OHIO-BIRDS Archives

August 2015

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From:
robert lane <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
robert lane <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Fri, 28 Aug 2015 08:39:26 -0400
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The dream of every avid birder is to have an out of the ordinary bird show up in your own backyard. Ten years ago today, we did. It is hard to believe that it has been a decade since my wife came to the house on the morning of August 28, 2005, to get me, claiming to have two Black-billed Magpies in the backyard, and she did!!! Over the next forty-seven days the pair of western celebrities could sometimes be found roaming the environs of our hometown of Damascus on the Mahoning-Columbiana County line. By the last day of the magpies visit on October 14th, over 140 birders, some from as far away as Ontario, had succeeded in adding Black-billed Magpie to their Ohio Life List. Icing on the cake was The Ohio Birds Record Committee in March 2006 accepted the magpies, constituting the 4th Ohio record. This experience was an interesting chapter in our lives. It gave us an identity. An e-mail address was created, ([log in to unmask]), a vanity plate (2MAGPIE) was now on one of our vehicles, and we were dubbed the Magpie People. As diehard birders, this was our once in-a-lifetime spot in the limelight, right in our backyard, our moment of birding glory! The changes that have taken place in reporting rare bird sightings in the past ten years is unbelievable. There were no smart phones or computers to send messages from the field. You had to get to a phone and call someone, hoping they could relay your find to others, again by phone. If a person could get access to a computer, about the only site was birdingonthe.netohio, and even if it was posted, someone had to see it, then again somehow relay the sighting information. There were some phone hotlines, updated occasionally, but again, access in the field was not readily available. Today's birders, including us, have almost instant access to knowing where the rarities are. It is hard to imagine the way birding has changed in the past ten years.
 
Bob and Denise Lane  
                                          
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