To List, or not to List?

Humans are inveterate list keepers, not always in a pragmatic useful sense, like a shopping list, but more of a personal tally sense. Naturalists, especially birders, can take this to extremes.

Top of the shop is the ‘life list’, most birders, though strangely not me, keep a list of all the species of bird they have ever seen, anywhere in the world, we can then narrow this down to, Country of Residence list (again, not one I keep), this one typically involves ‘twitching’ and the burning of lots of carbon credits. For those unsure what ‘twitching’ is, it boils down to dropping everything and heading off in pursuit of the latest ‘mega’, rarity, or even scarcity, sometimes on an annual basis if folk are also ‘year listing’.

Drilling down a little further we have’ County lists’, ‘Patch’ Lists and ‘Site Lists’ and then we come even closer to home, The Garden List, which is itself is often sub-divided between ‘In the Garden’ and ‘Seen from the Garden’.

Now things can get complicated because you have to decide what constitutes ‘In the Garden’. Does a bird have to land within the boundary to be on the list? This is the purist’s version of a garden list, but what about the Kestrel hovering above the garden, surely that’s using the garden as a hunting ground. Having recently moved house we’ve opted for ‘it’s in the garden if it’s in the airspace directly above'. So, the Barn Owl that flew through the garden three times, on the day I wrote this, is definitely on the garden list!

Stock Dove - On my 'Patch' and 'Garden' and 'Seen from Garden' Lists

Then there are special lists. I have a few of these, ‘Albatross List’, ‘Tubenose List’ this being an inflated version of the former. I also have a ‘seabirds I’ve rescued off ships’ list. And finally, I have a ‘Cetacean List’.

Now, how do I keep abreast of all these lists? I know, I’ll make a list.