Just wingin' it (Week 43)

"The world would be a better place if everyone was a birdwatcher."

I wonder if the artist Robert Bateman knows just how popular birdwatching is these days. It may not be "everyone" but in one in five Canadians are now self-proclaimed birders. It's even soared past gardening in popularity. Naturally, I had to discover the joys of birdwatching for myself!

Val and I are truly lucky in where we live. Just a few blocks from our front door in Esquimalt, we ambled down to a quiet marina, and immediately spotted a pair of mute swans drifting along as darkness approached. Maybe not as rare a spotting as the trumpeter swan with its all-black beak, but stirring just the same. It was enough to want to get out with the binoculars and get more serious.

Next up was Esquimalt Lagoon, home of a migratory bird sanctuary that's been described as a birdwatcher's paradise. We went on a chilly but sunny day and were simply stunned at the variety and sheer numbers of birds. We gave our binoculars a good workout, spotting plovers, mew gulls, mergansers, herons, quail, and surveying the scene from high overhead, a lone bald eagle. As complete amateurs, we didn't even know what else we were looking at or where we should be looking, but we were instantly hooked.

The area is such a magnet for bird-watchers that a local driftwood sculptor, Paul Lewis, has devoted a massive amount of artistic energy to recreating the winged residents of Esquimalt Lagoon. His work is now the subject of a new documentary, which I'm sure will be a thing of beauty. We were particularly smitten with the owl, perched almost menacingly on a log overlooking the harbour and probably frightening the bejeezus out of countless sparrows.

Beyond just getting outdoors and exploring the natural world, birding comes with a lot of other benefits. Maybe the best list comes from the venerable Audubon Society, which includes among other things, improving your eyesight. Birding also builds our connection with conservation and environmental stewardship. Birders are important to biologists needing information on migratory patterns, numbers and even the current state of health of certain species. They can even hint at the possible effects of climate change. A great example in our neck of the woods was the spotting of a yellow-browed warbler this fall, which had birders from around the world flocking to Vancouver Island hoping to catch a glimpse and add it to their journals. The tiny warbler had crossed an ocean to get here, and nobody knows why, other than perhaps its dwindling habitat had forced it out.

Now that Val and I have discovered how much fun birding is, we're going to pick up a proper birdwatching book and begin to catalog our finds. After that, we'll probably want a better set of binoculars. We want to be sure the next time a yellow-browed warbler flits into view, we can see every feather.

NEXT WEEK: Finding my inner handyman!