My Life’s Birds: #208

May 20, 1994 – Ozark City Park, Mo – There’s a term I’ve used before when describing certain birds. “Birder’s birds”. Those that occupy the opposite end of the spectrum from the spark birds, the flashy or charismatic or otherwise similarly impressive species that draw you in and hook you on the hobby. Some birders never really go beyond the spark birds, the first hesitant toes in that ocean. Some will wade in up to their waist or their neck, slowly taking on tougher families. Becoming familiar with sparrows or Empids or gulls. But becoming a good birder means you have to get familiar with, and spend most of your time on, bland birds, “birder’s birds”.

As you became a better birder you find yourself taking on those birds more and more. It can be frustrating for a beginner, once you become more attuned to the birds around you, to realize that the vast majority of birds you may come upon on a given day are, in fact, subtler greens and browns. About this time in your birding career you may, like we did, come upon a Warbling Vireo, maybe the definition of bland in plumage, but making up in song what it might lack in beauty. It’s not an uncommon bird in the east, but definitely one that could be easily overlooked by a birder not quite desperate enough for new birds to take it on.

So the Warbling Vireo went on my list, even if those other birder’s birds, the empids, the larids, the Swainson’s Warbler, would have to wait. I was only in up to my neck so far, I’d have to learn to swim a little better before I take them on.

photo from almiyi via flickr