Birds are dinosaurs. I’ll say that again. Birds are dinosaurs. Yes, birds, in fact, split off from a common non-avian dinosaur long before the asteroid hit 66 million years ago, and were flying the skies of our ancient planet while T-rex ruled the earth. In fact, they shared the airspace with the pterodactyls, and out competed them. The birds took took out the pterosaurs long before the last days of the dinosaurs. All 11,000 modern species of birds that soar the skies today, were descended from the group of ground dwelling, seed eating, beaked, feathered dinosaurs, capable of powered flight, known as the “crown group” in the family tree. These birds made it through the apocalypse of the astroid strike that caused the extinction of all the non-avian dinosaurs, including our favorites from Jurassic Park, T-Rex, Vleosorapter and Stegosaurus.

In the original Jurassic Park, Dr. Grant famously compared a Vleosorapter skeleton to modern birds, pointing out that their bones were hollow and their pelvis was turned backwards like a bird. Of course, he was scoffed at, and in fact many paleontologists in the late 20th century, like Dr. Grant, were in the minority. Ornithologists were actually amongst the last holdouts. In the early 1900’s biologist Thomas Henry Huxley, famously knowns as “Darwin’s Bulldog,” for his dogged defense of Darwin’s theory of evolution by means of natural selection, proposed that birds were, in fact, dinosaurs and that Archaeopteryx, the first known bird, was a transitional species between dinosaurs and modern birds. Yet, decades later, this obvious fact fell out of favor amongst scientists and ornithologists, who lacked the imagination to see what was so self-evident to Huxley.

In 1994, when Jurassic Park came out, the perception was beginning to change. Then, in 1996 the first feathered dinosaurs were discovered in China. Suddenly the bird-dinosaur connection became a fact that no one could ignore. Birds were and are dinosaurs. Which brings us to today’s guest, paleontologist Riley Black, author of many books, including “When the Earth was Green,” and “The Last Days of the Dinosaurs.” I recently finished her book “The Shortest History of the Dinosaurs,” and as I was listening, one thing became apparent early on, Riley’s history of the dinosaurs was in many ways a history of birds, from the first feathered dinosaurs, to the first that discovered flight, to our modern birds of today.

And on October 27, 2026, her newest book, “Tyrant Lizard Queen” will be published in print and available as and e-book or as an audio book, which is my preference. The book is available for preorder at your favorite digital book store, and I can’t wait to begin listening. So while I wait for publication date, it’s time to travel back in time about, oh I’d say, 120 million years with Riley Black and learn just how, where and when birds evolved from dinosaurs.

Reptiles, dinosaurs and birds, oh my!

If you want to take a deeper dive into both dinosaurs and the origin of birds, I highly recommend reading or listening to Riley’s other books, “When the Earth was Green”, “The Last Days of the Dinosaurs” and “The Shortest History of the Dinosaurs.” I would also suggest you check out the books of Neil Shubin and Steve Brusatte.

Welcome birders to fall migration and a new episode of The Big Year Podcast, with me your congenial host, Robert Baumander. It’s the time of where the phrase, “there’s no birding like shore birding” comes to mind.

In fact, I’ve written a little song to commemorate the Occasion:

There’s no birding like shore birding.

There’s no birding I know.

Every little sandpiper is amazing.

Every little plover is divine.

Nowhere can you can you get that birdy feeling

When you are see-ing a Snowy Plover

There’s no birders like shore birders

They smile at the sea shore

Yesterday they told you, you had missed the bird

Today you’re back to get your Lifer Plover

And you’re heart’s racing for more

Just yesterday down at Turkey Point Beach in Norfolk County, I enjoyed a young, migrating Red Knot, mingling with a Semipalmated Sandpiper and a few Semipalmated Plovers. Closer to home, we had shorebirds and sandpipers in farmer’s fields, especially sod farms and flooded fields. First up, here in Brant County, was a Short-billed Dowitcher, and over a dozen American Golden Plovers at our local sod farm. Baird’s Sandpipers came next, followed by everyone’s favorite fall migrant, the Buff-breasted Sandpiper. The dowitcher was a new county bird, species 248, finally landing me in the top five all time for Brant County in just under six years. Hey, I like numbers, I like lists and lists of numbers. Anyway, all of us avid birders here in Brant County got our first looks at the buff-breasted last year at this time, and we were lucky enough to get one again this year too.

In fact, I got see it with two of my favorite local birders, Ellen and Jerry Horak. And wouldn’t you know it, the more obsessive half of the couple, Ellen, just happens to be my guest today. A nice little bit of Serendipity, if you will. In fact, after a winter trip to Costa Rica, it was Ellen’s 601st species of the year. Again with the numbers. I had a year like that in 2016, when Sue and I went to Panama for a week in January. That was part of my Birds and Blue Jays Big Year. That year I was traveling with the Toronto Blue Jays Baseball Club on all their Major League road trips. It was a true North American Big Year. We saw 229 species during our week in Panama and I counted 483 in the ABA Area, ending the year with a combined 665 species, and a back that would put me in the hospital just two months later. In fact I spent three weeks in the hospital, ending my consecutive daily eBird streak at over 800 days when I spent a couple of days in a windowless intensive care unit.

Ellen and Jerry’s third consecutive Big Year was a Canada Big Year. As you know from last season, Ellen and Jerry began with a Brant County Big Year in 2023 counting over 200 species, followed by an Ontario Big Year in 2024, where they finished in first place with over 330 species. If you haven’t listened to that episode, go back and catch up, and and you’ll be ready for this newest installment. For 2025 they hit the trifecta, ending up first in Canada with 431 species, joining the exclusive 400 club for Canada. This is he equivalent of the 700 club,(no not that one), for the ABA Area. The 400 club includes Neil and Andrea MacLeod, who set the bar with 457 species in 2018. The Sandy Komito of Canada, Bruce Dilabio, the current record holder with 480 species, has topped 400 species four times. David M Bell who’s 435 species ranks him fifth all time for Canada in a single year had has topped 400 twice. Other members of the 400 club include previous guest Gavin McKinnon, who had back to back 400 plus years, including 425 species last year, only six species behind Ellen and Jerry. Rounding up the 400 club, we have Rain Saulnier and Jacob Stasso with 406 and Monica Nugent,(405). Oh, I forgot me! I had the record for all of one year in 2022 with 458 species.

The newest members of the 400 club, Ellen and Jerry, are also part of the even more exclusive 431club. Only eight birders have ever topped 430 in a single year, here in the Great White North, with our friend Bruce having done it twice.

Well, enough with number crunching, which is, as you may guessed, is a favorite activity, if not obsession of mine, and on with the show.

It’s my birthday and I’ll bird if I want to bird if I want to. You would bird too - if it was you.

Welcome to the birthday edition of the Big Year Podcast. Well, the only thing that makes it a birthday edition is, well, because it’s my birthday. I’m Robert Baumander and I’m 66 years old today. Do you like numbers? Of course, we all do. So, here’s a little birthday math for you. I was born on the 16th in 1960, and 1+9+6+0 is 16. How about that. Hey, it’s my birthday, and I’ll add if I want. As birders, how do you celebrate your birthday? Me, I watch the backyard birds while sipping a morning coffee, then hope that my birthday wish of a rare bird alert comes true. So far, not so much.

Any hoo I’ve spent much of the dog days of summer birding in my back yard and building a mini green house and rock garden. And lots of baby birds are fledging from the trees. Just this week, there was a baby Downy Woodpecker, baby Common Grackles, and House Sparrows. I’ve seen young Baltimore Orioles, Northern Cardinals, Rose-breasted Grosbeaks and even a recently fledged Black-capped Chickadee.

Out in the wilds of Southwestern Ontario there are still moments of excitement to be found, as a couple of rarities dropped in for a visit during the past few weeks. In Hamilton Harbour, along with a group of excited birders, I was able to enjoy watching a Brown Pelican. Very rare sighting for Ontario, and in fact I only saw my very first one last year along the Niagara River in Fort Erie. Perhaps this is the very same bird. The other great find was even more personal, a Eurasian Collared-Dove, right here in Brantford. Again, I had only ever seen one in Ontario, way back in 2018. That’s how rare they are in these here parts. A couple of weeks ago our very own Eurasian Collared-Dove showed up in a local back yard and the homeowner was gracious enough to allow visitors to come see it.

So, what have we learned over the years from The Big Year Podcast? Well, the life of a birder seems to be long drives followed by brief but beautiful experiences in the middle of nowhere looking for a bird that might not be where you hoped it would be or might not show up at all. Someone once said, birding is not always about the birds you see, but often the places where the birds take you. The places you might never have seen if not for the birds.

Yes, there is more to birding than Big Year Birding. Yes, there is something to be said about the thrill of the chase and the discovery of one of the rarest birds you’ve ever seen. But then, once the Big Year is over, there is the return to the purest form of birding. Just you, your binoculars and the birds, somewhere in the woods or a park or even, where I sit right now, in your own backyard. Well, I’m not actually in your backyard, but you get the idea.

For me, and many others,(especially those of us with ADHD), birding quiets the mind,(when not chasing rarities), and lets you take a step back from the noise and chaos of life. The quiet of the woods, only broken by birdsong is what makes birding truly special. It’s not the bird, it’s the journey. Well, sometimes it is the bird.

So, was that too much? I mean, really, that just sounded a little too sentimental for me. I was trying to end on a lighter note and I just sounded like I was trying to be profound. Well, maybe I wasn’t trying to sound profound, so I hope it didn’t seem over the top. I think I really did from the heart. Well, the brain. Certainly not the heart. The heart can’t do anything more than pump blood and get clogged arteries. It’s the brain where thoughts and words come from. Sorry for waxing a bit philosophical, but hey, it’s my birthday and I’ll wax if I want to.

And with that as I sit here, enjoying my backyard birds, about to head out to go birthday birding with Sue, then for a free birthday latte at Starbucks, let’s meet our guest for today’s episode:

Tarik Shahzad is a Chicago birder who broke the Cook County Big Year record in back to back years. We recently spoke about his Big Years and birding along the shores of Lake Michigan.

Enjoy!