>From Russell Rogers, Seattle WA, rrogers at halcyon.com

Stuart and all,

I ran into the same problem. I was disappointed with the lack of
information avalable about the birds of Washington when I arrived here. I
found that most of the knowledge about the birds in the state was held in
much the same way that the Illiad and the Odyssy was held, i.e. an "oral
tradition". I would have to call Gene or Dennis up all the time and bug
them about this and that.

I soon saw this lack of information as a calling and set out to write an
update to Jewett's Birds of Washington. Co-authoring this project with me
are Terry Wahl, Bill Tweit, and Andy Stepniewsky. I am happy to say that
we are well on our way.

The book will not be out any time soon however as it is no small project.
However, comparing our situation with things done in the United Kingdom
is not quite fair, as the UK is about 20,000 sq miles smaller with about
50,000,000 more people. If Washington had as many birders as the UK, I
would be working on something else I am sure.

To make our book as complete as possible, we need the Washington birding
community as a whole to participate by sending reports in to WOS
Field Notes and to Audubon Field Notes, not only of rare birds but of
common birds. Even if you don't send reports in, keep a "birding
notebook".

The gaps in what we know about our bird life are many. From time to time
we (the authors) will ask the birding public to help fill in these gaps.
Gaps like "what is the highest elevation that Pied-billed Grebes breed?",
"how low to Yellow-rump Warblers breed?", "do White-crowned Sparrows breed
in the Blue Mountains?", and so on.

You would think that questions like that would be the easiest to answer as
they are among our most common birds, but they are turning out to be the
most difficult. These are also the most important questions to try
to answer.

So, to _answer_ everyones questions about amateurs contributing to
ornithology, YES, everyone can. Questions like those above could be easy
to answer if EVERYONE THAT GOES OUT BIRDING KEPT FEILD NOTES OF THEIR
OUTINGS!

On that note, as Joe Morland stated, it is time to send in your reports
to the Field Notes Department.

Thanks,

Russell


On Fri, 2 Jun 1995, Stuart MacKay wrote:

> When I arrived in Seattle. I was very keen to get a copy of the annual bird
> report. Every county in the UK publishes one, detailing all the significant
> (rare birds, unusual birds, all sightings for a given species, top 100 counts
> for a common species, breeding records etc, etc, etc). I was disappointed when
> I found that no such report existed - WOS recent reports goes a very small
> step along the way.
>
> There is no real way of finding out whether a particular sighting is
> interesting or worthwhile, whether it is common on unusual. I suppose with
> more experience out here I get more savvy, but I bird largely in ignorance ;-)
>
> Gene Hunn's guide is excellent, but it doesn't tell me whether 5
> yellow-headed blackbirds at Montlake Fill is worth writing down or reporting
> (in a perfect world I would record absolutely every bird - but I can't write
> that fast).
>
> There is a real gap between "casual" or systematic birding and ornithology,
> more so over here than in the UK. The birding and ornithology are different -
> casual birding and ornithology have for the most part nothing in common other
> than the subject of interest.
>
> Stuart MacKay
>