tomstips's Profile
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[ currently offline ] • Gender: Male • Location: Los Angeles, CA, United States About Me I began birding at the age of 12. I was lucky enough to grow up in Ithaca, NY and spent quite a bit of time birding with Arthur A Allen and Peter Paul Kellogg. One of my earliest memories of birding technology was Dr Kellogg opening up the hood of his car and strapping the power supply of his portable Wollensack tape deck to his car batteries to play back the song of a Rose-breasted Grosbeak. “It’s just like a robin”, he often said, “only sweeter.” My first claim to birding fame was a Northern Hawk Owl that I discovered on a telephone pole in winter near Ithaca when I was 14. I was written up in the Kingbird, the NY State Ornithological Association’s magazine. That was really exciting, however the article must not have gotten very wide circulation, as I don’t remember having to worry any about the paparazzi. During spring migration, most mornings before school my brother and I used to bike down to a local park to find the latest migrant arrivals. The Laboratory of Ornithology at Cornell had weekly bird lectures, and prior to the lecture there was a reading of the bird list. If you got the first sighting of a bird for that year, you got your name on the board. After a couple of years, and enough time birding with the Cornell folks so they knew we were really careful, my brother and I started getting 30 or 40% of the first spring sightings. That was a great motivator for us and the anticipation of those meetings was the highlight of our spring seasons. In subsequent years I have carried on the passion of my younger days by traveling to many birding locations around the world. I have also given a number of lectures and workshops on birding in the NY City and Los Angeles areas including sessions on digiscoping, Photoshop for birders, and trip shows on SE Brazil, Madagascar, Botswana and other locations. I have also written articles for Birding Magazine and other publications, and have had photos published in books and journals. On the non birding front, I was a musician for many years, touring, recording and doing session work which included a lot of audio editing. My clients included Phil Collins, The Grateful Dead, the Philadelphia Orchestra and the FBI. Currently I’m the Director of Technology for a division of Roland/Edirol Corporation, one of the world’s largest manufacturers of electronic musical instruments and digital recorders. But even though I have a day job, my primary passion is still for the birds. Entries Written: 7 entries Comments Written: 0 comments Signup Date: March 18, 2007 Last Login: February 26, 2008 |
tomstips's Blogs
 Tom's Tips | 7 entries, 0 comments |
| Topics for Birders on Technology and ID Technique | |