Garry Messenbird RIP

It was with great sadness that today we said goodbye to Beddington Farmlands Birding Legend Garry Messenbird. Garry started birding at Beddington in 1978 and birded there continously (practically daily through the 1980s) until he moved with his family to the Sussex coast in 2007. In those Beddington years (particularly in the 1980s and 1990s) he meticously recorded the birdlife of the farmlands and became a birding celebrity in 1984 when he found a Killdeer in February and a Lesser Yellowlegs in the autumn of the same year. He added countless other firsts for the farmlands and more importantly recorded the changing bird populations through some of the most important transitional years of the farmlands.  

Garry was a mentor to me and many other beddington boys and remains one of the best birders I've ever known. He had an arguably not particularly healthy disdain for authority and particularly had no time for rarities committees (he quite rightly knew that less skilled birders than him were in no position to judge his records) and he was stubbornly needless of any validation by anyone. As he didn't play by the rules, didn't submit descriptions or even attempt to provide evidence for his records (even though he often had good photos to back up everything) he may have appeared as an untrusthworthy observer for those who had never seen him in action and maybe that wasn't helped in some of his later years where older age and ill health may have also clouded some of his judgement. 

He was certainly one of a kind and indeed was the single cause of me having to conduct some writing gymnastics when I wrote the 'Birds of Beddington' as I had to have Garry's records seperate  (many of which I or others had either seen or seen the photographs of but he would never submit them to the official channels) and the official records (processed through the channels). There was then a palava when it came to publishing as some group members felt that only an official record should be published but the group agreed that this was a very unusual situation (the greatest birder in the group was a complete and utter rebel!) which required a compromised approach which we agreed to publish (after some group members withdrew their photos in protest).  Alls well that ends well and we published what was described in Birdwatch as a local birding benchmark. 

The funeral was held at Worthing Crematorium and in addition to Garry's family there was a nice turn out of Beddington birders and their wives including Grant and Marie Prater,  Kojak (aka Kevin Guest), Derek Coleman, Devilbirder (aka David Campbell), Nick and Darry Gardner, myself  and a special appearance by another Beddington legend Johnny Allan with his partner Lynn. With Johnny's appearance today it was like a funeral and a resurrection in the same day! Great to see Johnny who famously disappeared off the birding scene in 2012 in order to give up twitching and pursue a more balanced and healtheir life style (pursued his interests in history and wider natural history) and it showed today as he looked great with a big orchid list too! Great to see all the guys and what a great send off for Garry. 

We did a birding walk over the South Downs after the funeral service and then on the way back Kojak and I checked out Cissbury Ring- a Sussex famous birding spot which I haven't been to before. We had Marsh Tit on the walk which was a year tick for me. 

GARRY'S TRIBUTE PAGE

RIP Garry- the original binoculars that he found the Killdeer with

Beddington birders, left to right: Derek Coleman, Sussex birder, Grant Prater, Dave Campbell (the soon to be new editor of Birdwatch magazine), me, Kevin Guest, Johnny Allan, Nick Bond (Garry's briding nephew) and Nick Gardner

View over the South Downs from Cissbury Ring