The book takes you through the various twitching adventures in the British Isles and aspects of my private life. A term coined in the 1960s to describe the jaw-rattling sound of chasing after rare birds on rumbling motorbikes, "twitchers" are narrowly defined as bird-watchers willing to drop everything to chase a sighting. More broadly, it includes those who see a bird within a few days of an urgent bulletin. The One-Star rating is the least possible to be able to submit a review - please count this as a Negative 1-star. Many see twitching as an outcrop of the British fascination with "spotting" things – most notoriously, trainspotting, a hobby that involves the obsessive pursuit of seeing as many locomotives with your own eyes as humanly possible. But others say it may simply be a case of boys who refuse to grow up.

Garry Bagnell, a memoir of his ‘Twitching by Numbers’ by Garry Bagnell, a memoir of his

Perhaps he ought to publish two editions - the revised sanitised version and the original, the latter to contain a warning on the cover that some of its content may cause offence to certain readers. The story starts in 1999 just after my 32nd Birthday and I've just ended my 18-year love affair with watching private jets around the world.Just before Christmas, Garry Bagnell published Twitching by numbers: Twenty-four years of chasing rare birds around Britain and Ireland. The desk close to the again of this e-book which lists the High 10 listers in Britain and Eire in 1987 and now (two names seem in each lists) is fascinating. You’d have been on the prime of the record in 1987, apart Ron Johns, in the event you had seen a paltry (I jest!) 463 species whereas now Steve Gantlett’s estimated 590 species leads all of them. Twitching is a lifetime marathon and because the writer factors out you’ll must spend 4 a long time at it, and pretty obsessively at it, to face any probability of a prime 10 rating. All of the names within the two lists are males – who may have guessed? If you’ve done something really, really bad and you wish to atone for your sins there are several things you can do: you could wear a hair shirt for a month, you could walk naked through Canterbury on a market day whilst self-flagellating and proclaiming your sins or you could read this book. In retrospect I think I would have preferred to have suffered the walk of shame, at least that would have been a more interesting way to spend my time.

Twitching by numbers by Garry Richard Bagnell | Waterstones

Britain isn't the only place that has hatched a culture of fierce birdwatching. In the United States, book-turned-Hollywood-film The Big Year chronicled the quest of three men vying in long-held American competitions to spot the most species in a single year. Nevertheless, observers say the intensity of the rivalries and the small size of the twitching community – in the thousands – have singled out British birders as some of the world's most relentless. But sections of soon came under the notice of feminist Lucy McRobert who, like him, is both a birder and a writer - but on a different wavelength and at the primmer end of the literary spectrum. Any author who deviates from what is considered decorous and appropriate enjoys no licence - he (or she) risks being singled out and pilloried with opprobrium. A smartphone app to help British birders is being advertised as an essential tool when "there have even been recent cases of violent clashes between bird watchers as people desperately try to get the very best spots".I had by no means heard of a foam get together till I learn this e-book – perhaps I ought to get out extra, or perhaps not. Twitching by Numbers: twenty-four years of chasing uncommon birds round Britain and Eire by Garry Bagnell is self printed. This was my first book and I didn't expect to get complaints about my single life between 2000 to 2002 (Chapter 2 to 4). I decided to remove the offending passages and rewrite these early years and republish as "Twitching by numbers: A birder's hectic life as he chases rare species across Britain and Ireland". In other countries, the world of birdwatching may be a largely gentle place ruled by calm, binocular-toting souls who patiently wait for their reward. But in Britain, it can be a truly savage domain, a nest of intrigue, fierce rivalries and legal disputes. Fluttering somewhere between sport and passion, it can leave in its path a grim tableau of ruined marriages, traffic chaos and pride, both wounded and stoked. Years ago, British boys used to spend their childhoods collecting birds' eggs – now you wouldn't dream of doing such a thing," said Brian Egan, manager of the Rare Bird Alert. "But what they can do as adults is chase sightings of rare birds. So that's what they do."

Garry Bagnell – Mark Avery Twitching by Numbers by Garry Bagnell – Mark Avery

During the story I get selected for a BBC documentary called "Twitchers: A very British Obsession" and formed a successful WhatsApp group called “Casual Twitchers”. I had never heard of a foam party until I read this book – maybe I should get out more, or maybe not.

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KEEN birder Gary Bagnell has pledged to rewrite sections of his first book after it came under fire on social media. Encountering rare birds is amazing, I’ll never forget coming across a grounded little auk in a public park and if I ever look out at my mum’s bird table and see a rose coloured starling I’d probably be at serious risk of cardiac arrest from excitement. But instead of seeing something that’s wandered on to your local patch you travel hundreds of miles to see it then I feel that the experience is a bit devalued. All the same twitching is a far less damaging way to be obsessive about birds than standing in a butt and try to shoot as many as possible that have been driven towards you by a bored teenager looking for beer money. However principally, and overwhelmingly, it is a e-book about twitching – the fieldsport of speeding round attempting to see uncommon birds so as to add to your lifelong record of untamed birds seen in Britain and Eire. Like most sports activities, twitching will appear completely pointless to the overwhelming majority of individuals. Who cares that Scotland beat England at rugby just lately? Fairly a couple of, together with me. And who cares that Garry Bagnell has seen 553 hen species in Britain and Eire (which places him approach behind Steve Gantlett on an estimated 590 species)? Fairly a couple of folks and they’re principally males. Do I care? Not deeply, however I’m definitely on this e-book as a result of it’s a very clear description of the fieldsport of twitching from the perspective of a eager exponent. In 2009, Bagnell said, he and other twitchers were aghast when two elderly rivals on the circuit went for each other's throats. "One was saying he'd seen a bird, and the other said he didn't believe him," Bagnell said.