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From: dmark@acsu.buffalo.edu (David Mark)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: television bird lists
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Date: 1 Sep 90 16:41:30 GMT
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Anyone else out there keep a list of bird species identified (seen or heard)
on television?  I do, and the others that I know who do this keep the
following rules:  (1) bird must be wild and unrestrained when filmed or
taped (i.e., if you had been next to the camera, you could have counted the
bird on a 'real' list; thus captive birds in TV programs don't 'count');
(2) listing only while program is being aired (i.e., you can't videotape
the program and then identify birds during playback; you only get a second
chance at ID if the program is re-broadcast).

My own personal TV total is 768 species.  Of those, about 500 are ones I've
seen in the wild as well.

In the "Pettingell Book of Birding Records", p. 134, the top TV lists are
given as:

1109 species, by Hugh Currie, of Toronto, Canada, as of 2 August 1985.

 985 species, Pete Fraser, or Bristol, England, as of 17 May 1985.

 581 species, Charles Leck, Kendall Park, New Jersey, as of 29 March 1985.

But Leck and lots of others probably are way ahead of me now.

So, to repeat, any other TV bird listers on rec.birds?

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
David Mark
dmark@sun.acsu.buffalo.edu