The Reluctant Twitcher

THE RELUCTANT TWITCHER

THE RELUCTANT TWITCHER

Richard Pope
Foreword by Graeme Gibson

NATURAL HERITAGE BOOKS
A MEMBER OF THE DUNDURN GROUP
TORONTO

Copyright © Richard Pope, 2009

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.

Published by Natural Heritage Books, a member of the Dundurn Group

Copy Editor: Allison Hirst
Designer: Jennifer Scott
Printer: Friesens

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Pope, Richard
    The reluctant twitcher : a quite truthful account of my big birding year / by Richard Pope.

Includes index.
ISBN 978-1-55488-458-2

   1. Pope, Richard. 2. Birds--Ontario. 3. Bird watching--Ontario--Humor. 4. Bird watchers--Canada--Biography. I. Title.

QL677.5.P66 2009     598.072'34713     C2009-902460-8

1   2   3   4   5      13   12   11   10   09

We acknowledge the support of the
Canada Council for the Arts
and the
Ontario Arts Council
for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the
Government of Canada
through the
Book
Publishing Industry Development Program
and
The Association for the Export of Canadian Books
, and the
Government of Ontario
through the
Ontario Book Publishers Tax Credit program
, and the
Ontario Media
Development Corporation
.

Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in this book. The author and the publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any references or credits in subsequent editions.

J. Kirk Howard, President

Printed and bound in Canada.
www.dundurn.com

This book is dedicated to the memory of my
father and great friend, Ernie Pope, and to the
memory of Charlie Molony and Ott Devitt

Contents

I
LLUSTRATIONS AND
P
HOTOGRAPHS

F
OREWORD
BY
G
RAEME
G
IBSON

M
AP 1
S
OUTHERN
O
NTARIO

M
AP 2
N
ORTHERN
O
NTARIO

P
REFACE

1
I Am Committed

2
The Pecking Order

3
The Rules

4
Pish and Chips

5
Algonquin Grand Slam

6
To the Barricades

7
Pelee Madness

8
The Numbers Build

9
Rainy River

10
Making It Happen

11
Revelations

12
The Big Sit

13
Closing the Gap

14
Floating Jaegers

15
No Peace for the Wicked

16
So Close, and Yet So Far

17
299 and 300 — Sort Of

18
299 and 300 — In Sooth

19
Gravy Birds

20
The Big Dipper

21
Go Figure

A
PPENDIX 1
: L
ISTS OF
B
IRDS

A
CKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I
NDEX

List of Illustrations and
Photographs

Front Cover:
Northern Wheatear
.
Painting by David Beadle.

All maps and illustrations by Neil Broadfoot.

P
HOTOGRAPHS

Pileated Woodpecker (male)
.

Sam Barone

Blue Jay
.

Jean Iron

Grasshopper Sparrow
.

Sam Barone

Blackpoll Warbler (male)
.