[mou] WEVI tape discussion

[Katherine Kottke]

To all  Minnesota birders

How does using a tape to call birds differ from using epo to win the 
Tour de France or using  steroids to hit home runs?  Perhaps 
individuals who use a tape to see a bird should be required to asterisk 
that sighting on their life-list and posting.

  Katherine Kottke

On Jul 29, 2008, at 8:41 AM, douglas chapman wrote:

> Well said.
>
> The Cassin's Sparrows which have been found (and confirmed breeding) 
> here in South Dakota have not been posted for this reason. It's a bit 
> too bad, but understandable since even the ABA magazine "Birding" now 
> calls bird finding a "sport." 
>
> It seems that tapes are our steroids. 
>
>
> Doug Chapman
> Sioux Falls, SD
>
> On Jul 29, 2008, at 7:51 AM, Richard Wood wrote:
>
>> It seems to me that this discussion took place last year about the 
>> Yellow-breasted Chat that was at Black Dog Lake, and at the time, I 
>> wondered what was the point of everyone getting all upset, because 
>> it's just going to happen again.
>>
>> The fact is, it's "human nature" for people to act the way that they 
>> do.  People are going to want to see a bird that is "rare" when it's 
>> posted, and some of them are going to take any means necessary to see 
>> it, whether it be to drive their vehicle where they shouldn't (which 
>> happened in Maryland recently) or to play tapes, or to throw a rock 
>> at a rail and kill it.
>>
>> I wish we could put an end to this, "we can end this behavior if 
>> enough of us post ethics "rules"", because it just isn't going to 
>> stop someone from seeing a bird once it has been posted.  As I told a 
>> person in Maryland last year that was complaining about birders 
>> turning the location of a pair of Long-eared Owls into a circus, "if 
>> the original poster didn't want it to come to this, he shouldn't have 
>> posted the bird's location".  Maybe we should do that instead of 
>> citing "birding ethics" and then having everyone and his brother 
>> posting asking us to "go by the rules"?  In my almost 10 years as a 
>> birder, I've seen that asking others to "go by the rules" doesn't 
>> work.  It doesn't work in other parts of life, so why do we think it 
>> will work here?
>>
>> Richard
>>  
>> Richard L. Wood, Ph. D.
>> Hastings, MN
>> rwoodphd at yahoo.com
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----
>> From: Diana Doyle <diana at managingthewaterway.com>
>> To: mattjim at earthlink.net; mou-net at moumn.org; mnbird at lists.mnbird.net
>> Sent: Monday, July 28, 2008 8:22:11 PM
>> Subject: Re: [mou] WEVI tape discussion
>>
>> Are birders also destined to fall victim to Garrett Hardin's tragedy 
>> of the commons? It would seem that there is no such thing as "little 
>> tape playing" when it is multiplied over all the birders who want to 
>> see a particular bird.
>>
>> I agree with Jim. It's a disservice to the bird and to the person who 
>> then regrets sharing their excitement of an unusual bird with the 
>> broader birding community.
>>
>> We must ask ourselves what our priorities are--if we are first and 
>> foremost advocates for birds, their well-being, and their habitat. 
>> Ultimately that's what being a birder is all about. 
>>
>> Diana Doyle
>> S. Minneapolis
>>
>> -------------
>>
>> On Jul 28, 2008, at 16:09 , James Mattsson wrote:
>>
>> THIS IS A RARE BIRD THAT IS ON TERRITORY WHERE MANY BIRDERS HAVE A 
>> CHANCE TO HEAR AND SEE IT !!!!   TAPES SHOULD NOT BE USED "SPARINGLY" 
>> OR ANY OTHER WAY !! TAPES CAN ONLY BE HARMFUL TO THE BIRD WHICH MIGHT 
>> BE MATED (PREDATION, ENERGY USED TO DEFEND AGAINST NON-EXISTENT 
>> NEIGHBORS, ETC), AND MAY PRECLUDE OTHER BIRDERS FROM SEEING/HEARING 
>> THE BIRD.
>>  
>> THIS IS WHY I NO LONGER POST BIRDS I FIND THAT I FEEL THAT ARE 
>> SUSCEPTIBLE TO TAPE PLAYING.
>>  
>> HERE IS THE COMPLETE ABA CODE OF ETHICS.
>>  
>> http://www.americanbirding.org/abaethics.htm
>>  
>> Jim
>>
>>
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