When I started birding, it was daggy – that was precisely why I wanted to learn more. I wanted to do something so niche, so consuming, I could lose myself in it. I was in a funk that needed urgent lifting.

It started as a distraction. I was battling addiction and mental illness, spending so long in clinics and therapists’ rooms my vitamin D count had bottomed out.

In my younger days, I loved bushwalking but had no friends left to do it with. I couldn’t carry a pack anyway, as my back health was terrible due to lack of exercise.

Somehow I heard about a weekend introduction to birds at The Briars, Mt Martha, run by Birds Australia (now BirdLife Australia).

A wholesome course of nature studies seemed harmless enough. I could get out of the house – and my long-sleeved shirts – for a couple of days.

I went and it was a bit, ahem, obscure. I’m ashamed to say the lengthy talks about bird taxonomy made me fidget like a child. There were........

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