Three Cheers for Birders

Give yourself a hand, birdwatchers (and if you’re also a hunter, give yourself two): a new survey conducted by Cornell University confirms you really are the salt of the Earth. Researchers wanted to know if people who spend time in the outdoors are also invested in conserving nature. The answer was a resounding yes, but still, birdwatchers took the crown.

Here are some of the findings, published in the latest issue of Journal of Wildlife Management:

• Birdwatchers are more likely than any other group surveyed (hunters, hunter-birders, “non-recreationists”—we’ll call them indoor kids) to do environmentally-friendly things like recycling, conserving water or energy at home, and environmentally friendly or energy-efficient products.
   
• Birdwatchers are five times as likely as indoorsy types to engage in wildlife and habitat conservation.
   
• Hunters are traditionally the focus of state wildlife programs aimed at increasing conservation, but the study showed hunters are less likely than birders to participate in conservation activities (only about four times as likely as non-recreationalists) ...unless they also bird watch. In fact, people who hunted and watched birds had the greatest likelihood of all four groups surveyed to do conservation work.
   
• As a group, birders and hunters as a group are about eight times more likely than indoorsy people to engage in conservation.
   
• More than three quarters of all respondents said they make effort to make their yards or land more desirable to wildlife. Of those groups though, bird-watching hunters and birdwatchers were the most likely to do so—close to 100 percent of both groups said they had. (If you’re interested in doing that, here’s how.)
   
• Birdwatchers and hunter-birdwatchers were likely to vote in support of an environmental policy or regulation—almost 75 percent of both groups said they have done so.
   
• Hunters and indoor folks were less likely to vote in support of environmental policy or regulation—less than 50 percent of those groups had done so.
   
• The only conservation activity that hunters were more likely to engage in than birders was “wildlife recreation advocacy” ...but the study’s authors had a pretty loose definition of “advocacy”—it included convincing others to participate in wildlife recreation activities, i.e. inviting your friends hunting with you.
   
• Almost half of all hunter-birders have volunteered to improve wildlife habitat in their communities, the highest share of the four groups surveyed. (More than 40 percent of birders had volunteered, about 30 percent of hunters had, but only about 10 percent of non-recreationists.)