Bird New to U.S. Found in Texas

A Pine Flycatcher (Empidonax affinis) in Choke Canyon State Park in Texas, as reported here. The individual in question is said to have been first discovered by Willie Sekula on Decemer 13, 2008, and identified by Martin Reid on January 1, 2009.

The AOU Check-list (1998) describes the range of this species as follows:

Resident from northern Sinaloa, central Chihuahua, southern Coahuila, Zacatecas and San Luis Potosi south in the Mexican highlands to central Oaxaca, Puebla and west-central Veracruz, also (apparently resident) in Chiapas, and Quatemala.

My attention was drawn to the first comment, which is repeated here because of its relevance:

The bird listers that rush to see a bird like this leave a hideously large carbon footprint from air travel and car rental to spend 15 minutes in a remote area with a bird. This is a degenerate hobby. Knowing a few of them, I'd generalize that many are folks who never should have inherited money. Wasteful consumerism is destroying the planet, SAY WHAT??

While I'm not ready to call birding a "degenerate hobby," I do believe that birders need to be more conscious of the impacts of their activities on the environment, and focus more effort on the long-term conservation of the living organisms that they lust after.