The Big Year Podcast

Season 2, Episode 8: Josh Gant, 2020 Ocean County, NJ Big Year

Well, it's Friday, November 7, 2024.

I'm now five weeks late for my latest podcast, this episode with Joshua Gant, which was supposed to have appeared on October 1st.

Well, I got busy in October, actually in September as well, and I started a project that kept me pretty busy.

Not only was I building a set of cat shelves in the living room for the cats to play on this winter, I was building a dream project of mine.

I was born in 1960, and in 1966, the TV show Star Trek appeared, and by the time I was about 13 or 14, I was getting into woodworking, and I loved building the props from Star Trek.  I used Lego and wood and tape and markers to make my own phaser and communicator, and kind of destroyed my brothers clock radio to get the parts I needed.

So, yeah, that was a different time.

I was not a birder way back then, but I was an obsessive compulsive, though I didn't know that at the time, and I decided at that point that I was going to make the ultimate prop from Star Trek, the command chair that Captain Kirk sat in.

Well, as a 13 year old with crappy tools from Canadian tire and a bunch of plywood and other scraps of wood that I found behind apartment buildings and things like that, I tried to make one.

I didn't get very far.

It fell apart before it even got started.

Well, fast forward to 2024 and as a woodworker, who builds a lot of my own furniture, I decided it was time to build my own chair.

So that's what I've been doing the last six weeks.  debuted it on Halloween, and it was a success, and now it's in my recroom as my TV chair, so woo hoo for me, but as far as my podcast is concerned, yeah, I kind of dropped the ball on that.

So, the last few days, I've been working feverishly to finish the podcast, which I did yesterday, and the episode is finally ready.

Josh Gant is a birder from Tom's River, New Jersey, and he did an Ocean County Big Year in 2020.

So thank you for your patience and your continued support of my little show.  I appreciate everything that people say to me when I meet them in the field.

It's always exciting to know that I put something out there that people enjoy - all three of you 😏 -

Thank you very much.

Season 2 Episode 7: Danny Bernard and his Accidental Michigan Big Year

Well, it’s September 1, 2024, the Dog Days of Birding are behind us and fall migration is underway, signalling the end of the summer breeding season and birds booking their flights south for the winter.  Happily for birders, there are no direct flights from the breeding grounds in the north to the wintering grounds in the south, which means we are graced by the presence of southern migrants.  When the wind is just right, shorebirds and seabirds pass through, many of them stopping to refuel at various mudflats. rivers, lakes and ponds, where they fill their bellies with enough food to get them through the next stage of their journey. Some birds, like jaegers and southern migrating gulls, like the Sabine’s, don’t always stop as they pass over the lake.  In that case, birders who want to count such birds as Long-tailed Jaeger, Parasitic Jaeger or any other rarity that happens to be blown off course, head to the beaches and cliff edges for the annual lake and sea watches. This is especially important if you’re doing a Big Year. 

In the case of today’s guest, and myself in 2022, we were lake watching on opposite sides of Lake Huron.  Danny Bernard was looking for jaegers and other rarities for his Michigan State Big Year and I was scanning the waters for a Long-tailed Jaeger to complete my jaeger trifecta for my Canada Big Year,(Long-tailed, Parasitic and Pomarine).  Luckily for me, birders like Danny were communicating from the US side whenever they had a sighting and that helped me get to see my only Long-tailed Jaeger of the year.  I should have had them up in The Yukon in the summer, but that’s another story, for another show.  Suffice it to say, we both got our bird and celebrated in style.  Pie for Danny and a steak dinner for me.  Though we didn’t know it, we were destined to cross paths again, this time, instead of across the lake, we met over the internet.  

And as we were talking about alternative Big Years, that got both of us thinking. There are so many ways to do a Big Year.  Who says it has to be a state or county or even start on January 1st?  Well, the record keepers for the ABA area might have a thing or two to say about it, if you want an official title, but what the heck.  If you want your Big Year to start on your birthday, go for it, or perhaps your wedding anniversary.  In that case, be prepared for it to be your last anniversary.  Unless, of course, your spouse is as rabid a Big Year birder as you, in that case, have at it.  More and more, couples or brothers or even best friends are teaming up to do Big Years.  4 eyes and ears are better than two of each, and you get to split the driving and hotels bills.  Which reminds me that a future episode will feature local Brant County birders Ellen and Jerry Horak, who as of this date, are 3/4 of the way through their Ontario Big Year.  In 2023 they did a Brant county Big Year, and  in 2025 will be heading out across the country together to see if they can count over 400 species during their Canada Big Year.  I’ll look forward to hearing how easy or perhaps hard it is to bird everywhere, every day together. 

So, since I need to wrap up this introduction, without further blather from me, let’s log into our Teams meeting and check in with Danny Bernard and his record breaking 2022 Michigan Big Year.

Season 2, Episode 6: Marcus Legzdins and his 2023 HSA Big Year

Welcome, birders and non birders who have to put up with the birders in their lives, to the Big Year Podcast, with me, the one, the only,(thankfully), Robert Baumander.  As I sit and type this introduction, it is August 1, 2024 and the unofficial start of The Dog Days of Summer.  Actually, for birders in Ontario, at least, the birding really begins to slow down near the beginning of July.  But even so, there have been a few rare birds to chase, including a Brown Booby and a Ruff.  Boobies are quite rare in Ontario, but I’ve seen a few over the years.  Of course, if you want to really see boobies in their natural habitat you just need to visit south Florida in the spring.  

And what’s a Ruff? My research has found that it is named for the feathers it displays with its tufts, or ruff extended. The Ruff is a medium sized sandpiper and on its breeding grounds the males put on the most spectacular displays worthy of any fashion show catwalk.  Alas, though I have seen plenty of boobies, I have never seen a Ruff display. For that you need to visit a Lek in Northwestern Alaska.

Now, to get to today’s episode. We are returning, once again to Ontario and will meet a young man, who in 2023, after watching so many of his fellow birders do Big Years the previous year, decided that he would enjoy trying one himself. Marcus Legzdins was in his final year of high school, and was birding in the Oakville area when, in December of 2022, decided to do an HSA Big Year.  What’s the HSA you ask?  I had heard of it, but just thought it was where birders who lived in Hamilton reported their sightings.  But it has exact boundaries and strict rules for reporting species for official records.  It is a circle, 25 miles,(about 40 kilometres) centred on downtown Hamilton. Yes, we birders are sticklers for details.  If you see the bird on the wrong side of the road, well, you haven’t really seen it in the HSA until it crosses that invisible boundary.  I wonder if it’s bad form to coax the bird over the line with calls or sunflower seeds? 

You don’t have to be crazy to do a Big Year, as Marcus showed me during our chat, but it doesn’t hurt either.  A common theme I have found is, even if it’s not to the level of my obsessiveness, a desire to make sense of the world, whether it’s making bird lists, or traveling to exotic places to see things you’ve never seen before, and in some cases, never imagined seeing.  It’s the desire to collect, not just things, but memories, and stories of adventures you can share with the world.  Many birders love taking photographs but a lot do not. To them it’s the experience that makes it rewarding.  Though I’m not sure I ever met a Big Year birder who wasn’t also a photo buff. 

Exotic locals and photo memories are not necessary to enjoy many aspects of a Big Year, or birding in general. Marcus birded in a pretty good patch, but as he told me, anywhere you live, you can find that one spot where you’ll almost always have good birding. Big Years can be really small or really big.  And can be in any patch you find.  Anyway, Marcus was perfectly located in Oakville to begin his year long quest.

So sit back, relax, since August birding is so slow anyway, and enjoy…

 

 

Season 2, Episode 5: Trailblazing Extreme Birder Lynn Barber

Today’s episode, features a trailblazer, who was the first woman to do a full out ABA Big Year and has been an inspiration to women in the birding world ever since she saw 723 species in 2008, one more than Sandy Komito’s first Big Year in 1986.  Lynn Barber is an author and artists and had done two Texas Big Years prior to her ABA Big Year and has since done Alaska and Wisconsin Big Years,  Her first Book, Extreme Birder is a must read for anyone considering doing their own big year.  She now lives in Wisconsin and is working on a new book about owls.

 

Season 2, Episode 4: Brett Forsyth's 2022 Human Powered Green Big Year

Well, happy birding to everyone who has chosen to join me here today. It is Saturday, June 1st, 2024, as I type.  I'm Robert Baumander and this is The Big Year Podcast.  My guest is Brett Forsyth, who, in 2022, did a self-powered Big Year, which means he never got in the car to go to see any bird, only walking or cycling from home. So that was a grind of a Big Year because he cycled nearly every day, in every type of weather, sometimes  150 to 300 kilometres and in single day.  And I can safely say he now has the all time record for self-powered Big Years in Ontario.

But first:

Moose, Busses and Automobiles

Now I have a little story to tell.  Once again, I shouldn’t be alive.  I was doing my Trans-Canada Jay Highway trip, and I had a great time going all the way up to Halifax, Nova Scotia from my home in Brantford, Ontario.  On my way back through New Brunswick, I decided, you know what?  I'm going to go through Maine on the way home.  Could be fun.  What could possibly go wrong?  Why not take a little detour and enjoy some of the sights and sounds of birds in Maine? I was about 15 miles from the border, I guess about a 30 minute drive, where I would cross the boarder into Quebec, and I was driving at night and I know, there is the hazard of moose on the road at night.

Of course, I was driving slower and I was paying attention to that possibility, and I thought, I'll be in Canada in half an hour. Why not just keep going instead of finding a place to camp for the night? Well, that was the wrong decision. Going to Maine was the wrong decision, because at 9:02 p.m. on Saturday, May 25th, I hit the moose.  The one thing I had been warned against since taking a defensive-safe driving course when I was 21, NEVER HIT THE MOOSE!

Luckily, that training on safe driving techniques, that I learned over 40 years ago when our instructor taught us about not hitting the moose,(hit the deer, hit the dog, hit the squirrel, hit the bird), but never hit the moose, saved my life.  However, sometimes, though, there are situations where it's unavoidable and you have to be driving in such a way that you can avoid the crash or at least death. In my case, I avoided death. I was driving about five to ten miles per hour below the speed limit. I had my brights on. I was watching ahead for any sign of anything on the road. And suddenly I see the glint in the eye of a moose coming out of a ditch on the right side of the road. Instinct, luckily for me, took over. For once, I did everything right. I slammed on the brakes, making sure that I was swerving in such a way so as not hit the moose head on, veering a little bit to the right as the moose was moving to the left.  

The moose leapt into the road, of course, it had to, and just as my car came to a stop, the moose's butt hit my windshield right in front of my eyes. Talk ab out intense?  Oh my god, that was quite the moment, and yet I survived.  So did the moose.  It signalled a left turn and ran into the woods.

I was very much in the middle of nowhere with no cell signal  Two things saved me from a very long night alone on an empty road.  First, another driver, behind me in a pickup truck, on the way to his camp, stayed with me and second and more importantly, my iPhone 15Pro with Emergency SOS by satellite.  Using the phone I was able to message for help and have Emergency Services come to my location and rescue me.  Thanks Apple!

So, let this be a warning, because I hear about people who are driving the dark country roads, in Canada and the States, and they just, in the middle of the night, in the dark dark, with no other cars on the road, are just booming along at 80, 90 miles an hour, and every single one of those people who hit a moose is dead now.

Go slow, have your brights on, watch for moose.   Or better still, don't drive these roads at night. That's crazy. I'll never do that again. But I am here to tell the tale. My car probably is probably a write off, and well, oh well, will get a replacement at some point in the next week or so to continue my journeys and voyages.  Cars are replaceable, you are not.  So, as the saying goes, stay safe out there.

And now, without further ado, now that you've heard my tale of woe, please enjoy The Big Year Podcast with Brett Forsyth!

Season 2, Episode 3: Krissi Martin's 2022 Double Big Year

Welcome back to The Big Year Podcast.  Sorry to have been gone so long, but birding seemed to drag me away from editing more often than not in April.  Not to mention that I was recovering from a severe hand injury, when I fell after seeing both Ross’s and Snow Geese in Burlington in March.  I hyper extended all the fingers on my right hand, using it to brace myself and protect my camera as tripped over a rock and fell to the ground.  

It is May 2, 2024 and I was supposed to publish this episode yesterday, but once again, birds got in the way.  In this case a Summer Tanager arrived in my old birding patch in Toronto, Colonel Samuel Smith Park, on the shores of Lake Ontario.  There seems to be an eruption of Summer Tanagers here in Ontario this spring. This year at least half a dozen have shown up in various locations.  I had just seen one in Chatham, not far from Rondeau provincial park, a few days ago, but one in Col. Sam was worth the drive yesterday morning.  Second only to my ABA list, my Colonel Sam list is the most important to me.  I began birding on January 1, 2012 and I have been birding there ever since.  The summer tanager was number 242 for the park.  With migration gearing up I’m sure to out birding nearly every day, including a drive to the east coast, along the Trans-Canada Highway. I’ll be working on some new content and working on the next episode along the way.  This trip, unlike my 2022 Big Year, will be on a budget. I’ve got a new air mattress for the back of my Ford EcoSport and will be camping most nights, probably in a WallMart parking lot, or the occasional roadside ditch.  I might even splurge and get a spot in a province or national park some nights.  I was inspired to do this trip by Tiffany Kirsten, as that’s how she saved money when shebroke the all time lower 48 Big Year Record.  

Well, enough of me rambling, so let’s get on to this episode.

My guest, all the way from the west coast, is Krissi Martin .  Krissi did a double big year in 2022.  While I was criss-crossing the country, Krissi was birding locally in two counties, the Fraser Valley and Metro Vancouver.

So, sit back, relax, unless you’re driving, and enjoy.

Season 2, Episode 2, Part Two: Bruce DiLabio’s Canada Big Year

Hello there everybody,

 

Welcome back to The Big Year Podcast. This is part 2 of my chat with the new all time record holder for a Canada Big Year, Bruce DiLabio.  As I type this, it’s a sunny spring day in late March and the excitement of migration season is just around the corner.  It’s what all birders crave after a long, cold winter in the northern US and Canada.

However, for those in the southern US, migration gets going an about month earlier.  And one of the best places to be in April is Texas and specifically, High Island on the Gulf Coast, where spring storms can bring the holy grail of migration season, a Fall Out. Sue and I will be heading there the second weekend of April and fallout or not, it’s one of the best places to see southern migrants passing through on their way home to their breeding grounds.  I’ve experienced two fallouts. The first was at Fort DeSoto near Tampa Florida in April of 2012 and Sue and I enjoyed one in Rondeau Provincial Park in South Western Ontario in May of 2018.  On both occasions, warblers and other songbirds were sitting, exhausted, like Christmas ornaments on all the trees.  Not just a Kaleidoscope of color, but even carpeting the ground, forcing birders to gingerly step over and around them.  And for Big Year birders, it’s an event not to be missed.  I’ll be reporting live from Texas beginning April 10, and perhaps I’ll run into a birder or two doing their own Big Years.

In Part One, I left you hanging, so we’ll pick up where we left off, with Bruce Di Labio heading out for his 53rd consecutive Ottawa Christmas Bird Count when things took a very unexpected turn.

I hope you enjoy listening to Bruce’s stories of his amazing, record shattering Canada Big Year.  Having enjoyed many of the same adventures, including my own slip on the ice in Nova Scotia, that could have brought my Canada Big Year to a crashing end only 3 days into 2022, I can appreciate all Bruce went through in 2023. Congratulations Bruce.  And good luck to anyone attempting their own Canada Big Year in future. 

Next month, we have a guest from out west.  Krissi Martin,(Sorry I said “Kristi” last month).  Krissi lives in Abbotsford British Columbia and is known on line as Momma Birder.  Krissi is very open about living life after a brain injury, and like many of us, has discovered that birding has had a very positive impact on her life.  We’ll talk about that and the Big Years she’s done in British Columbia and how birding in general and Big Years in particular can improve your well being and outlook on life.  Following my chat with Bruce, I’ll leave you with a brief excerpt from my conversation with Krissi Martin.

 

Season 2, Episode 1, Part One: Bruce Di Labio’s Canada Big Year

Hello Birders, welcome back to The Big Year Podcast.  I am so excited to be back for a second season.  I wasn’t sure we’d get renewed but the birds tweeted their approval and desire to hear from even more Big Year birders, so here I am and boy do I have a great line up of guests ready to share their stories.

Over the course of the spring and summer, you will get to hear form Lynn Barber, the one of the great ABA Big Year birders, and author of many books, including Extreme Birder: One Woman’s Big Year, the story of her 2008 ABA Big Year. Lynn was the first birder to break Sandy Komito’s record with 723 species.

I’ll also be catching up with a couple of Ontario Big Year birders, including Andrew Keaveny, who was doing his Ontario Big Year when I was a newbie birder doing an ABA Big Year in 2012, and Brett Forsyth who did a self-powered Ontario Big Year, in 2022 when I was doing my Canada Big Year.  I will Never be doing a self-powered Big Year, I can tell you that right now.

We’ll also be venturing out west to talk to Kristy Martin, who did a Big Year in British Columbia, and Danny Bernard who completed a Michigan Big Year a few years ago.

But today we have Part One of my lengthy and wonderful chat with the new all time record holder for a Canada Big Year, Bruce Di Labio.   In 2022, I was only the third birder to ever top 457 species for Canada in a single year.  Hot on my tail during the second half of 2022 Bruce, who had already been birding and guiding for 50 years, pushed me until the final day of the year.  During 2022, though we birded in many of the same places, sometimes within hours or even a few miles of each other, we never actually met.  With Bruce breathing down my neck in New Brunswick near the end of the year, I was able to end up in top spot, with Bruce a close second, each of us only the third and forth birders to ever see over 450 species in one Canada calendar year.

Finally in the spring of 2023, when he was trying to break the all time record,  we met at Point Pelee National Park during spring migration.  We talked about his spark bird on that occasion, and his expectations for his Big Year.  His initial hope was to hit at least 460 in 2023.  Knowing what I missed in 2022 and my lack of extensive coast to coast birding experience, not to mention his vast knowledge of the country and where and when to find the most species at the best times, I expected him to pass my record, easily.  Thanks to an amazing year for rarities in Canada, zoomed way past 460, setting a record that may stand for a very long time indeed.  I know records are made to be broken, I just never expected to be dethroned less than a year later.  I take solace in the fact that I was even able to get past 450, given my various physical and mental disabilities.  We all bird for our own reasons, and a Big Year is a personal journey.  The success you reap depends on the passion for birding that you sow.  

So, as winter turns to spring and a birders fancy turns to migration and all the excitement of the return home of hundreds of snow “birds” from the south, let’s catch up with the birders of The Big Year.  Or words to that effect.   Go forth and enjoy the podcast and the birds.  Perhaps you’ll be inspired to take on your next adventure!