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Those who are naive to my hobby assume that I spend my weekends clad in an anorak, pointing some kind of giant lens out of a bird hide, or chasing around after impossibly rare species of birds. Yes, you guessed correctly – I’m a birdwatcher, although the stereotypical image of birdwatching is far removed from my own experience watching birds. In fact it’s in the very name of my interest that I hit a stumbling block. It may be called ‘birdwatching’, but that optical element is only a segment of the complex web of observation that really occurs when one is immersed in an outdoor environment. You see, I would describe birdwatching as a true multi-sensory experience, and I’ll give you an example.
As I walk out of the enclosed car park, the view spreads out widely over the seemingly barren heath, but there’s a lot going on under that surface gaze. On every sharp and spiny gorse bush, bright yellow flowers are open, basking in the splendour of mid-morning rays. A flicker of movement, and a small bird rises from the brush, flying upwards until it hovers on short, stiff wings. It utters the sweetest of melodies – a warble – a ditty – redolent of mild spring mornings, redolent of positivity. It’s a skylark, and no binoculars are needed to absorb its aural and visual lustre.
This is the wonder of birds, of Nature and of wild places, and they are all part of an ever-evolving cycle. While the seasons change around us, and our migratory and breeding birds come and go, a solid core remains, and these are what I call our bird community. Garden birds are a strong feature of these consistent avian figures. For me the community comes in the form of our sedentary blackbird and robin, ever-present in an ever-changing and worrying world. They are joined by the local house sparrow flock, who fly in and chip away as they gluttonously tackle the seed feeders. They are often frightened off by the writhing and shimmering mass of a starling arrowing serpent-like to the suet balls and attacking them with grit and gusto. Such character can be found in getting to know them, their nuances and their place within your place.
This is the first step to building an interest in birds and birdwatching, and in my journey it was part of the back-to-basics, building-block approach that I applied to finding out about them. This led outwards, to exploring my local area more, and this is where I began to synchronise with Nature’s inbuilt calendars. The year can be followed by the movements of birds as each season passes. Winter brings ducks to sheltered bays and inland waterbodies. It also brings mixed flocks of thrushes to cropped areas of grass: fieldfare and redwing united in their search for sustenance both rural and urban. Spring is signalled by the returning warblers, setting up territory and announcing their arrival with a range of tuneful (and not so tuneful) songs. Wading birds pass through, pattering and probing on coastal mudflats, their piping and mournful calls echoing around saltmarshes and estuaries.
All over the country in spring and autumn, those who watch local sites, or patches, eagerly search for scarce migratory birds that have overshot their usual routes. Wanderers from the east and west can arrive on our shores in the ‘right’ conditions – note that those may be right for rarity hunters but perhaps not for the birds. Summer can be a quieter time, as our resident breeders hunker down to renew their lineages, but birds are ever-present and constant. A presence offering reassurance and focus. An escape clause in our ever-hectic lives.
I discovered the hobby by happy accident. My grandfather instilled a love for the outdoors in me when I was a child, and I retain vivid memories of shared Nature experiences with him. This interest was suppressed in my teens and twenties, as I built a defensive shield of drug taking, debauchery and devilishness. This arrogant coping mechanism damaged my mind, left me in debt, and almost cost me my life on a number of occasions. At worse I was a daily drunken mess; at best I functioned in short-term jobs until my camouflage was inevitably rumbled. I had to break in order to rebuild, and in 2013 I did just that.
I suffered a breakdown, and from that point onwards I had to make wholesale changes to my life. I quit all substances (legal and non), paid off my debts and, most importantly, sought help. Help took many forms – medication and counselling for a start – but nothing came close to the solitude and relaxation I found when I was out walking, and specifically when I started to look at and observe birds. This interest widened as I learnt more about birds themselves and about the subculture that exists in birdwatching. This can be a high-pressured environment at times and perhaps not always conducive to wellbeing, so I found that forging my own path enabled me to keep a hold on my obsessive tendencies.
Birdwatching gave me a focus. It provided me with safe places to visit at times of great stress. Places where I could fall into the rhythms of Nature and foster a deep sense of feeling grounded. As I followed ancient paths well worn by decades of footfall by fellow Nature-lovers, I felt more connected. I felt connected to these people and connected to these places – a shared love and a common ground, in myriad ways. This was all part of the undulating road leading to the state of recovery I find myself in now. Not just a state of recovery, but also a state of belonging. In fact, a state of being.
