Kathryn Masano
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Listers: A Glimpse Into Extreme Birdwatching is an incredibly funny, engaging, and shockingly educational 2025 documentary revolving around the subject of birdwatching. The film follows two brothers, Owen and Quentin Reiser, as they journey through a “Big Year” bird hunt. A “Big Year” is the highest and most challenging possibility of adventure a birdwatcher can risk taking. From a broad perspective, the goal may seem simple: find and document as many bird species as possible within the United States in a single calendar year. However, their lax (and I mean extremely lax, they’re high for most of the film) attitude unveils the secret, less glamorous side of being a “lister.” Listers are competitive birders who keep organized lists and records of birds they’ve seen or heard in real time. The huntee is required to live in challenging off-the-grid conditions for 12 consecutive months, including, but not limited to, backpacking through the mountains, manual boating across bodies of water, and out-of-car camping. While they are, at heart, stoner amateurs with mullets, the brothers’ wit and charm engage an enormous platform of viewers, building a mixed audience of those who are truly passionate about the subject and those who have no idea what they’re watching but know they like it. Through hilarious highs and lows, ranging from confusion about birdcalls to witnessing a fight in a Cracker Barrel parking lot, the charm of the Reiser brothers makes the informational documentary irresistible to anyone seeking a pretty bird and a pretty good laugh. The film begins in the stomping ground of Tucson, Arizona, though it is just one of several dozen places later to be explored. Quentin and Owen Reiser introduce themselves, their goals, and their reasons for listing to their audience. Already, viewers’ attention spans are captured by Owen’s opening line: “This here would be my brother Quentin. And last year, he caught an aggressive form of Early Onset Birdwatcher. Highly contagious… I caught it too.” Immediately, watchers are engrossed in what can be defined as the Reisers’ “unserious passion” for birdwatching. This cleverly contradicts the practice’s standard stigma of being an uptight and nearly religious career. Rest assured, as far as the brothers go, this is simply a once-in-a-lifetime side hustle, as evident by their hand-sketched Boobie Bird, which features actual boobies. An artist’s take, one might argue. “One day, I got high and found the family bird guidebook. And I thought about how crazy it would be if you knew all the birds in that book. Just how insane that is,” Quentin Reiser, 5’7, 148 lbs, (I’m staying on theme with the sporadic details scattered throughout the documentary). With nothing but a bong, a minivan, and a dream, the Reisers embark on their 365-day adventure, which is eventually boiled down into a wild 1-hour and 59- minute bird-watching ride. While the brothers’ goal at heart is to raise awareness and document their journey, at the end of the day, they simply want to show their viewers how fun it is to take a picture of a cool, flying, colorful bird. Owen and Quentin Reiser are living, breathing proof that, to be a bird watcher, you don’t need an extensive end of featherly knowledge— all you really require is a passion, a friend, a good sense of humor, and a blunt, if you swing that way.
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You’re a punk rock teenage boy living in the 70s. What a time— a time when boring hair is out, and mohawks are in. It’s early, 7 a.m. on a Friday to be exact. Last night, in a burst of rebellion, you snipped and shaved your long blonde locks. Mom told you you’d be out of her home if you ever touched your hair, but you don’t care, because you’re as cool as a Pileated Woodpecker (hint, HINT). To add to that, your band, The Pileated Woodpeckers (named after the most awesome bird ever to fly across North America, Canada, and parts of the Pacific Coast), is playing a gig at the inn tonight. If this doesn’t go well, you can kiss your dreams of being a professional drummer boy goodnight. So you gotta look the look to rock the rock. Carefully, you shave up the circumference of your head, stopping short of the center. The sides are painted a deep black, while the extra-long scruff is molded into a red mohawk held together with enough gel to make Elvis Presley flinch. Finally, with two fingers on each undereye, you rub sleek white streaks onto your skin. The awesome look equals complete; now, you’re concert-ready! Just like the Pileated Woodpecker itself, you carry a mostly black head, with white flashes on either side of your face and a red scruff of bundled feathers. But oh my gosh, Mom will KILL YOU if she sees what you’ve done. Quickly, you snag your brown lunch bag and scramble out the door. It’s the usual contents— a Bologna sandwich paired with wild fruits and berries, nuts, and occasionally seeds. Gently, you press a blackberry onto your tongue, crunching the miniature seeds between your teeth as though you had a strong beak. You lean back into your bus seat, closing your eyes to imagine what it would be like to rustle in the brown bark of a tree for beetle larvae, carpenter ants, and termites as opposed to digging through your brown paper bag in hopes of an extra cookie. But honestly, get real. Larvae, carpenter ants… yuck! Maybe it’s good you don’t do everything the Pileated Woodpecker does. But you have to admit: eating wood-boring beetles all day? Pretty cool for a bird, if you think about it. When the bell finally releases you from the chains of high school, you opt to take a long walk home through the mixed deciduous-coniferous woodland of tall hemlock trees. Secretly, you’re hoping to catch a glimpse of one of your favorite birds’ nests. If you were a woodpecker, as the male, you’d be doing most of the labor. This isn’t a problem— in fact, you would prefer punching large holes through trees all day instead of punching numbers into your calculator during honors algebra 2. Suddenly, as if a miracle touched down on you, you spot one, a male (which you can tell from the matching red mohawk), carefully chipping away at the cavity of a tall oak in a circular junction. He’s coming from the inside, eventually reverting to tossing extra chips back inside to cushion his estimated 3-5 eggs. Wait…look at the clock— you’re late for the show! This nest won’t even be done for another 3-6 weeks, anyway. With no time to spare, you fly out of the forest at what seems like a whopping 21 miles per hour, the average flight speed of a Pileated Woodpecker, and burst into the inn with your drumsticks in tow just in time. You’ve never jammed a better jam in your entire life. Like the Pileated Woodpecker, the crowd’s song is wild and loud, laughing and cackling alongside the series of cuk-cuk-cuk notes from the beat of your drum. After what seems like an eternity of rock and roll, you bring down your high-pitched yet clear series of notes with a slow, deep, and non-rhythmic whacking down of your bass. With a final cuk-cuk-cuk, you bow to the crowd, who beg for an encore. Ladies, ladies, please. You’ve got homework to do. As you exit the stage, walking towards your for-certain rockstar future, you can hear the audience chanting Long Live the Pileated Woodpecker! The Pileated Woodpecker rules! Who are you to disagree? They’re right, clearly. Now, two things are for certain: the Pileated Woodpecker is the best, and your mom is going to kill you when she sees your red mohawk hair.
Works Cited
Christensen, C. (n.d.). The drumbeat of the woodpeckers. Park Bugle. https://parkbugle.org/ 94125/birdman-of-lauderdale/the-drumbeat-of-the-woodpeckers/ Collins, M. D. (2017, October 2).
Periodic and transient motions of large woodpeckers. Nature News. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-13035-6
Pileated woodpecker life history, all about birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology. All About Birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology. (n.d.). https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/ Pileated_Woodpecker/lifehistory
Pileated woodpecker. Audubon. (2025, November 11). https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/ bird/pileated-woodpecker