I am Bernard Bracken and am in my early 60's. Married with 2 daughters, 2 step daughters and one stepson. I have been a keen, but very bad, birder since my youth. My family are quite supportive of my birding activities but have not one clue what I see in it or what the attraction is!
I will come clean and say that I am not one of these guys that can tell a warbler with full latin name and subspecies from a nanosecond long view of its tail as it vanishes into a bush, if that's what you are looking for - sorry. Nor am I a lister, while I do keep lists they are not for any competition but more for my own memory, I do however, record my sightings on eBird and a number of other such sites as I think its important for the furthering of the knowledge base available to all.
My shortcomings aside I do love to bird and go out wherever I find myself in the world and try to get at least a little birding in. Until quite recently I travelled a lot with work so had the pleasure of seeing woodpeckers in Central Park, Sparrows in Singapore, Yellow-crowned Gonolek's in the Gambia, Goshawk in Namibia and Hamerkop in Saudi Arabia. However, it is fair to say I am primarily a home patch birder most of the time and have a fantastic home patch in my adopted home in Colne in Lancashire, UK.
I have recently taken a degree in Biological Sciences from Birkbeck University in London and having recovered from that am now embarked on an MSc in Ornithology so you may get some witty dittys from that drifting in from time to time.
If you have any questions or comments please feel free to contact me. I do love to chat with fellow birders. Email is bernard@brackens.net
I found this quote recently in a book I was reading which I found interesting;
"You can know the name of a bird in all the languages of the world, but when your finished, you'll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird.... so let's look at the bird and see what it's doing - that's what counts. I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something".
Richard Feyman (1918 - 1988)
Significant Birthday!
I recently celebrated a significant birthday and my gorgeous wife got a rather special cake, what can I say, I think she knows me very well. Spectacular eh :)
"You can know the name of a bird in all the languages of the world, but when your finished, you'll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird.... so let's look at the bird and see what it's doing - that's what counts. I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something".
ReplyDeletelove this.