Thursday, January 18, 2007

Open letter to Tyler Hicks

Here.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nicely stated. I think Bob should make this generic and publish it in Birding for all young and new birders.

Everybody has made their share of judgment errors, and I'm no exception, but I've seen several young birders over the years who didn't understand just how badly they could be mistaken. They were highly prone to be definitive with a quick view. I learned much of my birding with an older and more experienced group of guys, and that helped temper my youthful exuberance.

I've also seen older, more experienced birders who never learned judgment skills. Some have excellent birding skills, but they are known as "stringers" and nothing they report without hard evidence will ever be accepted. (Mike Collins comes to mind as an example.)

Anonymous said...

And the Carpinterio Real makes an appearance in the comments. Glad to see he's still alive and well somewhere.