I'll leave it to the attorneys and wildlife professionals to speak to legalities. But I do have to say that the advent of the smartphone has increased the amount of birder playback being done by an order of magnitude or more. I now see more species-specific playback (i.e. not general attractants like screech owls and pishing) in a single outing than I used to see in a year.
Bill Pulliam Hohenwald TNOn Jun 4, 2014, at 5:45 PM, (Redacted sender "knoxmartin2@xxxxxxx" for DMARC) wrote:
I generally tell folks to refrain from using recordings during breeding season as it tends to pull nesting birds off the nest. Mostly it is just common sense, but some novice birders need to be aware that recordings should not be used all the time. I would think the same should apply to pishing, but it would seem to me to be not quite as serious to the birds as recordings. Of coarse I could be wrong about this.Knox Martin Mid-South Raptor Center Memphis, Shelby County -----Original Message----- From: Bates Estabrooks <wgpu@xxxxxxxxxxx> To: tn-bird <tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Wed, Jun 4, 2014 5:33 pm Subject: [TN-Bird] OT: Ethics, Legality, etc.? TN Birders,I saw a statement recently on a web site for a park/natural area (not in TN) that puzzled me. So I thought I'd post this here to see what TN birders think.The statement says that it is against their rules to "pish" or play recordings to lure birds in, because these behaviors are against the law and "harmful." The area is a breeding area for an endangered species of bird.My questions:Is it indeed illegal (federal or in some states) to "pish" or play recordings?Is "pishing" harmful? Are recordings harmful? Thanks. Bates Estabrooks Anderson County
