Gary,

Yes, pagers have powerful potential for birders. However, even more people
have cellular/PCS/GSM mobile phones than pagers. Nearly every cell phone
currently being sold is capable (I know of none who are not) of sending and
receiving text messages from its key pad. I do this every day with mine.
All can also receive text messages sent from any email client or web
browser. I receive every Tweeters message on my cell phone every day. All
cell carriers that I know of allow unlimited incoming emails and text pages
at no charge.

I do a lot of driving in my line of work, and more than once I have found
myself about to drive past (and thus miss) a bird in a distant part of the
state that had just been reported on Tweeters.

I wish everyone with a cell phone would learn how to use these features!

Scott

""""""""""""""""""""""
" Scott Ray "
" Moxee, WA "
" scray at wolfenet.com "
""""""""""""""""""""""

-----Original Message-----
From: TWEETERS-owner at u.washington.edu
[mailto:TWEETERS-owner at u.washington.edu]On Behalf Of Gary Bletsch
Sent: Monday, December 09, 2002 7:17 PM
To: tWEETERS at u.washington.edu
Subject: Fenno-scandian high-tech birding


Dear Tweeters,

The cell phone solution would seem somewhat backward to European birders.
Many Tweeters already know this, but it is worth mentioning that the
Scandinavian birding community is far ahead of us on the use of high-tech
communication in the field. Last summer I had the good fortune to bird the
Stockholm area with a local. He was actually one of the guys who started the
whole birding pager system there. There, the birders carry pagers on their
belts.

The thing goes off, and all you see is a long series of numerals. The
numerals equate to species, location, observer, and other details. With a
little practice, a birder can glance at the unit and discover that, say,
Sven Svensson has spotted an American Widgeon in Valdemarsvik harbor, across
from the lutefisk stand.

The fellow I birded with had his unit set on vibrate rather than tone, so
I never heard it go off. He checked it four or five times during our outing,
but of course the birds on there were all too far away for me to worry
about--and mostly southern European specialties, anyway.

Good birding,

Gary Bletsch

garybletsch at yahoo.com

somewhere near Lyman, WA





----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now