To each his own, Denny. But if you like, we'll all adopt you criteria for a
jinx bird. You can be a committee of 1 and decide yourself who qualifies.
I suspect there are those who feel your search for the Spruce Grouse is to
date a weeny attempt.

I choose to believe you meant all of this in good humor. It may not sound
that way to some. And what's wrong with NPR?

Marv Breece
Seattle,WA


----- Original Message -----
From: Denny Granstrand <osprey at nwinfo.net>
To: <TWEETERS at u.washington.edu>
Sent: October 30, 2001 9:08 PM
Subject: Re: Tropical Kingbird remains - jinx bird, not hardly!!


>
> Hi Tweeters,
> Scott Downes (see below) tells us he has gotten "this jinx bird off his
> back" after his seventh chase for a Tropical Kingbird. I hardly think
> driving around on paved roads searching for a bird qualifies for that bird
> to be a "jinx bird". Just consider my nine or ten (or perhaps even
twelve)
> serious struggles through extreme forests of thick lodgepole pine and
> subalpine fir with innurmerable downfalls that gave me countless scratches
> and bruises in search of a Spruce Grouse. That constitutes a serious
> attempt to find a bird. I have earned the right to call Spruce Grouse my
> jinx bird. Driving around drinking coffee or sodas (or perhaps hot
> toddies), munching on doughnuts and listening to NPR doesn't even compare.
> We need to contact the ABA's (American Birding Association's) rules
> committee for their specific defination on jinx birds. I am sure they can
> clarify this for us.
>
> This also brings to mind Charlie Wright's e-mail last year in which he
said
> he had gotten his jinx bird, Black Swift, off his back. Charlie isn't
even
> old enough to have a "jinx bird". To qualify as a jinx bird, a birder has
> to have been chasing a bird for at least ten years. For Charlie to have a
> jinx bird,he would have had to have started birding when he was two.
> Really, now, can a two-year-old be a serious birder? Not by my
defination.
>
> We are in a day-and-age when, in baseball games, a batter charges the
> pitcher when he has been nicked by a pitch, basketball players throw
> temper-tantrums for minor infractions and who wants to even bother to
> account for the behavior of football players. Let us not allow birding to
> fall to those depths. We have standards to live up to. I challenge us
all
> to do it!
>
> Denny Granstrand
> Yakima, WA
>
> Scott's e-mail:
> >>Hi tweets,
> >>Despite the weather being less than ideal the Tropical Kingbird was
> located early in the afternoon, around 1pm or so I think along the willows
> of Lk. Minard near the Tonquin ave bridge on the Marine View Dr. side. The
> weather stopped raining briefly while I viewed it but the bird never left
> its perch during the 5 or so minutes I watched so, probably hunkered down
> for the weather.
> >>Also of interest to watch was a group of 3 River Otters under this
bridge
> fishing and interacting with each other.
> >>Glad to finally get this jinx bird off of my back! This was the seventh
> time for me trying in Washington, persistence pays off eventually...
> >>
> >>Scott Downes
> >>downess at cwu.edu
> >>Ellensburg WA
> >>
> >
> * * * * * * * * * * *
> * Denny Granstrand *
> * Yakima, WA *
> * osprey at nwinfo.net *
> * * * * * * * * * * *
>
>
>