Birdwatching and the Glory of God

Join Fletch and his childhood friend and birder, Tom Slater, as they discuss birding and how the glory of God is on display in creation and nature.

Music by Jimmy Buffett: Summerzcool
Clip from The Big Year: The Big Year

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:04

Welcome to the Mango Times podcast. This is Fletch, and I'm the writer and editor for everything you read and listen to here on the Mango Times. On this podcast, we're going to discuss anything and everything that we experience together here on this crazy planet. So join me as I talk about different aspects of culture, from great movies to great music, to everything we love to binge watch online together. And I'll do my best to entertain you as I share my perspective on life as a husband, dad, and grandfather to a big loud family. So sit back as I grab a cup of coffee and my favorite dog and quietly make some noise. Hey, this is Fletch. I want to welcome you to episode 19 of the Mango Times podcast. This is called Discover Birding. Now, Discover Birding, we're going to get into this series on the podcast where we talk about discovering the glory of God through technology, through nature, through relationships, through creativity, whatever it is. So on this inaugural episode of the Discovery series, we're talking about birding with my good friend, my lifelong friend, Tom Slater. We'll we'll meet him in just a few minutes. But before we get there, a little housekeeping. You know, um, a lot of you have been writing in and talking to me about prior episodes, and I'm really excited because, you know, after the reboot total, we have, you know, this is 19 episodes of the Mango Times. It's not like this has been around forever. Um, and so a lot of you have had a lot of feedback about episode 17 about pipe smoking, where I differentiated the diff the difference between smoking and pipe smoking. I am a pipe smoker, and tonight, as I sit here recording on the longest day of the year, my favorite day of the year, the summer solstice. It's June 20th. I have my Costello poker pipe. And those of you that are pipe smokers know what a Costello is. It's a high-end Italian pipe. It's a it's a pipe that sits on its own. It's called a poker, and in it I have Pops Blend, which is an aromatic tobacco that I made uh specifically for my granddaughter. So she'll always equate this smell of pipe tobacco with her Pops. So it's called Pops Blend, and it's quite popular. I hand it out, sell it, give it to people. Uh, it's a great blend. Smells like vanilla scones. So here I am on the longest day of the year, June 20th, and I'm enjoying that. But a lot of you wrote in about the pipe smoking episode. A lot of you also wrote in about the Enneagram episode. Talked about um what your Enneagram number is and how that relates in your life. So thank you. And I just want to remind you, you can reach out to me at the Mango Times podcast by you can email me at mangoandy at gmail.com, or you can go directly to the Mango Times website and send me a secure email through the Let's Connect button. Um every episode has show notes, every episode has um information on how to reach me, but if you want to reach out, those are two ways and and just let me know what you're thinking. I'm excited about this new series. Uh, we will be going back into the Fletch Festo, we'll be going deeper into the Discover series. Uh, I hope to talk to people about coffee, about tea, about different foods, about different parts of technology, and things like that. So before we get to this episode with Tom Slater, I want to share a little bit of music with you to celebrate the first day of December. Alright, so then it's summer school by Jimmy Buffett off of his album Buffett Hotel, and I'll put a link in the show notes where you can go grab that over at Apple Music. I thought it was perfect for the first day of summer, uh, but it might be perfect for your backyard party as well. Alright, let's jump into this topic. We're going to be talking about uh birding, and and the series is called Discover. It comes out of a a history at our church, Redeemer Modesto, uh, Redeemer Church in Modesto, California, where we would do a series called Discover 167. Or, you know, there's 168 hours in the week. We spend one hour in church. So, where do you discover of glory of God in that other 167 hours? Um, since that kind of died out as a thing at Redeemer, I thought it'd be fun to bring it back up in this podcast uh in my own way. So, Discover Birding. That's our topic tonight. I sat down with my friend Tom Slater and recorded the interview, but before we jump into that, he had mentioned a movie called The Big Year, and I thought it would be fun just to play a quick clip from that movie.

SPEAKER_00 5:33

In 1900, Audubon Society ornithologist Frank Chapman suggested Americans should count them instead, leading eventually to the creation of the Big Year, a competition to see the greatest number of birds in North America in a calendar year. Hoho! Whoa! In 2003, New Jersey roofing contractor Kenny Bostick's big year resulted in an astonishing 732 species, breaking Sandic Cabito's North American record. Many believe that Bostik's record of 732 would stand forever, especially Mrs. Bostick.

SPEAKER_04 6:13

A big year? Kenny, you promised me you were never gonna do another big year. Well, that was before El Nino. Now I'm really worried someone's gonna try to beat 732.

SPEAKER_03 6:23

Bostick was right. Somebody was gonna try to beat 732. Yours truly. Alright, so that's a uh a promo clip from the Big Year starring Jack Black, Owen Wilson, and Steve Martin. A really funny movie. Um and it it's it's a true story. Um, you know, a Hollywood version of a true story about Birding. Um, Tom mentions that during this interview. So I spent some time with him on FaceTime. I recorded it, and so let's uh quickly get to this interview with my good friend Tom Slater. Alright, so for the introduction to my discovery section on discovering the glory of God, I have my friend, longtime friend, since childhood, Tom Slater. So, Tom, welcome to the Mango Times podcast.

SPEAKER_01 7:15

I'm glad you're here. Yeah, me too. Excited.

SPEAKER_03 7:18

So, can you tell my listeners a little bit about who you are, kind of life, family, career, maybe how we know each other? Be kind, no stupid stories.

SPEAKER_01 7:27

Oh man, that's a whole nother uh podcast. Um, my name's Tom, and I grew up in San Jose Bay Area. Um, I moved to a rural town in on the central coast called Napomo. Um I'm married, I have a son and a daughter, two teenagers, and I'm an English teacher in a junior high school. And I know Fletcher, I think we met in Boy Scouts, and then uh we pretty much palled around through junior high and high school, and uh have been friends ever since.

SPEAKER_03 8:02

Yeah, that would have been about fifth grade, I think when our when our schools merged.

SPEAKER_01 8:06

Yeah, I think we're going on about 40 years now, Fletcher.

SPEAKER_03 8:10

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 8:11

Yeah, great.

SPEAKER_03 8:12

So we're talking about I'm talking about the glory of God in a lot of things, and I decided to start the podcast out with birding. So how'd you get started in birding?

SPEAKER_01 8:20

Um, in an unusual way. Um I grew up with a naturalist father, and he would always point stuff out in the field when we were camping and backpacking, but I didn't really care. I was a rock climber and a surfer, and birds just didn't appeal to me. Um, but I had these three buddies uh in my 40s, and we would usually play poker, and one night we decided we were gonna go to a movie instead, so we just randomly picked a movie. Um it had Steve Martin, Jack Black, and um Owen Wilson in it, so I just thought, hey, that'll be a good comedy for a bunch of dudes to go see. So we went and it was called the Big Year, it was 2011, and little did I know the movie um changed my life. It was um about the 1998 um competition for the big year to see as many birds um in a calendar year as you could. Just a playful competition, no money, no prize money, um, no real glory, just um something to do um with your passion, kind of gives you a goal. But the movie just really appealed to me, and I started like two days later. I went out and got a um a field guide and some binoculars and went out into the backyard. And lucky for me, while I was out in the backyard, my seven-year-old son came out and said, Hey dad, what are you doing? And I said, I'm birding. And he said, Can I do it too? So I grabbed another pair of binoculars and uh he joined me, and we've been doing it ever since.

SPEAKER_03 9:48

Ah, that's cool. So, you know, I think you showed me that movie as well. I mean, how could it go wrong, right? Jack Black, Steve Martin, that's a win. Stella. So the term big year, that's a term. That's a thing, right?

SPEAKER_01 10:00

Yeah, I think it started in the 1930s. There there used to be this thing where they would go out and try and shoot as many birds as they could in a day. And then Audubon came along, I think it was Audubon, somebody back then, and they decided, hey, instead of killing as many birds as we can in a day, let's just go out and try and identify as many birds as we could in a day. And then it kind of grew from there. Um and it it didn't really get serious until oh 50s, starting in the 30s, um, plowed through the fifties, you know, maybe there wasn't too many of them, and certainly nobody really knew about it because there wasn't social media and and really even any magazines. But as conservation um kind of and uh um, you know, the environment became bigger and bigger issues. Uh some really important big years happened in the 1970s, and then it kind of grew into a full-fledged thing in the 80s and 90s. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 10:57

So for my listeners that may not, you know, they're just listening along going, where do people find the glory of God in birding? Give me a number. Like what would have been a big year number when those three guys were competing?

SPEAKER_01 11:08

Um, there's 10,000 species uh approximately in the world. And in North America, so what what it is is that you can do uh different types of big years, one for your city, one for your state, one for your North America, world big year. Um but we're talking about um North American big years. So that would be the lower 48, um, Alaska, and Canada. And uh a big year number, I think the first was around 500 plus, and then it grew to 600. That was a big number, and then um 700 was about as far as you could go, and then all of a sudden you had um the internet and you had um things like eBird, and so now the the biggest number I think is like 840 or something.

SPEAKER_03 11:57

Okay, because they're pretty much they're notifying people, like hey, there's a bird.

SPEAKER_01 12:02

Yeah, you get little alerts, um, but there's also guiding companies, and you could have friends, you know, your just your social networking could put you in touch with a lot of people, like, hey, come out here, there's a you know, a pink footed goose, you know, in our town. Come on over and so you book a flight and head on over. Okay. So this is a good thing. That's kind of the extreme aspect of birding. Yeah, that's the extreme aspect of birding. A lot of people just kind of enjoy it, um, you know, walking, walking to work, yeah, or their drive to work, or through their backyard, or or their local uh local wood patch.

SPEAKER_03 12:32

Uh, what aspects of birding do you enjoy the most?

SPEAKER_01 12:36

Um, it's been really fun to go out into the field and just meet people. Um sometimes I'll go to um the woods and I'll just you know meet people with binoculars and you kind of know, okay, they're probably looking at birds, and you strike up conversations. And then as you do that more and more, you begin to see the same people over and over. And you begin to learn their names or where they're from, and eventually you exchange phone numbers and and go out birding together. Um so that's kind of fun. The other day I was out surfing and this guy paddled up on a red longboard, and I've seen him a couple times in the field, and uh he had actually texted me the night before and gave me some tips on this rare bird on where to find it. So he just paddled out in the water and said, Hey Tom, I said, Hey Mike. He said, You see it? I said, I did, thanks. It was right where you said it was gonna be. So that was kind of cool. Um just you know that that kind of it's like when you're a Christian and you meet and you meet somebody and instantly you have um a lot to talk about. Yeah, a lot in common.

SPEAKER_03 13:31

There's a community aspect then. Totally that finding of community. Yeah, that's cool.

SPEAKER_01 13:35

Yep, and then travel is really cool. Basically, anywhere you go, you can see birds. Um, so Costa Rica, Arizona, Texas, Europe, anywhere.

SPEAKER_03 13:44

I like Hage. Yeah, like Costa Rica. Yeah, right. Like I was gonna go to Costa Rica this summer.

SPEAKER_01 13:50

You should. It's great. Kids would thank you.

SPEAKER_03 13:53

All right, so my big question for people on these is how do you find the glory of God in birding birds?

SPEAKER_01 14:01

Yeah, well, um okay, so in Genesis, right? Um the fifth day. On the eighth day, God went surfing. But on the fifth day, um he created, you know, the the the fish of the sea. And and I I I loved whales growing up. I was a big, I thought I was gonna be a marine biologist. I love whales. Yeah, no, you had a narwhal on your door. On my door, yeah. And I had uh whale mugs, and I was just a whale nerd. Um so the other half of that day um were the f were were the birds of the air. And um, you know, to go see a whale, I gotta drive to the coast, book a book a you know, a boat ride, and then go out into the ocean, and then get really, really lucky. Um but with the birds, um, I can see them in my backyard, I can see them in my neighborhood, I can see them basically anywhere. So, you know, evidence of the of the creator can be found in various ways, but one of those ways is evidence and creation. Um today I was out uh just walking through Osoflacco and I saw tons of new fledgling birds, you know, just popping out of nests and you know, trying out their wings, and um, you know, you you're just seeing warblers from the in the trees and thrushes, and it's just a really neat way to see the evidence of God. And you know, Fletcher, if I could go back and and be there on that fifth day and watch the skies erupt and just rain down, you know, a kaleidoscope of different species of birds. Um I mean that would be just fantastic. You could get all the birds in one shot right there.

SPEAKER_03 15:43

Yeah, that's a big day.

SPEAKER_01 15:45

Yeah, that would be a a one and done day. But um so it's kind of neat, you know. Um I think we take uh creation for granted sometimes. Um, you know, we we we you know we love mountains and streams and stuff, but those kind of aren't really living, and so it's you know, it's neat to see things um alive. I you know, I I'll I'll leave my house in the morning with just the the goal of just trying to go out and see nature, just see something that's alive and see evidence of God and um see all these pretty things and just marveling the creativity um that he has um for in creating these things.

SPEAKER_03 16:21

So yeah, you see that in birds though, imm immediately when you uh when you pay attention, right? It's like some people aren't paying attention. And do you find that when you introduce people to birding? Like suddenly they go, Oh yeah, that's all around me.

SPEAKER_01 16:36

Yeah, I'll see you know families walking out um across the boardwalk, whatever, and they're engaged in conversation, which is great. Um, and they'll kind of see me with my binoculars, and and sometimes I'll I'll just let them pass and and I'll I'll I'll see this you know, this awesome green heron in the weeds right so close to them, but you know, they're just not looking, so you they don't see it. Um and every once in a while I'll say, Hey, you guys want to see something cool? And they'll stop and come over and I'll point it out, and then their kids just flip. Um, and then that's all they can talk about. And you know, I'll start pointing out some more birds. And um so when you when you're paying attention and and you're looking for it, you know, you can find it. But it's it is easy to miss. Um we're surrounded by uh an amazing amount of creation. Um but we but we just don't know it.

SPEAKER_03 17:25

Um all right, so yeah, that's that's amazing. I know when I've gone with you, the very first time you ever took me birding, like seriously, we went out to a um a reserve area just in the valley here, and it was winter, and you were going to show me the um I think Ross's geese. I think that's what you wanted to show me, or the flight of them. Does that sound right?

SPEAKER_01 17:46

Yeah, because we were there like Mercedes Merced National Wildlife Refuge, and it was um sandhill cranes and the Ross's geese, snow geese, um Ibis. It's it was a it was a fall migration, and that's a spectacular moment.

SPEAKER_03 18:00

Uh when those take off and you see you know a thousand birds taking off at once, it's one of those things that kind of catches your breath. So yeah, okay. So do you have a favorite birding story for us?

SPEAKER_01 18:13

Do I have am I limited to just one?

SPEAKER_03 18:16

I don't know, the power of editing.

SPEAKER_01 18:18

Yeah, there you go. Um I'll tell I'll I'll tell you a couple. Um one was the seize the moment kind of thing. We were we were leaving church and I was driving my kids. We were just getting on the freeway on ramp, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw a flock of cedar waxlings, which is a beautiful bird. You can Google it, look it up. Um, and uh, and there were so many of them, and it was a new bird for us, so I literally flipped a U-turn on the on-ramp and flipped over to the off-ramp, um, and which is probably not advised. And I pulled over immediately off to the side, and my kids and I just crawled out onto the hood of my truck and just watched as literally hundreds of cedar wax wings worked through the trees and ate the berries, and um, it was just like nature show right there on exhibit. So that was really cool. Um, there was another one where it was just kind of chance and preparation came together. Um, Owen and I were out birding and we were inside this tree tunnel. So you it had a wall and a and a and a ceiling of of just thickets and trees. You couldn't see the sky. And faint in the faint distance we heard uh a familiar sound. Um, one that we hadn't seen locally, but we had seen at Merced National Wildlife Refuge, and we realized that it was a sandhill crane. And those aren't in our county at all. So I began to run simultaneously, just instantly, just running down this tree tunnel. I think we did about an 80-yard dash. And as we exited the tree tunnel and out onto the beach, it was right at the moment where the one single sandhill crane, you know, flew right over our heads, and that was the last sandhill crane we saw in our county. Um that was about um seven years ago. So that was pretty cool.

SPEAKER_03 19:56

Uh do you have a favorite bird?

SPEAKER_01 20:00

Um, I always my standard answer to that question because people ask me a lot, I usually say the next new bird, um, just because it's such a a thrill, um, you know, like a kid on Christmas, when you see a new bird that you haven't ever seen and you just marvel in it. Um that's always, you know, my answer. But if I had to pick one, it would be a Rufus-capped warbler. Um, it's from Mexico. It comes over once in a while in southeastern um Arizona. And I was um driving 12 hours from our town to basically Phoenix to pick up a trailer that we had bought. Um and I found out that there was a Rufus capped warbler three hours south of that. And I'm like, well, hey, I'm already 12 hours over here. What's another three? So uh I dropped the trailer at a at a um grocery store, parking lot, and then drove three hours down, walked up the canyon, and then found the bird, um, took bunches a bunch of pictures of it, and really just sat there and appreciated it. I realized how how rare it was, how uh what good fortune I was having, and it was just such a beautiful bird. Um the stark colors of Rufus, kind of orange and white and yellow, it was just magnificent. So I just sat there and enjoyed it, and then I drove 15 miles home. It's a long way to go for a bird.

SPEAKER_03 21:18

Yeah. Um that's awesome though. That's good. That's that's a good answer. I like that answer. Hey, can you tell us what um what's your uh what's your list numbers? What are your numbers right now?

SPEAKER_01 21:29

Um uh 841. And I researched that just because you said you were gonna ask. But um it's fun for me to count. You don't have to be a listener, but it's kind of fun to kind of keep track. Um because you really do kind of lose um track. And you're like, Did I see that bird? You know, and you're not quite sure if you'd seen it or not, because sometimes you only see these things once every decade. Um so yeah, I keep track of where I was, who I was with. Um and and that's a fun thing. Thing. And then uh I have a backyard list. I have about 90 that I've species that I've seen in my backyard. So you can actually really see a lot probably just from you know where you are, or at least a park nearby your house if you live in a city or something. For example, Central Park in New York is a fantastic place to go, bird.

SPEAKER_03 22:21

Now, I know this goes against everything I'm asking you about, finding the glory of God and birding, but is there a bird you would be happy if you never saw it again?

SPEAKER_01 22:33

Um I mean, like you said, like like the Robin, you know, you see it a bunch and then you don't see it at all, and then all of a sudden you want to see it. Um Mockingbirds are obnoxious at three in the morning. I wouldn't, you know, but they're also really pretty um in the day. Uh California tohis are kind of just brown, um, kind of boring, maybe a bush tit, those are kind of boring. Um, but I try not to let myself go there. I try to appreciate everything, you know, because it is something that God made. Um we tend to be drawn towards colors, you know, the more spectacular colors is where we like it. Um but you know, if you if you really start to get to know the bird and you start observing its ha its um its habits and get to know it as a character, then it can become very interesting even if it's visually very boring. So that's what I think. Watch them feed, watching them build a nest.

SPEAKER_03 23:23

I tell that to people about bush tits when I see them because it's just a boring little bird, I think. But when you see them like I think they buzz around like little bees kind of jumping around. And I always go, look, they look like I mean they're small too, so they go, they just look like glorified bumblebees. All around. And so it's funny how when I've said that to people, and that just comes from you. That's you sharing your passion with me. Because nobody else I know is a birder. I mean, it's only you. So this is like the one one thing in life that you shared with me that I go, oh, I'm I'm running with it. And when I share a little bit of info with someone else, my kids, I'll be sitting in the backyard, because the other thing is sounds. I mean, you just see I see the glory of God, and just all they all talk differently. You know, just these little chips, and I can I can stop and go, Oh, there it is. There's our acorn woodpecker. He's back. Yeah, which that's like nothing in my yard. There's so many of them.

SPEAKER_01 24:18

So there's different languages out there.

SPEAKER_03 24:21

Uh, and then lastly, um, so we've encouraged people and they say we want to get started. How do you get started in birding? How do you go from being a bird watcher? Well, maybe just from nothing to a bird watcher and then bird watcher to a birder.

SPEAKER_01 24:34

Yeah, I mean, whatever wherever it takes you, you know, you don't have to be, I tend to, you know, be a little fanatical about things I get into. I just kind of put in 110%. Um But yeah, you can enjoy it um from your backyard with just a pair of binoculars. Um I wouldn't advise watching birds without binoculars. Um you'll lose interest. But when you have a pair of binoculars, you'll begin to see things um about the bird that you wouldn't see with your naked eye. Um and then, of course, the next question is what am I looking at? Um so a field guide is very handy. And it's tricky at first. You don't know a sparrow from a warbler, from a vireo, from whatever. Um so a field guide is really helpful. And then if you can um join a bird festival. There's probably bird festivals you know near your house. Um it accomplishes two things. It puts you in touch with other birders and you begin to learn. Um and also it goes, your your um your fees for the for the festival go towards bird conservation. So um bird, bird, um, birds are in steep, steep, steep decline. So um it kind of once you start to appreciate something, you start to care about it, and once you care about it, you want to take care of it. So I think that's a good thing to remember is you know, we're stewards of this world, and um, you know, there are a lot of birds out there that kind of need our help. So I'd like to preserve those things for the generations to come so they can see and appreciate God's glory, um, just like I've been able to.

SPEAKER_03 26:03

Awesome. That's great. Hey, thanks for taking your time out of your day to uh be on the Mango Times podcast.

SPEAKER_02 26:10

Yeah, baby.

SPEAKER_03 26:11

That's it. That's Tom Slater, the glory of God in birding. All right, so that's the inaugural episode of Discover. We talk about birding. Thanks to my good friend Tom Slater for joining me, and thanks to you for listening. If you have topics you want to talk about on the Discover series, please reach out to me, Mangoandy at gmail.com. You can go to the website, themangotimes.com, and hit let's connect. You can find me on all the socials at the Mango Times, and I would love to hear from you what topics should we discuss? Do you want to be a guest on the Mango Times Podcast? Let me know. Hey, thanks for listening. Have a great first day of summer, and we'll see you next time. You have been listening to the Mango Times Podcast. Everything written and produced on this is by Andy Fletcher. If you're going to use it, steal it, borrow it, or share it on the internet, please just let me know. I don't care. I just want to know where my voice is being used out on the internet. And as a bit of a disclaimer, don't forget, everything I recommend on this podcast, you should use discretion. Choose whether you should watch it, listen to it, eat it, try it, go there. But when you do, don't forget to quietly make some noise. Thanks for listening.