Punk Rock Big Year hits the road and skies.

So as our fall migration starts to slow down and it gets less and less comfortable to drive the Duster (it has no heater), what's a punk birder to do? Follow the birds I guess.

I have been feverishly planning a couple of really exciting things lately for PRBY. Well, exciting for me anyway. A little less so for my wife and kids. Many of you might remember that me doing this documentary was actually inspired by a few paragraphs in Kenn Kaufman's Kingbird Highway. If you haven't read that book, get to it. It's the story of a dude that drops out of high school to try and break a Big Year record. Even crazier is that he did it spending only $1000 and with no car. He hitched about 50, 000 miles around North America. You birders may already know this story very well. You non-birders should read it. It's a very cool story about a kid finding himself within his passion for birds. Well, now Kenn is one of our most prominent birders and bird conservationists and author of not only Kingbird Highway but other books as well as having his own line of great nature field guides; the Kaufman Field Guide series. Not bad for a dude that dropped outa' high school. I never dropped out but I was certainly vacant most of the time in high school, spending all my time painting, drawing, birding and getting into a fair amount of extra activities that my parents would most certainly have frowned upon. And here I am working for one of the world's most prominent creative advertising agencies. The moral here is school sucks but education is extremely important. Ok, school doesn't always suck but I hated it. Anyone under the age of 18 reading this? Stay in school, take charge, make it what you need it to be. Neither Kenn, nor myself would encourage anyone to do things exactly the way we did.

When I started this thing, Rachel said, "Well, you have to go birding with Kenn on camera." She may rue the day she said that now because that's exactly what's happening. I'm lucky enough to be able to attend the Ohio Young Birders Conference. I wouldn't exactly call myself a young person but I tend to be on the younger side of birding. These are actual young people and they care about birds! Something I never experienced when I was their age. I was pretty much alone in that back then. Oh, and did I forget to mention, I'll get a chance to go birding with Kenn and Kim Kaufman! If you are into sports, it's sort of like playing a game of pick-up hockey with Wayne Gretzky. And if you're in a band, it'd be like being on stage with Neil Young or Tom Waits.

As if that's not amazing enough, I'm also in line to go to Nicaragua birding for a few days. This isn't just any birding trip. This is to go birding on coffee estates. The main place we will visit is Gaia Estate. It grows Smithsonian certified Bird-friendly coffee. We will also find a full-sun estate to visit. What I want to show is just how much damage we are doing to habitat when we clear-cut a forest and change it into a full-sun coffee farm. You can read all about bird friendly coffee at an earlier post I did about Birds and Beans coffee companies. If you want to do ONE SIMPLE THING that will dramatically help birds, it's drink ONLY Birds and Beans coffee. Not just at home, ask your favorite coffee shop if they will get it for you. Since I found out about Birds and Beans, I've probably only drank about twenty or thirty cups of coffee where I wasn't sure the origin. Hell, I actually carry around my own coffee, press and kettle (when needed) for when I'm on the road. And shade grown isn't enough. Some farms have shade grown certification with only two or three trees on the estate. That's hardly a good wildlife habitat. Sorry about this always turning into a rant, I'm just really passionate about this subject.

So, big things on the horizon for me and Punk Rock Big Year. Wish me luck and I would like to take this time to thank a few people for my good fortune. Firstly, my wife for being so understanding and supportive all year, putting me first all the time. I love you Rachel. Secondly, Kenn and Kim Kaufman for taking time out of their insanely busy schedules to spend time with me, a heavily tattooed aging punk that just randomly fired them an email this spring. Thirdly, David and Madeleine and Bill from Birds and Beans for helping me get further in touch with Kenn and Kim. Also, all the people supporting me by way of donating time and mad skills with shooting, editing, onlining, sound design and transferring (some of these things won't happen until next year but they are greatly appreciated).

Oh yeah, I also went birding last Sunday morning and found some LBDOs.

Long-billed Dowitcher by almiyi.

October 23, 2011 day list
Long-billed Dowitcher

Punk Rock Big Year
Paul Riss

Mixed emotions about The Big Year.

There are some pretty exciting things happening for Punk Rock Big Year right now but I can't let them out of the bag yet. Don't want to jinx some things that I've been looking forward to so much.

So Sunday night we got a babysitter and Rachel and I went to see The Big Year. The birder in me really loved it. But there's this other side of me. A film lover, a creative professional, a perfectionist. This is what that person thought...

(The following is a comment I left on 10000birds.com's excellent blog which I love and read every day.) spoiler alert. A couple things here might spoil it if you've not seen the film yet.

More people aren’t going to be interested in birding because of a bad director. Sure, he’s probably a better director than I am but he’s not great. The film was far too much about a series of birding events and not about the characters. Mark’s book is really great and I felt like maybe I knew those guys by the end of it. There was zero character development in the film, ZERO. If I missed my wife’s fertility treatment for a Snowy Owl, shit would have hit the fan a hell of a lot harder than that. It would have been a devastating blow to an already fragile relationship. Yes, so he lost her, she left him, but what’s the saying, “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” That statement is a serious truth. She never even threw anything at him! As for the relationship with Jack Black and his dad, there was one moment where I might have believed that they connected but it had little to do with the emotion pulled out of the actors by the director and more from the owls all-seeing eyes. The only place I really saw the way I feel when I see a rare bird is when Steve Martin got his Hummingbird at that fence when it seemed he’d miss it. His eyes said a lot in that moment but it was the only half-second where I could turn to my wife and say, “That’s why I’m a birder.”

If you are interested in what I mean by character development, go see a film called 50/50. They did more to tell me about the main character in the first two seconds of the film while he studiously waits for a walk signal before crossing a road while other joggers just go right across. That kind of directing is very powerful and could easily have been done with The Big Year too. There’s no reason I shouldn’t have teared up when Jack Black’s dad finally understood that his son wasn’t a complete failure but a person with a passion that deserved recognition.

For birders, it’s a fine film because we can see bits of ourselves in it, but it ain’t good for anyone else. My wife fell asleep for a bit and I don’t blame her for a moment. I know she’d enjoy the book, though now, I won’t be able to get her to read it.

I’m in the process of trying to make a short documentary about my own big year but if it sucks when it’s done, it’ll stay shelved. As with most big years, it’s turning out to be the people I’ve become acquainted with that are what I’ll remember most. I’ll always love the birds but counting them is getting a bit old after 10 months of it. In a way, I’m glad I did this at a younger age, that way, I can just enjoy looking at birds from January 1, 2012 until the day I keel over, hopefully with my bins in my hand...

Thanks for everything.

Canadian followers will know and maybe some American ones as well that this weekend was the Canadian Thanksgiving Weekend. The last of our good-weather long weekends.

Thank you #1

The company I work for, DDB, always gives us four day long weekends during the summer. Unfortunately for me, I had to work Friday on colour transferring a commercial I shot for Subaru a week before. That's OK, I spent the day with Mark (the editor that will work on PRBY), Andrew (the Executive Producer at DDB) and Billy (one of the best transfer dudes in Toronto, maybe Canada). They are all great guys and we usually sit around listening to records while we work.

Thank you #2

I spent Saturday hanging out with my kids. Early Saturday morning, like every morning, I could hear a flock of Canada Geese approaching my house. I happened to look out side just as they went over. On the right tip of the flock was a Snow Goose! A new bird for the year! I also went to see a movie with Rach called 50/50. I highly recommend it. Very funny at times and very touching at others. Great little film.

Snow Goose by kukkurovaca.

Thank you #3

Sunday, Rachel's new shop, Sunday's Child, was closed for the holiday Sunday/Monday. Read it again, that sentence makes sense. We went apple picking and pumpkin buying with the kids. We never got around to planting our own apple trees or pumpkins this year. We also had a great outdoor dinner for Thanksgiving. It was a great time spent with friends and family. We killed a turkey, but I know it had a humane existence on a nearby farm prior to it's demise. Many of our veges came from our own garden.

Thank you #4

Monday was not the best but it was a cloud with a silver lining. The kids seemed to have grabbed a sore throat type of cold. Lots of hacking and spitting of phlegm. Both Rachel and I got this one too. Still feeling it today as I head to work. Why am I thankful for that? Well, we folded our couch out into a bed and spent the day renting movies from apple TV and generally just spending time together.

Thank you #5

In lieu of working Friday while the rest of DDB was enjoying the spectacular weather we were having, I took Tuesday to go birding and shoot some footage for PRBY. I never got a lot of new birds and missed a couple I was trying for but I got two new birds. A pair of Trumpeter Swans  and a pair of Hudsonian Godwits. It was a great day spent wandering around looking at birds with two great people, Richard Pope and Margaret Bain, my birding teachers.

Trumpeter Swan by James Marvin Phelps.

Hudsonian Godwit by Henry McLin.

Hudsonian Godwit Digiscoping I did.

Thank you #6
Thanks to all the people reading and following my blog. This year is drawing to a close. What should I do next year?

October 8, 2011 day list

Snow Goose

October 11, 2011 day list

Trumpeter Swan

Hudsonian Godwit

P.S. Last Thursday I finally got to do a couple hours of tattoos of bird names. We managed to get 13 of them done. I'm realizing that I'll be tattooing well into 2012. It takes longer than I expected. I need a strategy, any ideas?

And so it begins.

Paul Riss

Punk Rock Big Year

What kind of birder will you be?

There's an awful lot of chatter about the Hollywood film coming out about birding big years. Well, there is in the birding community. The rest of society has no idea about our world really, now do they? I'll have to reserve judgement on the film. The above trailer doesn't fill me with confidence but that doesn't mean anything. Trailers can be deceiving. At the very least, people that never knew birding even existed will know it after this. But will it bring anyone new into the realm of birding. I kind of doubt it. My guess is that most folks will come away saying, "Those birders are silly." Too bad if thats the case because the book was really amazing. Hopefully we will see some other interesting takes on birding films, preferably more real and less Hollywood. Maybe that can grab a few people to be our new birders.

I guess I'm writing this post in response to a couple of others I've read recently on the subject of new birders and how they will change birding. Gunnar and Alvan have both written on the subject.

I want more people to be birders. Lots more. But as to what kind of birder they'll be, I just don't care. As long as they are in it for love. Some might want to photograph them (I personally have no interest in that side of it), some may want to be crazy listers (I don't really do that much either [beyond my 2011 big year]), some may just want to be feeders (like my mom) and some might want to get deep into the world of bird ID (I like that but it's not everything to me). What's most important is that they love the birds in their own way, respect the birds boundaries and share their passion with somebody else.

I don't think we should limit the way we get new birders. Let's welcome them all in with open arms, teach them as much as they want to know and give them nothing more than what they want. As long as they appreciate and love birds, they'll be much more inclined to care about their survival and therefore be more inclined to care about our planetary ecosystem. Who cares if they're only doing it to continue to get their Blue Jays and Chickadees to their feeder, as long as they're doing it.

I work in advertising and most advertisers see the huge value (to their brands) of youth. They are a powerful group of consumers and advertisers take full advantage of that. I don't always agree with the way they do it but we birders can learn from them. We should target youth and try to bring them into the fold at a young age. If they grow up appreciating the natural beauty of birds, that can only translate into good things for the environment. Check out this blog of a young Californian birder. We need more people as devoted as he is to seeing a bird. (lost this link, will add it soon).

In case you're wondering. I went out birding Sunday morning, trying desperately to squeeze in a couple species before taking the kids to a birthday party of a friend form school by 10:30am. I'm not sure what the hell I was thinking since the drive to the spot is and hour, the drive home is an hour. It left me with about 25 minutes of birding. I guess it was worth a shot. I found nothing I went looking for, though my friend Richard saw them the very next day.

Paul Riss
Punk Rock Big Year

You gotta jump back in with both feet.

Note: this is a long post but much needs to be said.

I'm not sure if you've noticed or not by my postings but I'm a little tired of this Punk Rock Big Year project. In the beginning it was fun and I had high hopes for getting funding for the documentary, maybe a little corporate sponsorship to help pay for trips to see birds and so on while I plugged product that I already use and love (I'm not getting any so I won't bother telling you what brand of bins/scope I use). There was also the exciting prospect of seeing between 275 and 300 birds in a single year, many would be lifers as I've never chased birds like this before. This project would see my first ever trip to Point Pelee (8 days of nothing but birding). There was talk of meeting people like Graeme Gibson and Margaret Atwood (both avid birders). Things were moving along so well.

Then, summer happened, the birds flew right past me on their way north, taking much of the wind in my sails with them. I was halfway through my Big Year and there was no funding. To the contrary, there was (and still is) a maxed out credit card. I'm not too far off turning tricks downtown for a few extra dollars so I can go to Rainy River (a trip that I may in fact be too late for now). There was only 200 birds. And it's looking like I might only be able to get to 250 now (and that's with some effort). I felt as if I'd be sitting at 220 forever. The kids were heading off to their first year of school, my wife is opening a retail store downtown Orono, my partner (in advertising) and I decided to split after 8 years working together so work is busier than ever because I now need to find a new writer (a full-time job in itself). Suffice to say I was just plain tired of the bird chasing shit.

I almost gave up. I tweeted as much and was sent many messages from you folks that urged me to carry on. You all told me it was important that I didn't give up now and that you wanted to see me keep going. My wife, having given up a lot to let me do this, said she would be pretty unhappy to have given up a year of what she might want to do for nothing. So I did what she told me, and what you told me, I planned to jump back in with both feet, literally.

I emailed someone I never even knew in 2010, but whom I now consider to be a great friend and teacher. Richard Pope. He wrote a book about his big year. You should read it, it's funny, it's honest and if you are planning to do a big year in Ontario or anywhere, you need to read it. It's put together like a blueprint of how to do a successful big year. It talks about needing a plan and a support group. Richard being Richard, he sent me a message right away asking when was the soonest I could get out birding. There were a couple of shorebirds I needed that he knew we could find nearby. So off we went two days later.

And when I say I jumped right back in, that's exactly what I meant, though it was more like wading back in. After some running around in the city I needed to do, we met at Richard's home and headed off to Presqu'ile Provincial Park. It is one of the best places to see shorebirds in the fall in Ontario. Luckily it's only an hour from my house. Things were not looking great all day though. It was raining heavily the entire time I was in the city. And weather patterns always being the same here, I knew that by the time I got out to his place, it would be pouring there too. Feeling a bit dejected, Rachel and I started out of the city. While Rach slept, I fumed at the amount of traffic on the highway. It's one of the things I hate most in life, traffic. I called Richard  to let him know I'd be at least two hours late. He calmed me down and assured me we'd be fine. I helped Rachel pick up the kids from school and raced, and I mean raced (140km/hr at least) to Richard's place.

We got to the park, parked the car and walked out to the beach where these birds might be. There's a spit that reaches out into the lake and a small island not too far away from the main land. Richard said that I should bring a shitty pair of shoes. I wasn't totally sure why but I did what he had said. We saw a couple birds right off. One of which I needed, White-rumped Sandpiper. A second flock of shorebirds flew in and one of them was a standout bird from the pack. Process of elimination and our common observations made it an American Golden Plover. Then Richard started to take his boots and socks off. The rain had let up, thankfully, but it wasn't overly warm. He said I needed to do the same. Since I almost always do what richard says, I removed my boots and threw on my shoes. Then he said, "OK Risster, walk over to that island." there might be two or three new birds over there. I probably looked at him a bit funny, but like the good student, I walked in. The water was cold. Hell, Lake Ontario is cold in late June, and colder in late September. The depth was about up to my thighs until the first wave came. After that, I knew I'd be driving home in wet underwear.

On the island, we saw lots of dead gulls. It was a breeding colony and I guess lots die. We saw a few more birds but nothing new yet. I was starting to think this wet trip to the island wasn't going to get me another bird. Then, we saw some American Pipits, such a nice little bird. They flew around in the strong winds, almost looking like they were doing it just for fun. Then we came across another bird we had been hoping for, a Stilt Sandpiper. Around another corner were three Ruddy Turnstones. I was really enjoying being out birding again, filming some of it on my iPhone so it can be used in the movie (couldn't get a cameraman on such short notice),  and of course adding to my list.

Stilt Sandpiper by dominic sherony.

Ruddy Turnstone by davidhofmann08.

White-rumped Sandpiper by dominic sherony. 

American Golden Plover by lgooch.

American Pipit by THE Holy Hand Grenade!

I'm feeling a renewed energy for the project, I'm meeting my producer Friday to talk money. I'm still working on a zero budget but hoping for some relief of some kind. Though it's a one way street with the money on this thing, even my financial advisor is telling me not to give up hope. That's encouraging. I'm still under an enormous amount of stress at work and home but there's only a few more months to go this year. And it doesn't matter really what number I get to, as long as I have a good time doing it. Who else can say they made a documentary about themselves? Well, maybe lots of people but nobody I know, that's for sure. So I want to take this opportunity to thank my support group (of birders),  Richard, Margaret, Hugh, Dave, etc. To my cameramen, Jon, Jonathan, Derek, Chris, Jesse. And to all of you that follow this crazy thing. But most of all, my family, Rachel, Shepard and Georgia for putting up with this. Thanks.

Sometimes it's the smallest things.

My weekends are disappearing like the leaves soon will. Not that I'm having a bad time but my birding is suffering. I bet I've already missed many shorebirds I wanted. Last time it was work. A really big job I was working on ended up shooting in Florida. That was all well and good except none of the birds I saw were of any use to either my big year or my film. What's worse is that when I returned, there was no time to go birding. My kids were starting school and I'm pretty sure if I had said to my wife that I was heading out to hunt down some shorebirds a day after being away in sunny warm Florida for 5 days, I may not only have been met with resistance but also a bullet to the face, or two. Rachel is a very understanding lady for sure but that may have been too much.

I also love liquor.

I threw up in this thing. Not my fault, he flew sideways, often.

I didn't throw up in this one. No sideways flying.

First day of school. How cool is that car?

My little girl.

My little dude.

This weekend it was something much smaller than a photo shoot that kept me from birding. Not small so much as microscopic. The common cold virus. After four days at school my daughter came home with a runny nose. Followed by a night of zero sleep. Then, two days later, Shep was down with the same thing. That friggin' train is never late. I don't know what it is but men (from 2 yrs. and on) can be such sucks. I know I am when I'm sick. Rachel just seems to handle being sick better than me. She says it's because women have to deal with pregnancy and nothing is worse than that. A cold renders me completely useless. Turns out Shep is an apple that fell close to the tree. He went to bed saying his throat hurt. Two hours later (11 pm) he was up again. And he never went back to sleep until about 7 am. Rachel spent most of the night with him. I subbed in about 4 am.

Food from our garden.

The day before he was sick, he helped clean the carrots and parsnips.

More food from our garden. Well cleaned by Shep.

Needless to say, there'd be no birding happening. So, with Shep flat on the couch in front of Netflix and Georgia just getting over her cold, we needed to find something to do in the house. CANNING! Yes, canning. As many of you know we moved to the country last October. There are many reasons why but one was to depend less on grocery stores and that whole terrible food chain. We started growing lots of our own food and shopped only at farms for local food. But as the birds leave us, so does the fresh food. No we grab an extra bunch of fresh vegetables each time we hit the farm. This time it would be tomatoes. I bought an entire bushel of Roma tomatoes for 7 dollars. We spent the day blanching, peeling, coring and stewing them. We also made salsa. It was a ton of work but it'll save us lots of money and trips to the grocery store when it's minus 30 degrees out.

Spicy mixed pickles. Mmmmmmm.

I really need to do more birding. I'm sinking into the hole again of feeling I'm not doing enough toward this film. This week I'll spend my 2 hours a day of commuting on the train watching footage I've shot so far. There's a few things more that need doing. One is a trip to coffee plantations to show how incredibly bad it is to drink non-bird-friendly coffee. In a nutshell (because I can't help plug this any chance I get), you MUST drink Birds and Beans. If not, you are directly supporting the clear-cutting of forests in coffee growing nations. And buying shade-grown isn't enough. All they need is one tall tree to get shade certification. That certainly won't support an ecosystem that once was acres of forest. Buy Birds and beans. If you take nothing from anything I am doing with Punk Rock Big Year, at least do that. Sorry for the ranting.

Ok, so this week, send good thoughts my way, thoughts of sharp needles going into skin and beautiful (new) birds in my bins.

Paul Riss
Punk Rock Big Year

Working, not posting

I usually try to make a post every week. Sometimes, life just doesn't allow for that. Last week, things got very busy. I had to fly to the Florida Keys for work. Amazing place for sure, lots of birds but very little time to really take it in. Think, sitting in front of beautiful scenery and never looking up from a computer...

I grabbed a few shots here and there.

Action shot! Birding in the keys. I do this sillyness everywhere I go.

Spent most of Friday up an 85ft crane. Some birds flew underneath me.

A view of the Florida Keys people rarely get. From the crane.

Brazilian Skipper (ID by Kenn Kaufman).

White Ibis feeding in the grass.

Punk Rock Big Year
Paul Riss