I’ve always loved animals, but I have Pokemon to thank for turning me into a birdwatcher. For those unfamiliar, Pokemon was a very popular game in the late 90’s, the point of which was to catch and train fictional wild animals/monsters. Most Pokemon could “evolve” into stronger versions of themselves, and some were so rare that they could only be found in a single place in the game. To beat the game you needed to collect all 150 Pokemon, hence the game’s tagline, “Gotta Catch ‘Em All.”

When I first came across a book on bird-watching (thanks Kepler’s!), my eleven year-old brain immediately made the connection to my favorite game. Birding’s purpose, besides the general enjoyment of nature and whatnot, is to find as many different species of birds as you can. It’s basically an animal scavenger hunt to be played with all 10,000 species of birds in the world, neat!

Pokemon transitioned into birdwatching for me, and with my free quaran-time, I decided to repeat the process and find each Pokemon’s bird equivalent. Now, a few notes before we dive in.

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I’ve “only” matched birds with the original 150 Pokemon, from versions Red and Blue. In the twenty-plus years since these games originated, a dozen or so fresh installments of Pokemon have been released, each bringing with them new characters to catch (there are now 807). I’ve matched Pokemon and birds based on rarity, looks, cool factor and whatever other criteria I thought I could make stick. Not all Pokemon translate well into birds (I mean, Jynx?), but I was pleasantly surprised at how many of these matches seemed to click.

Second, since my birding journey began in the Bay Area, I’ve populated the list with mostly Californian birds, although many of these are also found nation-wide. A clever wrinkle of the original Pokemon Red and Blue games was that a few Pokemon were exclusive to only one version of the game. In order to obtain the missing critters and complete your collection, you needed to trade with a friend who had the other version. Since Pokemon Blue was my game of choice, I’ve made the “Red Exclusive” Pokemon into East Coast birds, which require traveling across the country in order to “collect.” For “Blue Exclusive” Pokemon, I went with West Coast endemics.

Lastly, I’ve ordered evolutions mostly by size, although in some cases I gave the rarer species higher ranking. I’ve included hyperlinks for each bird species which lead to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s excellent online field guide, appropriately titled “All About Birds.” There you can find further information on each species, including its calls, identification tips, and even where best to find them.

Now, it’s time to trade in your Pokedex for a lifelist…

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