Ask the Bird Folks: award winning short nature-humor articles

December 13, 2008 8:23 AM

Mike O'Connor, owner of Bird Watcher's General Store in MA, writes a column "Ask the Bird Folks", for The Cape Codder newspaper. Five of O'Connor's short but humorously enlightening pieces were chosen by Steven Pinker to be included in the 2004 edition of the Best American Science and Nature writing. Those five can be read here: [1],[2],[3],[4],[5]. The full set of articles here. He started in 2001 and is sort of a "Car Talk" of bird watching.
posted by stbalbach (8 comments total)

w00t!

/bird nerd
posted by rtha at 9:44 AM on December 13, 2008

These are great! Boot Tom & Ray from NPR and get this guy a gig.
posted by jazon at 9:49 AM on December 13, 2008

And yet … the third one, at least, is actually not very well written.
posted by kenko at 9:56 AM on December 13, 2008

Aww, my favourite bird is the chickadee too! I hadn't heard of Mike o'Connor before so thank you.
posted by saucysault at 10:47 AM on December 13, 2008

Also birdnerditude going on here. Thanks.
posted by Stewriffic at 11:43 AM on December 13, 2008

Thanks for the links. I've shopped at Bird Watchers' General Store often, been to their website ages ago, am a fan of the entire "Best American ..." series, and read the Cape Codder sometimes when I remember it exists, but "Ask the Bird Folks" was still new to me.

It's not too often that the Best of the Web and the Best of Cape Cod intersect.
posted by McGuillicuddy at 2:00 PM on December 13, 2008

Nope. This guy does not beat Tom and Ray, Dave Barry, or even Strong Bad. Factual enough and occasionally amusing in a droll sort of way, but ... there's still only one way to get to Carnegie Hall, and O'Connor needs to do some more of it.

Totally correct about the chickadee though. One of the neatest birds ever. Seriously, if you've never watched them up close, go into some brush with a cup of black sunflower seeds and just hang loose till they arrive. It's excellent.

Also: Didn't Steven Pinker used to have a productive job?
posted by eritain at 2:22 PM on December 13, 2008

McGuillicuddy: "It's not too often that the Best of the Web and the Best of Cape Cod intersect."

Your right McGuillicuddy. It was unusual to see such an off-beat author make the book. With all the high-profile star writers and national magazines, this was a real delight, and by far the funniest thing in that particular edition.
posted by stbalbach at 3:45 PM on December 13, 2008