Tips for effective note- taking
Let’s value what we see and tell the world about it. Here are some simple tips for effective note- taking.
Record the date, time, weather (temperature, wind speed/direction, predominant conditions, tide state if relevant) and who you were with.
Provide accurate location information ie. grid reference, postcode etc, local name of place (if there is one), locator information e.g. at bottom of path overlooking stream, or hide name etc, and any other feature that locates your position.
Record bird species, number(s) present, gender, number of young (when relevant), bird behaviour observed ie. feeding, mating, roosting, aggression etc.
Sketch the birds observed, if possible (see article by Lucy Saunders, Bird Watching magazine, August 2021) or take photographs.
Note your/fellow birdwatchers’ responses to sights. Were you/they uplifted or depressed by what was seen? Remember those times when you’ve ‘high- fived’, you were so thrilled to see a bird.
And here’s an important step: think what should happen to your observations. Check out resources such as iRecord, iNaturalist, BirdTrack, or eBird and contribute to their database.
Let’s return to J. A. Baker’s diaries. Some may criticise his entries, but one can gain a sense of the impact of his birdwatching. Take his entry for Friday 21st May 1954, for instance:
“Abberton Reservoir. A Dunlin in breeding plumage, looked as though it wore black trousers, well hoisted up … A Turnstone, in rich tortoiseshell breeding plumage, had very bandy red legs, scampering. Great Crested Grebe seemed hardly a bird, more like a Lewis Carroll character … On first seeing it,
I felt that it was beyond a joke.”
And on Thursday 5th October 1961 we see evidence of his observational capacity:
“V. sunny, white fleecy clouds, deep blue sky, strongish SSE wind – fairly mild, brilliantly clear skylines. Trees… just turning a little.”
He then makes an observation that excites him but to many of us, 60 years later, feels commonplace: “Gradual realized (sic) it was a Buzzard – most exciting… I must have watched it for nearly 5 minutes, circling and dodging – long way it went up in varying widths of circle, with Jackdaws trying hard to keep up, changing direction v. suddenly …”