Bird's opening versus the Dutch Defence I have played Bird's opening for around a year now, but I don't understand why Bird's opening isn't played as much as the Dutch, even though it is a tempo up. Why is this?
Even if you play the Dutch a tempo up, you don't have great chances of gaining an advantage (especially if your opponent is completely satisfied with just equalizing). As White you typically want to maximize your chances of getting some edge, and a better way to do this is by controlling more of the centre with 1.e4/1.d4, or perhaps developing a piece with 1.Nf3. The Bird's still a fine opening, but not very challenging.
In addition to this, Black doesn't necessarily have to play 1...d5 (even though it's the most popular move). He could go for something like 1...c5, 2...Nc6, 3...g6, 4...Bg7, 5...e6, etc, playing similar to how he would against the Closed Sicilian. If at any point White decides to push e4, then we've actually got some kind of Closed Sicilian where Black is fine. And if White doesn't push e4, it's kind of odd - after all, in the Bird/Dutch isn't one of the main goals to push e4/...e5?