[Tweeters] Bad Birder Billboard

[Robert Gray]

The bird paparazzi find comfort in their numbers. Awfulness always finds acceptance in this way.


-----Original Message-----
From: Kevin Lucas <vikingcove at gmail.com>
To: Tweeters <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Sent: Mon, Feb 13, 2023 8:18 pm
Subject: [Tweeters] Bad Birder Billboard

Using Washington State Highway 12 westbound 40th Avenue exit ramp in Yakima to bird is not legal, is not safe, is contagious, and makes you a Bad Birder Billboard for all of the already annoyed drivers who've just been anxiously jockeying for exit ramp pole position as they approach you. Less than six hundred feet away, Highway 12 shoulder is posted "EMERGENCY PARKING ONLY" for the safety of ALL motor vehicle operators and passengers. Those who would like to view the birds or "get" a tic on their list at the beaver pond there, can access that pond via well worn trails from the 16th Avenue Greenway Path parking lot. That walk is about one and one-third miles.

When I hiked in the other day, two motor vehicle operators used the 40th Avenue exit shoulder to "get" a duck on their checklist. The first that stopped agitated the birds. The next flushed the birds, birds I'd been watching from the cover of vegetation as they'd been peacefully foraging. I realize it is a common practice for some listers to use the shoulder there to list birds. It should not be. Please do not endanger and anger other drivers and their passengers and set such bad examples. Let's get bad birders off YouTube's dashcam dangerous highlights reel.

On my hike to that pond I was treated to scenes of fifty crows taking baths and preening and playing in the river edge cobbles, of a gorgeous male Anna's Hummingbird singing and flashing his gorget, and of waterfowl peacefully foraging in the pond,..., until the billboards arrived, and flushed that last scene down the tubes.

Instead of putting forth tainted checklists and lame excuses, put forward your better foot -- Take A Hike.

Good Birding,https://www.aba.org/aba-code-of-birding-ethics/Kevin LucasYakima County, Washington
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