There are birding big years, where the stated object is to find the highest possible number of species in a given area in a calendar year. These are relatively common and there have been lots of birders who have done these and written books about their year. Some of my prior guests have done variations on this theme. Dorian Anderson on Episode #5 did his Biking for the Birds big year. Lynn Barber in Episode #79 did big years in Texas and Alaska as well as an ABA big year, and wrote two books about these endeavors.
My guest this episode is R. Bruce Richardson. He and his wife took on birding during a year of travel around Australia. Bruce is also a songwriter, entertainer, comedian, and all-around funny guy. I bought the book right after we recorded the episode, and am loving it so far. Buy it here on his website.


I knew that Australia is a big land mass, and in the front of his book he shows how the size of the lower 48 U.S. states approximates the size of Australia with map overlays. It is a cool visual. I also didn’t think of Australia as a place with lots of Parrots. I cannot find an easy answer to how many extant species of parrots are wild in Australia vs the Americas, but certainly both areas have a lot.
I thought that this would be a great place to embed a few of R Bruce’s You Tube funny songs.

Also of course a link to his book on Amazon: An Australian Birding Year

I hope you enjoyed the episode. Please leave comments or suggestions.
Thanks for listening.
Good birding and good day!