[TN-Bird] Re: OT: Ethics, Legality, etc.?

  • From: Bill Pulliam <littlezz@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: kenneth_mcdonald@xxxxxxx
  • Date: Fri, 6 Jun 2014 10:29:16 -0500

My thoughts on the conservation value would be...
If documenting the presence of the bird in an area is valuable, then breeding-season playback could be warranted. But, it would seem, as soon as the bird responds and is documented, the playback should stop. No drawing it in to get a visual (unless visual ID is necessary) or a better photo.
I wonder about wintertime pishing? Has that been studied? One could argue that CBC data are valuable for conservation, and pishing/ screech-owl imitations are very widely used. How much harm might there be in a once-a-year exposure to one intense bout of pishing and tooting, I wonder? Might be hard to study, you might set up paired plots, pish one regularly the other never, then do point counts without pishing regularly during the study period. Would need a lot of replicates, but could be a good student research project...?
And along the ideas of conservation value, filtered higher-quality eBird data (complete checklists covering small areas) are also being used for large-scale "big picture" monitoring of birds at regional and continental scales. So if one ^could^ argue that if consistent use of pishing as part of collecting these data helps elucidate the spatial and temporal patterns of distributions of species that might be harder to detect without it, maybe it can be justified...?
I don't pish in the nesting season, but I do in the winter. I am judicious around my house, because the birds could be exposed daily, and it seems that they also become resistant to the pishing as the winter wears on if I do it too often -- "Oh, just the big hairy one again." Which, one might wonder, could impair the legitimate mobbing behaviors in response to a real threat? 

Lots of question marks.  An interesting topic.

Bill Pulliam
Hohenwald TN

On Jun 6, 2014, at 8:46 AM, Mcdonald, Kenneth wrote:


Hi,
My name is Ken McDonald and I am a biologist with the USFWS in Cookeville. Usually, I'm the point of contact for calls regarding the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.
While this shouldn't be construed as legal advice, I point out The Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 states it is "unlawful at any time, by any means or in any manner, to pursue, hunt, take, capture, kill . . . [or transport] any migratory bird, any part, nest, or egg of any such bird" (16 U.S.C. 703). The only exception to this is when regulations authorize these activities for the purpose of conserving migratory bird trust resources.
Some agencies interpret "take" to include harassment from pishing or playbacks because these activities can lead to bird mortality. For example, a bird responding to a playback may become more visible to predators, may inadvertently signal to predators the proximity of nests, or may abandon the nest, entirely if they believe the source of the pishing or playback poses as risk to themselves. Additionally, many agencies (such as the National Park Service and the Department of Defense) have even more stringent mandates and legal authorities to implement regulations even more protective of Migratory Birds than is found in the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.
My own view is there is a great deal of peer-reviewed, published scientific literature which indicates phishing and playbacks can knock individuals off of territories, make birds vulnerable to predators, or cause birds to abandon nests. Given that pishing or playbacks can increase risk to birds, the question I ask is "Does interacting with a bird through the use of pishing or playbacks contribute to the conservation of the bird?" In my own birding experiences I refrain from doing anything that causes a bird to alter its behavior unless my doing so somehow contributes to the well-being of the bird. 

Ken



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