Gene Hunn, Seattle, hunnhome at accessone.com

I'm willing to take some heat for my recent comments about the importance of
knowing WHO reported a particular mega-rarity. First of all, let me defend
myself: though I have served on rare bird committees, I am not an elitist,
arrogantly dismissing the observations of the beginner. On the contrary, I
do all I can to encourage new birding enthusiasts. But one of the most
important values to impart to new and aspiring birders is the importance of
a critical attitude toward one's own sightings, an awareness of how easy it
is to make mistakes, and the worth of contributing to the construction of an
accurate and detailed understanding of the comings and goings of our local
birds. I believe this value is more important often than ones ego. We all
have reputations, good, not so good, or simply "unknown" (not really a
reputation, I guess, but the absence of one). We EARN those reputations, and
they are something to take pride in. Identifying winter shorebirds, for
example, is not easy, and it takes lots of work and critical study to master
the art. To identify the observer of such a report is to pay a certain
respect to her/him for their contribution, or, if it should prove to have
been in error, serves as a valuable correction. I've blown a few in my day
and welcome the constructive correction. If I see something extraordinary, I
don't assume that I will be believed on the face of it, no matter what my
reputation, but go out of my way to provide the details necessary to allow
the reader of the report to make their own judgment of its likely validity.