Lens versus glass
There is a peculiar tension that sometimes hangs in the air of a bird hide or among the scattered bushes of a nature reserve. It’s thicker than the morning mist and hangs heavier than the morning dew. On one side, you have the birders, often armed with spotting scopes, the lenses, and notebooks. On the other, the toggers, us photographers, lugging heavy cameras and glass and sometimes tripods. Despite the fact that we are all often standing together in the same freezing patch of scrub or marsh for the same reason to see that beautiful or rare bird, there’s often a palpable, passive-aggressive chill in the air. A chill that persists to high noon, some days.
This came into sharp focus a while back with respect to a little patch of National Trust site known as Burwell Fen. Famously, over the last few years, this patch has played host to a number of Short-eared Owls. They show well and their presence attracts those with both glass and lens. These migratory owls turn up in the autumn from the north and will hunt over the Fen’s scrubby grazing preying on voles and other small rodents.
The patch is also a through route for cyclists, hikers, and dog walkers. While it’s never quite as busy as neighbouring Wicken Fen, when the owls are up, there are usually at least a dozen birders, twitchers, toggers, and others hanging around to try and catch a glimpse of these beauties, affectionately known as Shorties, and for us toggers, a chance to capture a classic shot of a hunting raptor at close hand or one of the birds perched on a post.
As both science writer and wildlife photographer, I’ve spent many years documenting the natural world. I’ve noticed among some of the more earnest birders that they see photography as somehow not proper “birding”. There is the implication that if one hasn’t got a set of binoculars or a scope then one is not truly experiencing the birds or nature.
I’ve experienced this snobbery at Burwell, where use of the nickname Shorties is frowned upon by those who consider themselves proper birders. There’s also the snobbery that surrounds the toggers wanting to get their shot and how many shots do you actually need? Obviously, if anyone is disturbing the birds then that’s not on, but I’ve never seen photographers clambering over fences or heading into patches to deliberately disturb birds, although some critics seem to claim that happens on a daily basis, if not more often.
As to how many photos one togger needs, well, there is always a better shot to be taken. It’s hopefully about creativity, aesthetics, capturing the detail, the nuance, and the beauty of the creatures we all love in our different ways. And, to flip that notion, for some birders it’s all about ticking lists, so I might ask “how many times do you even need to see the same species, isn’t once enough?”
It’s time we look at that divide through a clearer lens. Yes, there are photographers who push too close, just as there are birders who guard access like gatekeepers.
The most common critique levelled at photographers is that we are so obsessed with the “shot” that we fail to truly observe the animal. There’s a grain of truth in that for some toggers, I’m sure, but to get a high-quality, scientifically relevant image, you have to understand a little of avian biology, light physics, and behavioural cues. You are hopefully not simply having a quick look and a click of your subject; you’re observing and anticipating.
For distant birds, the big zoom lens and the big scope might both only produce a quivering, distorted smudge of a bird that’s a mile away. At that distance, for both togger and scoper, atmospheric distortion and heat haze can turn the bird into a vibrating blob. It might be an exercise in identification for both of us, certainly, but I usually don’t feel that I’m making an intimate observation under those conditions. For both lens and glass, it is, in many ways, like watching a low-resolution broadcast on a tiny screen.
The “togger” stigma often stems from a fear of disturbance. We’ve all seen the horror stories of someone flushing a rare owl for a flight shot. But, personally, I try to stay silent, camouflaged, and stationary, and avoid disturbing the birds. To get the clean, natural shot, you have to respect the bird’s comfort zone just as much as the birder.
From a scientific perspective, photography provides a permanent record that a memory simply cannot match. A photo allows us to count clutch sizes, identify individual plumage variations, and document leg rings without the fallibility of human recollection. We aren’t just taking pictures; we’re gathering data.
Nature doesn’t care how we look at it. The bird doesn’t know if it’s being recorded in pixels on a sensor or noted in pencil lead in a notebook. Indeed, nature would probably prefer that there were no toggers, no birders, no twitchers, and certainly no dogwalkers anywhere near them.
The snobbery, the comments about glass versus lens or the purity of the eye fragments a community that should be united in its wonder and joined together for the common cause of observation and conservation. Whether you are chasing a life tick or a portfolio shot, we are all witnesses to a world that is increasingly under threat.