Regulations, Explanations

For the unintiated, the Sweaty Sanderlings are a renegade band of youngish birders who have decided to combine their passions for birding and running in a competitive manner. The Sweaty Sanderlings are not deterred by heat, cold, mud, rain, pain, or ridicule over running shorts; they fear nothing, with the possible exception of phone conversations.

The rules are decidedly informal and flexible, mostly because I'm making them up as I'm typing.

1. Birds must be seen while running. This does not mean you can randomly spot a bird and start running to count it on your Sweaty Sanderling (abbreviated SWSA, rather than SS, to avoid confusion with Schutzstaffel) list. Rather, you must be on a run for a bird to count.

2. Report regularly to the SWSA blog or run (aha, no pun intended) the risk of banishment. The more outrageous the posts, the better. Format is not important, but try to include the birds you detected as well as some commentary on the run itself.

3. Run anywhere you want. I imagine our respective abodes will serve as our bases much of the time, but trail runs in Da Yoop will hopefully occur.

Oh. And you get brownie points (whatever they are...my mom frequently awards them to me, but I never get anything, brownies or otherwise) if you submit eBird checklists for your runs.

For the innocent bystanders, enjoy (or perhaps be horrified by) this mad dash (again...no pun intended) for guts, glory, and birds.