Geeks Spoil Their Own Fun
There are some disturbing headlines coming out of England (Note, for those who don't know, a twitcher is the British term for birder):
Twitchers Accused of Bird's Death (BBC News)
Hounded to Death...By Bird Lovers! (The Mirror)
Bird-brained Twitchers slammed! (The Sun)
The story stems from a complaint that a bunch of birders chased a rare starling "to death" and one of the members of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds asking for an investigation. Here's the BBC's version and here's the Sun's version (interesting to note the difference between the two stories).
On the one hand I think it's very uncool to chase down a rare bird at the expense of its health but on the other hand, I get really tired of over protective people getting worked up about one unhealthy bird. This was one bird way off course and probably in questionable health to begin with. Several people chasing a healthy bird for two days would not kill it, a bird in questionable health...maybe (and that's a big maybe). If its health was that bad, it's a matter of time before it dies anyway regardless of how many people were chasing it to get a glimpse of it. I get irritated with someone wasting all the media attention and effort on one bird in an extreme circumstance. Why don't we get that kind of momentum to solving (note I said solving, not whining about) the problem of millions of birds flying into windows and cell phone towers during migration. I think that doesn't get as much play because we know it's a problem and it seems too big to be able to solve. We're not going to stop using cell phones and skyscrapers, so we need to find ways to alert migrating birds that the structures are there and that is not something that's going to be invented overnight.
Twitchers Accused of Bird's Death (BBC News)
Hounded to Death...By Bird Lovers! (The Mirror)
Bird-brained Twitchers slammed! (The Sun)
The story stems from a complaint that a bunch of birders chased a rare starling "to death" and one of the members of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds asking for an investigation. Here's the BBC's version and here's the Sun's version (interesting to note the difference between the two stories).
On the one hand I think it's very uncool to chase down a rare bird at the expense of its health but on the other hand, I get really tired of over protective people getting worked up about one unhealthy bird. This was one bird way off course and probably in questionable health to begin with. Several people chasing a healthy bird for two days would not kill it, a bird in questionable health...maybe (and that's a big maybe). If its health was that bad, it's a matter of time before it dies anyway regardless of how many people were chasing it to get a glimpse of it. I get irritated with someone wasting all the media attention and effort on one bird in an extreme circumstance. Why don't we get that kind of momentum to solving (note I said solving, not whining about) the problem of millions of birds flying into windows and cell phone towers during migration. I think that doesn't get as much play because we know it's a problem and it seems too big to be able to solve. We're not going to stop using cell phones and skyscrapers, so we need to find ways to alert migrating birds that the structures are there and that is not something that's going to be invented overnight.
posted by birdchick at 9:51 AM
4 Comments:
I heard an interview this morning on the Beeb with the woman in whose garden the poor Rosy Starling died. She said that this starling had visible ticks on the day that it was first spotted (never a good sign - healthy birds usually groom those out) and later in the week was rescued from a her neighbour's cat.
Though the twitchers were chasing the bird and probably didn't help matters, I just don't think they killed the thing.
The woman interviewed buried the lost bird in her garden.
Its a slow news day here in the UK -
Right on Sharon - people have to understand that Mother Nature doesn't worry about the individual - She worries about survival of the species.
Most birds have very short life-spans.
What we need to worry about is giving them as much habitat as possible.
Groups like The Nature Conservancy have got it right. (end of rant)
Why don't we get that kind of momentum to solving (note I said solving, not whining about) the problem of millions of birds flying into windows and cell phone towers during migration.
Thanks for emphasizing "solving." I get tired of the whinging in the birding community.
This article on Surfbrids.com has pictures of the rose-coloured starling clearly showing a very bloated tick.
I do wish the media would get more excited about habitat loss and other things that imperil lots more birds.
On solving the crashing into tall buildings problem, I've often wondered if there's some sort of technological solution involving sound and/or magnetism in addition to simply turning the lights off on the buildings. Maybe a sound-based solution would work for wind turbine collisions too. Some gung-ho engineering student needs to make this her (or his) disssertation project.
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