User:Biking Birder 2010/sandbox

The Biking Birder is one Gary Brian Prescott, a well known Green Birder who participates in an extreme activity called Green Birding. Green Birding is a hobby, or maybe even a lifestyle, where one travels to see birds without the use of fossil-fuelled transport. Whether a birder, a person who is keen on birds and enjoys watching them, takes part in a Green Birding challenge, such as a Green Day, A Big Sit or in it's ultimate form, a BIGBY. . . a Big Green Big Year, is up to the individual birder. A Green Birder can be someone who loves watching birds around his or her home town and wants to help protect those birds and their environment by not contributing to Climate Change.

All issues involved in Green Birding are succinctly to be found in a book by a Canadian Green Birder named Richard Gregson. Published in 2013, Richard's book tells of Green Birding from home, the equipment to be used and the reasons why. Name of the book. . . Green Birding.

Gary Brian Prescott in 2010 cycled around the United Kingdom, ostensibly to visit every RSPB, Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, nature reserve and every WWT, Wildfowl & Wetland Trust reserve also. Cycling for the whole year, Gary achieved this and saw 251 different bird species. This equalled the UK BIGBY record held by Chris Mills of Norfolk, UK. A Big Green Big Year is one where one makes a year list of all birds seen.

In 2015, Gary repeated this quest to visit all of the nature reserves belonging to the RSPB and the WWT and saw 290 different bird species. This broke the UK BIGBY record. It did not however beat the European record held by Ponc Feliu Latorre of Barcelona Spain.

Ponc Feliu Latorre has written a book about his BIGBY of 2013 : Plumes y Pedales. The book is available in Spanish and Catalan.

So in 2016, Gary once more cycled around the UK but this time Gary did not visit all of the reserves, instead concentrating on seeing birds, especially rare and special birds. Gary cycled from The Midlands to Land's End and along the South Coast of England to Portsmouth. There followed a route that took him up to Newcastle Upon Tyne and across to The Lake District before heading south once more. April and May were spent cycling around East Anglia and Kent. June is when Gary finally got to Scotland where he was to spend the next five months! Indeed Gary spent the month of August on North Ronaldsay, the northernmost island in the Orkney Archipelago, staying at the North Ronaldsay Bird Observatory. Nearly all of September and October was spent on Fair Isle. After leaving Fair Isle and after returning to North Ronaldsay for two weeks, Gary cycled down the east coast of Scotland and England before returning to his starting point at Upton Warren Nature Reserve in Worcestershire, the flagship reserve of the Worcestershire Wildlife Trust.

Gary saw 316 different bird species in 2016. To birds that were classified as species in 2016, Hudsonian Whimbrel and Fea's Petrel, have since been lumped. In the case of Hudsonian Whimbrel it has been reclassified as a Whimbrel.

The 316 bird species seen by Gary in 2016 beat the total of 304 seen by Ponc Feliu Latorre but as Gary used some fossil-fuelled transport in the form of ferries to get to the remote Scottish islands, Ponc's European record still stands as the purest Green record.

A book called Biking Birder 2016 - The Quest for 300, written by Gary Brian Prescott is available that details the adventure.

The three years of Biking Birder adventures, 2010, 2015 and 2016, raised money for the RSPB, the WWT and for Asthma UK charities. Gary is seriously asthmatic. Gary also raised money for a charity in The Manu National Park in Peru's Amazonia region called Chaskwasi-Manu. Chaskwasi-Manu gives indigenous rainforest children the opportunity to access education.

Jim Royer of California maintains a blog called 'The World of Green Birding.' The blog details all known Green Birding records. On it Gary's BIGBY year of 2016 is placed beneath Ponc's European record year of 2013. Ponc's record on that page ends with a (G) denoting 'Green', whereas Gary's record ends with a (F), denoting Ferries.

http://greenbirdingworld.blogspot.pe/

In 2018 Gary is attempting to beat the World BIGBY record currently held by Dorian Anderson of the United States. Dorian, in 2014, saw 618 different bird species in the USA. Gary will both cycle and use an Alpaca packraft around Southern Peru for six months, from April first to September 30th in order to beat Dorian's total. April to early July will be cycling up and over The Andes. July to end end of September Gary will be packrafting down the Madre de Dios, Mother of God River to Puerto Maldonado. At no time during the six months will Gary use fossil-fuelled transport. Gary won't even be using lifts and elevators!

Gary is raising money in 2018 for Birdlife International and for the children of Chaskwasi-Manu.