{"id":225,"date":"2008-11-28T21:27:00","date_gmt":"2008-11-29T02:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/?p=225"},"modified":"2008-11-28T21:27:00","modified_gmt":"2008-11-29T02:27:00","slug":"birding-on-a-segway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/?p=225","title":{"rendered":"Birding on a Segway"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Because back problems have kept me from walking as much as usual for the past several weeks, a friend offered to let me try out a Segway \u2013 a battery-powered \u201cself-balancing personal transporter\u201d \u2013 and it turned out to be a great new way to go birding. It\u2019s amazingly easy to ride, and so quiet I could hear Yellow-throated Warblers, Ruby-crowned Kinglets, Brown-headed Nuthatches, House Finches, Bluebirds and other little birds as I glided along. The weather was warm and balmy, with five Black Vultures and several Turkey Vultures soaring in a big, open, soft-blue sky.<\/p>\n

You can go along at a pretty brisk pace on the Segway \u2013 or slow it down so that you\u2019re barely moving forward, or even come to a complete stop and still stay balanced, though I\u2019m not yet confident enough to use my binoculars quickly or easily without getting off. I should mention, also, that I didn\u2019t have a helmet and was riding in a pretty safe area with little traffic \u2013 but it\u2019s certainly better to wear one.<\/p>\n

Along the Old Field just outside our subdivision, I stepped off the Segway and walked for a while. White-throated Sparrows called from the tangle of dead weeds in the field, and one or two whistled a broken fragment of song. Two Red-tailed Hawks circled very low overhead, slowly making their way higher. One was a juvenile, with a finely-barred tail and a dark-streaked band across the breast. The other was mature, with a red-orange tail that glowed when it turned and caught the sunlight. Just watching the two of them gradually circle and climb, lit from above and suffused in a clear, almost golden light, was enough to make the day.<\/p>\n

Back on the Segway and headed back home, I passed a flock of at least 100 Red-winged Blackbirds perched in the limbs of trees in several yards, and stopped to look for Rusty Blackbirds among them, but found only a few Common Grackles. I\u2019m hoping the flock of Rusties we saw regularly the last couple of years will return again this season.<\/p>\n

Several Bluebirds and Chipping Sparrows flew up from the grass in one yard as I glided quietly past, and I heard the calls of a Pileated Woodpecker, a Northern Flicker, Golden-crowned Kinglets and a few Robins. All in all, there was nothing remarkable to report, but the Segway gave me the welcome freedom to go a good bit further than usual lately, especially up and down the steep hills I\u2019m not supposed to walk right now. And it was lots of fun!<\/p>\n

This Segway model wasn\u2019t meant for off-road use, so I had to stick to the roads, but there are models designed for trails and uneven terrain that are even better for birding. Bill Thompson has a good posting on his Bill of the Birds<\/a> blog that describes using a Segway for birding through the woods and fields of a farm in southeastern Ohio and includes several photos.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Because back problems have kept me from walking as much as usual for the past several weeks, a friend offered to let me try out a Segway \u2013 a battery-powered \u201cself-balancing personal transporter\u201d \u2013 and it turned out to be a great new way to go birding. It\u2019s amazingly easy to ride, and so quiet […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=225"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/birdingnotes.sigridsanders.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}