Birdwatchers - or "birders", as we prefer to call ourselves - come in several flavors. There are the little old ladies (LOLs), Bird Identifiers, and the "Listers."

Of all the game birds in North America, the only one with which I have a real love-hate relationship is the Common (or Wilson’s) snipe, often called “jacksnipe.” Snipe are devious, unscrupulous little birds, and they don’t play fair. When you flush one from his marshy playground, does he fly smooth and straight like any honest bird?

Most kinds of hunting involve a lot of waiting. The best thing about this fact is that the waiting is mostly done in some very pleasant places — autumn woods, near stock tanks in dove season, and in blinds on the bays, rice fields and river bottoms frequented by waterfowl, for a few examples.

My wife says I'm a little paranoid about blue quail, but that's ridiculous. If it were true, I would suspect that blue quail conspire against my dignity and my sanity, but I harbor no such suspicion. On the contrary, I know positively that I am the intended victim of a blue quail conspiracy! What's so paranoid about that?