Photography Ethics

(transcript of today's "For the Birds")
This weekend I posted several photos of a Northern Hawk Owl that I’d photographed in the Sax-Zim Bog. Suddenly I started being bombarded with emails from a photographer who was upset with my photos. He said that someone has been feeding the owl and its mate pet store mice—a practice I publicly disapprove of. Some photographers bait owls in order to get close-ups and flight shots, but I don’t think the ends justify the means. Baiting owls can raise their expectations that people they encounter are going to feed them. This is especially dangerous with Great Gray Owls and Boreal Owls, who may then spend more time at roadsides looking for people when automobile collisions are one of the main causes of death for them. Attracting them to people isn’t such a critical issue in the case of Northern Hawk Owls, who tend to be curious about us no matter what. They have long been known to follow large mammals around hoping to grab food from them, as Gray Jays do.

But in the case of all owls, including Northern Hawk Owls, baiting also involves the issue of releasing non-native mammals into the natural environment if the mouse escapes, and the issue of salmonella poisoning if the mouse doesn’t escape. The Centers for Disease Control lists cases of Minnesotans getting sick from salmonella from handling mice from Minnesota pet shops. It’s simply not right to risk an owl’s life this way for a photo op. The issue of animal cruelty regarding the mouse is also an issue. Mice are natural prey for owls, but pet store mice have been raised in warmth and security. Tossing one out in the snow to be torn apart by an owl seems a doubly cruel end. In a country with so little compassion for our fellow humans, it’s not hard to understand that photographers may not feel compassion for rodents, but that brings them one step closer to not caring if the owl itself is killed by salmonella or a car, due to baiting.
Without baiting them, we can get plenty of close-range photos of Northern Hawk Owls, including flight shots, as long as we are patient. That’s a small price to pay to show our respect for an owl’s genuine wildness, to protect it from potentially tainted food, and to interfere with its activities as little as possible.

I like to think my stand on baiting is clear and inflexible, but I’ve violated it myself twice, though not for photography. During the huge Great Gray Owl invasion in 2004, an emaciated Great Gray Owl visited my backyard, and I thawed out and offered it one of the frozen mice I keep onhand for my education owl Archimedes. These mice come from a reputable supplier, so I was certain it was disease free, but I did risk teaching the owl to trust humans, consciously deciding in this case to err on the side of compassion. Later that same year, when I was caring for an emaciated Boreal Owl until it could get to the Raptor Center, one of my more experienced friends suggested that I give it live mice, because he’d found that Boreal Owls don’t often take thawed ones. I tried my darnedest to get him to take one of Archimedes’ dead mice, but finally had to try a live one. He ate it, but I’ve had too many gerbils as treasured pets to be able to deal with that on any kind of a regular basis. That little owl was the last predacious bird I ever rehabbed.

Each of us grapples with ethical issues every day. In the final analysis, we know when we have found the right path for ourselves when we trust our choice without worrying about what others think. An ethical code should be set high, a standard to aspire to, something that gives us pride when we do live up to it. When we’re trying desperately to justify our own ethical shortcuts, doing things that we’re uncomfortable admitting, or pressing someone else to lower their ethical standard to our level, it’s a pretty clear indication that we don’t believe in our own heart that what we’re doing is right. Birds lead lives of direct simplicity. In capturing their images, we should never risk harming them. In the final analysis, it’s just that simple.

Winter and Spring duking it out

Northern Hawk Owl, a photo by Laura Erickson on Flickr.

I spent Robert Frost's birthday (March 26) at the Sax-Zim Bog, on an MOU field trip led by Erik Bruhnke. It was cold and windy, so we needed every stitch of winter wear we had, but what a fabulous day! Harriers courting, eagles kettling and at least one at a big nest, lots of gorgeous Rough-legged Hawks, a Great Gray Owl hooting, hilarious Red Squirrel activity, and more! A splendid day, whether we saw it as Winter's Last Stand or Spring Finally Arrives.

Just in case you need reminding that spring will come

Whooping Crane with leg bands and transmitter

Whooping Crane with leg bands and transmitter
Originally uploaded by Laura Erickson

Tom Stehn told Journey North's Jane Duden,

The radioed crane pictured is 2010-05, notated as (a)g/y. That translates to aluminum over green over yellow on the right leg. Radio on the left leg. Chick banded in August, 2010 in Wood Buffalo NP.

They've been bouncing back and forth between San Jose Island and the refuge this winter.

This means that the young bird has made one very long migration and many daily jaunts with the leg hardware, which is clearly not bothering it or hampering its flight.

Space Coast Birding Festival

I'm in Titusville, Florida, for the Space Coast Birding Festival. Every day I'll post one photo. I took this one yesterday on the porch of the visitors center at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. They have a sign saying if you want to see one, take three steps back and keep watching. (They maintain several feeders there.) This one came in within just a minute or two.

Painted Buntings are becoming ever more common feeder birds in Florida in winter. They used to be more common like this, but declined dramatically for a while, so this is one bright spot in the world of conservation.

If the Cubs aren't playing...

Northern Saw-whet Owl
Originally uploaded by Laura Erickson

...who cares?

Brrrrdathon!!!

Gray Jay
Originally uploaded by Laura Erickson

Erik Bruhnke and I had a fabulous time this weekend at the first annual Brrrdathon. This fun event was created by the ever-wonderful Sparky Stensaas in order to raise money toward four goals:

1. Acquire bog habitat in the Sax-Zim Bog area of St. Louis County, Minnesota
2. Build a small “Birder Welcome Center” on the land
3. Create a HD natural history movie about Black Spruce/Tamarack bogs
4. Fund educational/research projects centered on peatlands and associated birdlife

Erik and I only went out one day this year, but next year we hope to do the 2-day count. It's a great way to start a new year of birding--celebrating northern birds in the service of ensuring their futures.

Erik and I both entered the photothon, too, and he won!! We had really good conditions for photography--I'll be posting some of my photos in the next few days. We had great light and cooperative birds, though the Gray Jay in this photo didn't hang around long. If you're on flickr, make sure you check "see original size" to see the detail in some of the photos.

No one should start their year listlessly!

More about Bird Deaths

Young Tree Swallow killed by car on Goose Pond Road.
Originally uploaded by Laura Erickson

(Transcript from today's For the Birds program)

This summer, on a drive between Chicago and Duluth, my daughter and I stopped by one of my favorite birding spots outside Madison, Wisconsin. Goose Pond is a tract of restored prairie surrounding a lovely pond that serves as a magnet for migrating waterfowl and nesting grounds for songbirds, ducks, and Sandhill Cranes. Madison Audubon, which manages the property, has worked tirelessly over the past four decades to both restore the land and to work with nearby farmers, both encouraging them to manage their land in sustainable ways and to help them deal with any problem caused by birds. I was active in Madison Audubon during the years I lived in Madison, and Goose Pond is near and dear to my heart. Every time I drive along the nearby stretch of I-94, my personal tradition is to stop at the Arlington Rocky Rococo’s to pick up a slice of pizza to eat on the roadside next to Goose Pond while I scan for birds.

Katie and I stopped there in August. I love that time of year, when lots of newly-independent young birds are learning the ropes. The day was cool but sunny, and a lot of birds were gathered on the country road, basking in sunshine and picking up bugs.

But on this occasion, for the first time in the 35 years that I’ve been visiting Goose Pond, we came upon dozens of dead birds littering the roadside along the eighth-of-a-mile stretch. Apparently one or more trucks or cars had passed by at high speed, smashing into Cedar Waxwings, Tree Swallows, and Red-winged Blackbirds. I’ve come upon sights like this before, when my heart starts pounding. Every year there are fewer and fewer places where habitat is managed specifically for wildlife, and even those places are not safe. Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, one of the few jewels of natural habitat left along Florida’s Atlantic coastline, sits between Titusville and the Kennedy Space Center. The road cutting through it has a 55-mile-per-hour speed limit, and cars go much faster as drivers race to work or to visit the space center or beach. I go there every time we visit our son in Florida, and I’ve never once driven that stretch without seeing dead wildlife—sometimes literally hundreds of dead birds, after a car or truck plows through a flock flying across the road. When I started birding in 1975, I very often saw dead Red-headed Woodpeckers along roadsides. This beautiful species used to be so common that it was featured on the Pennsylvania Game Commission’s exquisite poster of birds commonly seen in backyards. Now in most of the areas where they once were abundant, Red-headed Woodpeckers have become so rare that if one is seen, it makes birding hotlines. Automobiles are also a major factor in the decline of Barn Owls and Short-eared Owls.

Dozens or hundreds of birds are killed every year near many individual ornamental fruit trees, after berries or crabapples start fermenting. The birds grow intoxicated, and collide with trees, buildings, cars, and one another. Some state DNRs provide educational pamphlets about plantings for birds, and strongly advise people to plant these trees away from roadsides and large windows to prevent the worst kills, but few people are aware of this hazard. Intoxication is apparently what caused the recent bird kill in Italy.

In the 35 years since I started birding, after DDT was banned, national and even local news media have been pretty much ignoring all of these bird deaths. Few people remember the thousands and thousands of dead Swainson’s Hawks littering South American farm fields thanks to pesticides barely a decade ago. But suddenly these stories are in vogue. Unlike when thousands of dead robins were being picked up in the 1960s thanks to DDT, this time the spin has nothing to do with protecting birds. In unsettling times, people who know nothing about birdlife are looking for evidence of a divine retribution. One minister even made national news by claiming that these bird deaths are proof that God is punishing us for ending the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy. A world without birds is apocalyptic enough for me, but none of the news media seem the least bit concerned about either declining bird populations or the tragedy of individual bird deaths—they’re seizing on the most bizarre storylines without the slightest glimmer of realization that the world we’ve created where these large scale bird deaths are becoming ever more commonplace really is a world where our own long-term survival as a species and our own quality of life are becoming ever more tenuous.

Archimedes

Archimedes
Originally uploaded by Laura Erickson

(Transcript from Thursday's For the Birds program)

In April, 2000, I was keynote speaker at a birding festival in Ohio, talking about owls. After my talk, a woman plied me with questions about my experiences handling owls as a rehabber, and how my understanding of their wild behaviors affected how I managed their care. During the course of our conversation, I mentioned that I had permits to keep an education owl, but hadn’t yet found an unreleasable bird. And at that moment, her face lit up, because she had an Eastern Screech-Owl that she’d had for almost a full year. He’d been sick and almost died as a very young chick, and his care required so much handling that he’d become imprinted. All the educational facilities in the area had their limit of birds, so she was thrilled that I could take him. Of course, I needed my state and federal permits in order to fly home with him, so I called Russ and asked him to fax them to me. Unfortunately for him, I keep the files in my four huge file drawers organized in taxonomic order, not alphabetically, but he assured me it didn’t take him too long. I had to arrange with the airline to fly with a bird and had to pay an extra $75 for the one-way flight, though he was in a little cardboard box the size a pet store puts a guinea pig in.

Archimedes has been a wonderful companion for almost 11 years. Every winter he starts calling, and we get into fun back-and-forth conversations. But during this time, it never once occurred to me to record his voice. Then on January 11, for some reason I had a flash of inspiration and brought up a microphone to try. I started with the microphone that I use for recording this radio program, and he called several times, but the mic just wasn’t sensitive enough to pick up his voice, though he was pretty close to it. So then I tried my Sennheiser directional mic. What you’re hearing in the background of this program is the recording I made of his voice.

During the year that he was kept at the Ohio rehab center, Archimedes heard quite a few Eastern Screech-Owls. Duluth is north of their typical range. I heard a wild one once in my neighborhood, but that was exceptional. So for the past 11 years, Archimedes has heard his own species calling very rarely if at all. He calls most intensely in late fall and again in early spring—this year I’ll try to get recordings when he’s making the trill call, and when he’s making longer whinnies. Here he’s making just a soft, short whinny.

For the first 45 or so years of my life, I never imagined living with an owl. There is definitely a dark side to it—sometimes I get very sad defrosting mice every night. I order them from a place in Louisiana. It was tricky finding a good dealer. First I tried a place that sells mice raised for medical research, figuring they’d at least died for a good cause. But they smelled after being defrosted, because they’d already been dissected at room temperature, and I also started thinking about the pharmaceuticals they’d been exposed to for research, and decided it was just too chancy. Many of the mice from my second supplier bore scratches and wounds that meant they’d been overcrowded and must have led sad existences. Now the mice I get look fit and healthy except for being dead. They’re killed with carbon dioxide and sent frozen in dry ice. I always feel sad at dinner time, and suspect that I’ll never want to deal with them again when Archimedes is gone.

The other dark side to living with an owl is keeping his room clean. I won’t get into details, but suffice it to say it’s not pleasant. But Archimedes has been an exceptional companion. As his 12th birthday approaches, I’m hoping he’ll set new longevity records for screech owls. He’s a treasure, and I feel lucky beyond measure to have been able to spend so much time in his company.

Birds falling from sky

Cedar Waxwing killed by car on Goose Pond Road.
Originally uploaded by Laura Erickson

(Transcript of Wednesday's For the Birds program)
Ever since New Year’s Eve, stories have been making international news about birds falling dead from the skies. On January 6, Discovery News put it this way:

It has been a bad week for wild animals. Starting just before the turn of the New Year, 500 red-wing blackbirds died together in Louisiana. Some 100 jackdaws turned up dead on a street in Sweden. And in Arkansas, about 5,000 blackbirds were found dead after crashing into roofs, mailboxes and the ground.

On January 5, a report from Faenza, a town in Italy, said that hundreds or thousands of turtle-doves were found scattered in streets and yards and hanging from trees. Some of the birds bore a mysterious blue stain in their beaks. Other reports of dead birds came from Sweden.

Large-scale bird deaths aren’t uncommon. People walking the streets of Chicago, New York, or other large cities sometimes pick up dozens to hundreds of birds on mornings after peak spring and fall migration events, because so many birds flying through the night sky collide with lighted sky scrapers and communications towers. Much larger events occur occasionally. In Baton Rouge LA, in July 1896, a shower of birds including ducks, catbirds, woodpeckers, and warblers, fell from a clear sky, literally cluttering the streets of the city. This kill was explained as an aftermath of a storm off Florida. Many thousands of birds were found under a single TV tower in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, after heavy migration during a foggy September night in 1957, and again in 1963.
On September 11, 1948, thousands of migrating birds were killed when they crashed into the Empire State Building in New York City and into the transmitting tower of Radio Station WBAL in Baltimore. On the night of October 7-8, 1954, 50,000 birds of 53 species dropped dead on the runways of Warner Robbins Air Force Base south of Macon, Georgia. A low cloud ceiling apparently drew the birds to the ceilometer lights.

On March 13, 1904, at least three quarters of a million migrating Lapland Longspurs were killed overnight in and near Worthington, Minnesota. The birds came from the Iowa prairies in a vast horde, and from 11 P.M. until morning, they were killed by crashing against buildings, electric light poles and wires, and by dashing themselves forcibly onto the frozen ground and ice. On January 22, 1998, up to 10,000 birds, mostly Lapland Longspurs, were killed at a communications tower during a West Kansas snowstorm.
So large numbers of dead birds falling from the sky is not new. The largest recent bird kill seems to have been the one in Arkansas, which was apparently caused when illegal, professional-grade fireworks were set off at midnight. In Arkansas, blackbirds, robins, and starlings roost together in huge flocks, many numbering in the millions. I’ve spent January in Arkansas, and seen the amazing density of blackbird flocks there. Unlike many songbirds, these species do not migrate by night. If tremendously loud fireworks in the middle of the night set these birds off in a panic, flying helter skelter, they’d be colliding at high speed with one another and with trees, poles, wires, buildings, and the ground. Necropsies done on many of them established that the cause of death was internal injuries from blunt force trauma.

Final reports haven’t been released about the causes of the other bird mortality events yet, but there are so many known ways for birds to die, from pesticides to collisions, that I’m sure each one has a straightforward cause. But sadly, now that our news is driven by Facebook and Twitter, items that would have made at most a 1-minute closing story on the local news are suddenly worldwide headlines, and each report feeds on and tries to top similar stories.

Some news accounts of the bird deaths have included the most recent Apocalyptic predictions. Although Matthew 24:36 makes it pretty clear that no one can know the day or hour, some of these predictions get pretty specific, like one that sets it for this coming May 21. That happens to fall right in the middle of spring migration, so I guess I’ll have to skip the Apocalypse this time around.