Phoebe Snetsinger is the first birder to list 8000 species. She was born on June 9, 2024 in Lake Zurich, Illinois and lived in Webster Groves, Missouri.
Phoebe Snetsinger via kwout
Upon seeing a Blackburnian Warbler in 1965 at her home in Webster Groves, Missouri, Phoebe was inspired to start birding. Birding remained a hobby for Phoebe until the moment in 1981 that would reshape her life; a doctor diagnosed her with terminal melanoma and told her she didn’t have long to live.
Snetsinger listed (by a revised count) 8,398 of the world’s 9,700 species, a record since broken only a couple of times. The end of her quest came in Madagascar in November 1999, when the van she was riding in rolled over and crashed.
Are you curious about birding but don’t know how to get involved? Here are four easy steps you can take to get started in birding shared by Nature.org.