For Jason Ward, an animal lover who grew up in homeless shelters in the South Bronx, hosting the bird-watching web series “Birds of North America” is beyond a dream job.

Ward, 32, has birded in Prospect Park with the comedian Wyatt Cenac, near Brooklyn Bridge with the Feminist Bird Club, and in Cape May, N.J., with his mentor, J. Drew Lanham, a wildlife biologist and fellow birder of color. Birders of color are pretty rare, which is why the program exists: to show that they do, too.

So Ward and his producers were shocked earlier this week when Rolling Stone unveiled a new bird-watching web series that shared uncanny similarities with Ward’s show.

Called “Birding With Charles,” it also featured a black host, Charles Holmes, taking a guest bird-watching — in the first episode it’s rapper Valee, who visits Central Park with Holmes. Accompanied by a tinkling piano overture and a British narrator, the host commits a series of bird-watching no-nos: he harasses a bird by chasing it, he disses a mourning dove and a robin as “basic” — “us top-tier bird-watchers don’t even care about ’em,” he says — and stands by silently as Valee lights up a blunt.