Followers

Friday 7 February 2014

January 2014: Farewell


 
WARNING, much of the following is a repeat of what has already been covered in Birds of Allen Road and Birding the South Burnett.

I did have ambitious plans for the new year; a new format, a different way of keeping any remaining public audience interested in the Biding Beyond the Pale.  It hasn’t come about so far.  All that additional time that virtual retirement was supposed to bestow upon Fay and I just fizzled out, like a wet squib at a fireworks display.

Having the time on your hands does not necessarily equate to more time for writing.  So far, most of our additional time has been squandered in increased birding!  As someone once quipped, you can’t have your cake and eat it.

To add further pressure to an already anxious mind, I am desperately attempting to maintain three blogs: Birding the South Burnett and Birds of Allen Road in addition to Birding Beyond the Pale.  Each has a reason for being there but combined they create a formidable challenge and in the end I cannot use any one of them to give the full birding picture.

Take January 2014 as a pointer.  The Allen Road tally amounts to 61 species; the South Burnett tally runs to an impressive 146 species.  However, the overall January tally is actually             170 species; a record in itself, clearly over-hauling the previous best January score of 145 in 2007.  Birding Beyond the Pale, designed primarily as an outlet for all those planned trips beyond the South Burnett, including overseas jaunts, ended January with a meagre 42 species. 

Mice and men!  There were only three trips beyond the pale: on 7 January to Toowoomba; 14 January when we raced across to our former stomping grounds, Redcliffe, to consult our tax accountant and the weekend of 17-19 January, our annual foray to Book Fest on the South Bank.

Not the stuff champions are made of.  May and early June approach but there appears to be little on the immediate horizon to alleviate a glaring blank in this blog.  It has clearly not lived up to mu initial expectations.

As loathe as I am to pull myself away from an enjoyable pastime – and you have to understand my deep-rooted passion for writing to fully appreciate the enormity of the wrench- I have decided that the time has arrived to put Allen Road to bed.

This will be the last Birding Beyond the Pale blog.  Farewell.

Keep an eye out for developments at:

http://birdingsouthburnett.com/

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