Derrick Marven wrote:

>The bird was clearly a female with a buffy breast ,long rufous feathers
>in the tail and the lack of a bright green throat.
>What do i do, send in a written report and cause more controvercy as a
>single observer sighting and suffer the ridicule of my peers or just let
>it pass and say this is a lesson learnt regarding rare birds .
>I will continue the rest of my birding life wondering if this was the
>same bird to the one in Gibsons or another which would have put a
>totally different light on the matter.
>I have tried to convince the elderly couple to write a report but they
>have taken advice from their son and will not have anything to do with
>it.
>I'm sorry to to have told you all this but i could not keep quite any
>longer.

Ah, yes. Such a turmoil. I think you made the right decision Derrick in
respecting the landowners' wishes. However, I would have tried very hard
myself to get some documenting photos or *at least* write up a
description to forward to the BCFO BRC (you did write it up, no? If not
you should be lashed with several wet noodles). Why? Because if it were
the Gibson's XAHU (about a 99.9% chance, IMHO), then it would suggest a
pattern of mobility (including over a sizeable water body) not usually
ascribed to this species which may impact on the previous decision made
by the BRC. Of course, there will be those who would then pipe up that it
is equally likely that someone is playing around and snagged the XAHU
over in Gibson's and ferried it over to the Island (getting tiresome,
isn't it?).

The chair of the BRC and all members of the committee would be bound by
your instructions to not release the location of the sighting. By the
way, this sort of thing happens all the time to people such as Wayne
Campbell. Wayne told me of a window-killed Siberian Accentor from the
Abbotsford area that was turned in during the late winter of 1998, a fact
which the finders did not want released to the public. There is always
more going on in the bird world regionally than the lay birder realizes.

Oh, a propos to a previous post by Michael Price, for the first time
ever, a new category was delineated for the Gibson's XAHU by the BCFO
BRC: that of "STATUS UNDECIDED" (BCFO Bird Records Committee Report for
1996-1997, by Gary Davidson; received in mail today). Seems a sanity
check evolved from this occurrence.

Please, if you did write this Cowichan sighting up, send it to Gary
soonest.

- Jack
---------------------------
Jack Bowling
Prince George, BC
jbowling at direct.ca