Birdwatching can be a compulsive pastime, a never-ending quest to see more species and add to a lifetime list.

Key points: A study reveals birdwatchers generated an economic boom when they travelled to see the rare bird in 2017

A study reveals birdwatchers generated an economic boom when they travelled to see the rare bird in 2017 Researchers say the study highlights the potential of bird tourism, especially around rare and vagrant birds

Researchers say the study highlights the potential of bird tourism, especially around rare and vagrant birds Work is now underway to create a bird trail in the lower Hunter Valley, NSW, to encourage tourism

It drives many devoted twitchers to travel long distances in search of unusual and hard-to-spot birds.

When a rare Alaskan shorebird, the Aleutian tern, was spotted for the first time in Australia in late 2017, hundreds of people travelled to catch a glimpse of the elusive species.

The Aleutian tern breeds in Alaska and eastern Siberia and usually spends the southern summer in the North Pacific and parts of Indonesia, so its appearance on a sandbar, off the small New South Wales mid-north coastal town of Old Bar, came as a surprise.

As a ripple of excitement travelled through the bird world, a surprisingly large ripple of money also went through the local economy.

Liam Murphy photographing Aleutian terns at Old Bar, where he recorded the first Australian sighting of the northern hemisphere shorebird. ( Supplied: Julia Hudd )

Study reveals bird boon

University of New South Wales science PhD student and keen birdwatcher, Corey Callaghan, witnessed the huge interest in the Aleutian tern and it inspired him to find out just how much money the birdwatching event generated.

"I have been on many of these twitches — looking for plenty of vagrant birds," he said.

"I've spent plenty of money myself and learned how many people go and how far they come to see these birds.

"So, I've always wondered if that could be quantified in a way to demonstrate how important these birds and their habitats are."

The appearance of these Aleutian terns at Old Bar drew hundreds of twitchers and resulted in an economic boost. ( Supplied: Liam Murphy )

Mr Callaghan led a study on the Old Bar bird event with other scientists at the University of New South Wales and the report has been published in the Journal of Ecotourism.

It estimates that the birders who came to see the Aleutian terns brought in more than $200,000 to the NSW economy over about four months.

"After word got out to the birding community, the who's who of Australian birders travelled to see the Aleutian terns — we estimated between 375 to 581 birdwatchers came," Mr Callaghan said.

"On average they travelled 580 kilometres to see the birds.

"We estimate the birders' activity brought between $199,000 and $363,000 to the Australian economy."

Hundreds of birdwatchers travelled to Old Bar to see the Aleutian tern. ( Supplied: Julia Hudd )

'Vagrant' birds generate huge interest and money

The tufted duck drew huge interest earlier this year, when it was sighted in Victoria — the first ever sighting in Australia. ( Supplied: Warren Palmer )

The UNSW study is the first to quantify the economic impact of a vagrant bird — a species observed outside its normal geographic range — in Australia.

It comes after a similar study published last year, also led by Mr Callaghan, estimated that a single black-backed oriole in rural Pennsylvania, resulted in more than $US220,000 revenue for that economy.

"These studies are demonstrating the exceptional pull of vagrant birds to birders, while also showing the real economic potential of these events," Mr Callaghan said.

"They are contributing to local economies around the world all the time."

The grey-headed lapwing drew strong interest when it appeared in Australia for the first time at Burren Junction. ( Supplied: Fiona Brook )

This forest wagtail was spotted in an Alice Springs backyard in 2013 and had never been seen on the Australian mainland. ( Supplied: Chris Watson )

Mr Callaghan said there had been a number of other notable instances in Australia where the arrival of a vagrant bird had generated huge birdwatching interest and flow-on tourism dollars.

They include this year's first ever appearance of the tufted duck and earlier, the forest wagtail in Alice Springs.

"There was the tufted duck in Melbourne in 2019, there was a black-headed gull in the Northern Territory, there was Australia's first collared pratincole in Perth, there was the grey-headed lapwing in Burren Junction, near Wee Waa … there's been heaps," Mr Callaghan said.

The untapped potential of 'bird tourism'

Birdlife Australia's Mick Roderick said while the arrival of vagrant birds generated tourism dollars so did opportunities to spot Australia's resident birds.

"Bird tourism in Australia is definitely a big market that can be tapped into," he said.

"Australia has the second [highest] number of endemic species in the world behind Indonesia.

"We have hundreds of birds that occur nowhere else in the world, so it's a very special place and we need to attract birdwatchers from overseas."

Critically endangered regent honeyeaters are seen as a bird tourism drawcard in the NSW Hunter Valley. ( Supplied: Dean Ingwersen )

One option is to create 'bird trails' and Mr Roderick said work was underway on a bird route for the forests around Cessnock, in the lower Hunter region of NSW.

"Some of the real Hunter drawcard birds are two critically endangered species, including the regent honeyeater and the swift parrot," he said.

The director of the UNSW Centre for Ecosystem Science, Professor Richard Kingsford, said the economic value of birdwatching should be factored in to more government decision-making.

"The benefits to the economy from birdwatching need to be factored in as real contributions, stacked up against development threats that destroy their habitats, such as land clearing," he said.