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Twitching by numbers: Twenty-four years of chasing rare birds around Britain and Ireland

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Twitching by Numbers: twenty-four years of chasing uncommon birds round Britain and Eire by Garry Bagnell is self printed. The most unfortunate twitchers race many kilometres to spot a bird only to find that their flighty subjects have flown off – a bummer known in the twitching world as a "dip". One of the most infamous dips came as Webb pursued a long-tailed shrike in the Outer Hebrides off mainland Scotland. The boat he and 12 others had hired died in choppy waters, forcing a daring rescue by Her Majesty's Coastguard. "We were worried for our lives for a bit, but we were more worried about not seeing this bird," he said. This was my first book and I didn't expect to get complaints about my single life between 2000 to 2002 (Chapter 2 to 4). I decided to remove the offending passages and rewrite these early years and republish as "Twitching by numbers: A birder's hectic life as he chases rare species across Britain and Ireland". KEEN birder Gary Bagnell has pledged to rewrite sections of his first book after it came under fire on social media.

Washington Post In Britain, bird-watching gone wild - The Washington Post

Years ago, British boys used to spend their childhoods collecting birds' eggs – now you wouldn't dream of doing such a thing," said Brian Egan, manager of the Rare Bird Alert. "But what they can do as adults is chase sightings of rare birds. So that's what they do."Many see twitching as an outcrop of the British fascination with "spotting" things – most notoriously, trainspotting, a hobby that involves the obsessive pursuit of seeing as many locomotives with your own eyes as humanly possible. But others say it may simply be a case of boys who refuse to grow up. Encountering rare birds is amazing, I’ll never forget coming across a grounded little auk in a public park and if I ever look out at my mum’s bird table and see a rose coloured starling I’d probably be at serious risk of cardiac arrest from excitement. But instead of seeing something that’s wandered on to your local patch you travel hundreds of miles to see it then I feel that the experience is a bit devalued. All the same twitching is a far less damaging way to be obsessive about birds than standing in a butt and try to shoot as many as possible that have been driven towards you by a bored teenager looking for beer money. In other countries, the world of birdwatching may be a largely gentle place ruled by calm, binocular-toting souls who patiently wait for their reward. But in Britain, it can be a truly savage domain, a nest of intrigue, fierce rivalries and legal disputes. Fluttering somewhere between sport and passion, it can leave in its path a grim tableau of ruined marriages, traffic chaos and pride, both wounded and stoked. But mostly, and overwhelmingly, this is a book about twitching – the fieldsport of rushing around trying to see rare birds to add to your lifelong list of wild birds seen in Britain and Ireland. Like most sports, twitching will seem entirely pointless to the vast majority of people. Who cares that Scotland beat England at rugby recently? Quite a few, including me. And who cares that Garry Bagnell has seen 553 bird species in Britain and Ireland (which puts him way behind Steve Gantlett on an estimated 590 species)? Quite a few people and they are mostly men. Do I care? Not deeply, but I am certainly interested in this book because it is a very clear description of the fieldsport of twitching from the viewpoint of a keen exponent.

Garry Bagnell - Facebook Garry Bagnell - Facebook

In the wake of the uproar, Mr Bagnell (55), an accountant, of Southwater in West Sussex, has both apologised for any upset he has caused and indicated that he now intends to rewrite his book, self-censoring the sections that have caused such offence.

The cover? Gives a good idea of what the book contains. The book is illustrated by the author and, although infinitely better than I could do myself, the illustrations are all quite good, but not tip top. The Ovenbird gives a fair idea of the quality of illustrations. I’d give it 6/10.

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