Why I Count Birds: A Personal Note on Obsession, Purpose, and the Bigger Picture

Every so often, someone asks why I’m so obsessed with bird monitoring. Why I care about seemingly routine surveys. Why I keep pushing for structured counts in remote places – even when few seem to take notice.

The answer isn’t short. But it is simple: because I’ve seen what these data can do. And because I believe in what they represent.

Scoping the coastline for oystercatchers – “Counting birds never took away the joy of simply watching them. If anything, it taught me to pay better attention.”

“Counting birds never took away the joy of simply watching them. If anything, it taught me to pay better attention.”

Back in the late 1990s, I worked with BirdLife Hungary as a programme coordinator. I helped launch nationwide monitoring schemes for our everyday species – the birds we see so often, we risk not seeing them at all. I also helped develop a long-term programme for colonial waterbirds, species that rely on fragile wetland systems vulnerable to even the slightest disturbance.

These programmes are still running today. They’ve grown, evolved – and most importantly, they’ve endured.

Years later, I founded World Shorebirds Day and its cornerstone initiative, the Global Shorebird Counts. It was born from the same desire: to rally birders around the world to contribute to a shared understanding. These counts don’t generate flashy headlines. I don’t publish glossy reports. But every record submitted feeds into global datasets – including those analysed by the eBird team at Cornell. They know how precious consistent, structured, long-term data is – and how hard it is to come by.

I’ve never been in this for recognition. I just want to make sure what seems ordinary today doesn’t become invisible tomorrow. That our fragmented knowledge becomes a little more connected. That our blind spots shrink – one survey, one bird at a time.

Eurasian Oystercatcher – “My favourite shorebird – not just for its striking look or sharp call, but because it reminds me why I started all this in the first place.”

Why BirdUTM Continues This Mission

The BirdUTM Project is my way of continuing – and expanding — this mission.

It’s an invitation to birders to go beyond observation. To document. To take the extra step that transforms passion into knowledge. To fill the gaps left by hotspot-chasing and under-surveyed terrain.

Some might say it’s too ambitious. Others may not yet see the point.

But I’ve seen small seeds grow into nationwide monitoring programmes. I’ve seen volunteer observations echo through peer-reviewed papers. I’ve seen the invisible become visible.

That’s why I count birds.

Not because it’s glamorous. Not because it’s easy. But because it matters.

Survey spot in the Southern Uplands In Scotland – “One of my quiet corners in the Southern Uplands — where White-throated Dippers and Common Sandpipers return each spring, and where counting birds feels like keeping promises.”

Your Patch Matters Too

So far, I’ve submitted over a thousand checklists across 133 UTM grids and regularly monitor 50 of them. That’s my personal commitment to the PatchBird Initiative — and to the birds.

But I can’t do it alone.

Whether you monitor one grid or fifty, your observations help complete the bigger picture. No one else can document your local patch the way you can.

If you believe in birds, believe in their data. Pick a square. Count consistently. Help build something that lasts. Because what we do today will shape what the birds – and the next generation of birders – inherit tomorrow.