00:00There's one incident that's become a thing of legend in the birding community.
00:04Swallow gave.
00:05And it goes a little something like this.
00:08A 16-year-old birdwatcher reported North Carolina's first ever sighting of a violet-green swallow, along with a photo.
00:17The sighting was unanimously accepted by the North Carolina Bird Records Committee.
00:23I found their constitution online.
00:25It's 6,171 words.
00:29The United States Constitution is only 4,543 words.
00:33Flash forward a couple years later, and the person who found, who claimed to find the violet-green swallow was doing a big year in North Carolina.
00:40And we're getting, like, reports from all these people of, like, just weird stuff going on.
00:43Like, the person claiming to be in places, and they're not ending up being places.
00:46There are some of us scratching our heads.
00:48Not pointing any fingers.
00:50With word being that you're in Florida after Christmas through the end of the year.
00:52Like, the logistics just not working out.
00:54And, you know, him finding all these weird birds, like, on the very last day to break the record.
00:59It's like, well, I suppose it's possible, but it seems very unlikely.
01:02The current NC record holder is curious as to how you pulled these five out of the hat.
01:08And so, in my head, I'm thinking, if he would do that, maybe there's something weird about this violet-green swallow.
01:13So, two years later, I start digging around.
01:15In digging around they did, the investigators put together a thorough document of evidence to refute the record.
01:24So, I decided, well, I'll download his photo and check the timestamp.
01:30And the date was from May.
01:32And not only from May, but from a week in May, when it was well-known on Facebook that he had been in Colorado, where violet-green swallows are common.
01:44I had friends that worked at natural history museums.
01:47And what we discovered was that these swallows have this really unique molt.
01:51They molt once a year in late summer.
01:54This person had photographed the violet-green swallow in October, as they claimed.
01:58Well, it should have had fresh feathers. It should have been finished molting and be in very fresh plumage.
02:06The violet-green swallow record was rescinded, and the birder was blacklisted from the community.
02:12Flash forward a couple years.
02:15A North Carolina man is fighting for his life this morning after being bitten by his pet, King Cobra.
02:20While the guy's in a coma fighting for his life, some of the local birdwatchers took to the chat group.
02:26And they have a long memory.
02:29You play with fire, you get burned by fire.
02:32Harsh, but true.
02:32I called him out on his fake big ear.
02:33This is pure karma.
02:35Turns out I was right all along.
02:37Is he still a birdwatcher?
02:39He's not part of the birding community alone.
02:44I managed to get in touch with the guy.
02:46I wanted to hear his side of the story 14 years later.
02:50He's actually kind of the man, and I'm convinced he really saw the bird.
02:53All he asked for was his identity to remain anonymous.
02:57Man, all that was so stupid, but oiled down mostly to me being a young kid at 16, I think,
03:02and finding a really good bird.
03:04The whole bird community being what it was at the time, sort of toxic and high pressure,
03:09had me freaked out over trying to prove it,
03:11and I used to pick a corner and take it somewhere else, out west, to glorify the record.
03:16Definitely not a great thing to do, and that's what I'll ever defend now.
03:21But the teenage brain just doesn't really work like that.
03:25I just remember thinking that the alternative was being screened out of a bunch of people
03:29who I was already intimidated by, and that seemed like a good enough reason.
03:34The full-out was what you'd expect.
03:36Kind of shocked at the immaturity of people twice my age or more.
03:40Because now, as a 29-year-old, I can't imagine being like that to a 16-year-old.
03:48Is it funny? Is it a funny story to you?
03:51Is it funny?
03:52I mean, it's all kind of ridiculous, right?
03:54We like to think we have an honor system,
03:56and when somebody breaks the honor system, that's pretty serious.
04:00You're welcome.
04:18We're good.
04:19We're good.
04:19We're good.
04:21We're good.
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