Birding in the Anglo-American world is about one thing: identification, the assignment of the right name to the right organism. It doesn’t have to be that way, and it hasn’t always been that way. A bit over a century ago, “we” made the conscious decision to transform birding from a broad natural historical pursuit into a much more narrowly classificatory enterprise. This was part of an effort to re-masculinize birdwatching, which had in some views degenerated into an activity suitable only for women and children. Originally meant to make birding more scientific, the success of this effort in fact drove a wedge between birding and ornithology, which had been largely complementary disciplines for more than a century.
Rick Wright, a native of southeast Nebraska, is the author of the American Birding Association Field Guide to Birds of New Jersey, the American Birding Association Field Guide to Birds of Arizona and is a tour leader for VENT (Victor Emanuel Nature Tours).