive birds on ponds and roaming free in between the wild habitats and hides so at the time we found it confusing to know what was wild and what wasn’t. In one small hide people were watching a bird feeder and there was a water rail (Rallus aquaticus) picking about on the ground underneath. It was a bird I’d only flicked past in field guides because they were supposed to be impossible to spot so we assumed it was some tame species. It was a year or two later that I found out that this bird hide is well known by birders who want to spot a wild rail because they’re very bold there for some reason. I wish I’d taken some photos now…
I was a very casual birder for years and listed the species I saw in my field notes but didn’t pay attention to numbers. I got more active in the 2000s and made more of an effort to find species I hadn’t yet seen. Since I got a good digital camera with telephoto about 15 yrs ago, the bird doesn’t count for me unless I get a diagnostic photo (if I didn’t get a pic, it wasn’t there). And I use iNat to keep track of those.
Out of curiosity: How many birds do people have on their life lists?
I have 164 species, but 12 of them are tentative IDs, 22 are from an early life list and are species I can’t verify (remember) having ever seen, and 4 are dated but I also cannot remember seeing – so somewhere around 126 confirmed species. I’ve also only been keeping my life list for a few years, though, and I’m still a student so I haven’t done much traveling.
349 without hybrids and escapees. I don’t think you need to travel a lot, US has a huge list of birds, keep birding and you’ll get as many as you wish!
Approximately 724 worldwide, 455 in North America. Almost all that traveling out of the country came before I was 25. It would be nice to travel again, but it’s harder now.
I added 28 species to my year list yesterday, including two added to my life list. 83 species already this year and the spring arrivals aren’t even here yet.
260 species (all in Australia) at last count, excluding hybrids and non-established escapees.
My personal list rules are:
1 - Birds must be seen directly - heard only birds are listed in eBird or otherwise noted, but do not count for life list.
2 - Hybrids/non-established escapees are are listed in eBird or otherwise noted, but do not count for life list.
3 - Birds are counted even if view was poor, so long as they can be identified.
4 - Unknown birds photographed and then identified later are counted.
5 - Birds I could not identify but were identified by other birders seeing the same individual at the same time are counted - even if I could not identify it myself, I still saw the bird.
I can certainly get behind number 5 when other birders have their £1000+ scopes and I just have my budget binoculars. I don’t fancy lugging a scope about though even if I could afford one.
The local rarities — typically species that are far away from where they should be — are of interest to me since I might never get to the areas where they can be regularly seen. I’ve gotten quite a few of those within a short drive from my office or home, thanks to eBird reports. I often refer to these as the “doomed vagrants” which might or might not be true depending on how far off they are from their natural range. I try not to use that term around the hardcore birders.
