Beware of upcoming Northern Hawl owl post

I experienced a tense situation this morning that tarnishes the image

of a bird photographer. A crowd increases every day to observe and

photograph a Northern hawk owl in upstate NY. The bird in usually

perched in a tree in a resident's front lawn. This morning, a

photographer from 3 hours away took out his equipment along side me

and others. He then proceeded to tresspass far onto the private

property, and take out a cage of three live pet store mice. After

placing it down, the owl instantly approached. the photographer

taunted it for 40 minutes by moving the cage near various trees. He

got photos within ten feet of course, with his 600mm lens. Birders,

local residents, and myself vocalized our disdain for his behavior.

He left, without ever feeding the owl. The owl continued to look for

the mice. Residents called the sheriff who came too late.

 

While birders and photographers were content to view the bird from

the road, this guy created his own owl portrait studio. As

photographers, we are often caught up in the addictive desire to get

frame filling shots. Fortunately, most of us have the ethics to not

harm wildlife or trespass. But the crowd certainly had a negative

reaction to photographers based on this event. People are driving

all over the northeast to see this bird and activities like this will

stress the bird, anger the local residents, and tarnish the image of

a nature photographer. This photographer claims to be a member of

this site. If he posts these photos, plese discourage this less than

ethical behavior.

Sounds HIGHLY unethical, whoever it was. Trespass is wrong, baiting is wrong, ignoring the wishes of others is wrong.

 

I guess some people will do anything for a buck, and I'm sure shots of the owl could be sold to birding magazines.

 

I've seen highly responsible behavior from nature photographers. I've seen a group actually prevent others from doing stuff like this, even if it came to intimidation, physical restraint or calling the cops. I hope someone got shots of this photographer doing what he was doing. Publishing them might do some good. Feel free to post them here if you have any.

 

Personally, I'll leave the owl alone. Though I could drive up there I don't enjoy shooting in a zoo atmosphere. If it were in NJ I'd feel just the same, plus I get somewhat upset by idiots. I very nearly came to blows with a jerk out on the West Coast who was tossing handfulls of sand onto sleeping Elaphant Seals to "wake them up". He stopped, but we had a pretty heated discussion before to slunk away. I do have his picture, but it's not a pretty sight so I won't post it here. He was NOT a member of this site!

Hello Jeff,

 

Fortunately this is not a very common thing, in my experience, although ive seen some behavior over the years, that is almost beyond my comprehension. I witnessed, some years ago, a chap liming branches on an area of scrubland favoured by various finches, in order to get some close up shots. Fortunately, he was chased off by some birders, and the branches removed out of harms way. For those who dont know what liming is: Its coating a branch with a sticky lime substance, so any bird that is unfortunate enough to land on it, remains stuck.

 

It seems to me, that the effort some of these idiots put into getting a frame filling shot of an obviously distressed bird, would be better spent by putting the effort into getting a shot of a bird by conventional means ie: long lens/stalking/hide/blind etc, and if it means not getting that full frame shot, then so be it.

 

A big part of bird photography for me, is the challenge of getting close enough for a reasonable sized shot, without distressing the bird. I dont see what satisfaction these idiots can get out of this type of thing.

 

All the best

It is a-holes like this that ruin it for everyone. I consider myself a birder first, then a bird photographer even though I "look the part" of a pro photog. More and more bird watchers consider the mere sight of a photographer as reason to call the police, thinking that we are going to flush the target bird so in the end no one will get to see it. I'm sure many here have heard derogatory comments from naturalists even though you�ve done nothing wrong � and this guy is just giving those folks more ammo against us. "Nature Photographer" is quickly turning into a four-letter word for many naturalists. Soon we�ll not be able to make any images when anyone else is around.

 

<p>What I cannot believe is that the others in the area allowed this to happen for 40 MINUTES! Why didn�t anyone run this clown off? I have done it before and would not hesitate to do it again. Photog or not, if someone is agitating an animal, that person deserves your scorn. Don�t let this happen when you are around.

 

<p>Sean

<br><a href="http://www.stnphotography.com">www.stnphotography.com</a>

This is already on the many birder-listservs and we're getting trashed as usual. Look at <a href="http://www.virtualbirder.com/bmail/oneidabirds/latest.html#32">the NY Virtual Birder List (the most read bird list of the area)</a> for the more easy-going accounts from the birders' point of view. I suspect the vitriol to start pouring in on there list tonight.

 

<p>Sean

<br><a href="http://www.stnphotography.com">www.stnphotography.com</a>

<i>

I do have his picture, but it's not a pretty sight so I won't post it here.

</i>

<p>

Ah, yes: the Charleton Heston incident. Remember it well.

Jeff,

 

<p>The post on B-Mail suggests you know the name of this guy. While it is ultimately up to you to decide whether to share that info or not, I would suggest that you do. No doubt that would bring scorn from other photo.netters which may or may not be useful, but it would for sure act as a prologue to any future posts that person makes here or on naturephotographers.net or anywhere else bragging about his great �found� shots of the Northern Hawk Owl.

 

<p>If editors here it as well, hopefully he won�t be able to profit from his stupidity.

 

<p>Sean

<br><a href="http://www.stnphotography.com">www.stnphotography.com</a>

It's difficult to comprehend this type of behavior. Seems as if bird/wildlife photography has been invaded by ruthless paparazzi.

 

On a similar vein, I've never been too pleased to see various personalities on TV roaming around the wild picking up reptiles, crocodiles, etc. They advertise themselves as ecologists, but don't set a particularly good example.

When you trespass, bait, and otherwise annoy an animal to get a good shot, you're no longer a nature photographer; at that point you've become a nature exploiter. This is my humble opinion, of course, but a true nature photographer enjoys taking photos of nature undisturbed by human encroachment. When someone asks you "How did you get such a great photo of that (owl, moose, bear, etc)?" a true nature photographer wants to say, "Well, I saw that (owl, moose, bear) across a field, 200 yards away from me. I stayed low in the grass, stayed downwind, and crawled until I was just 20 yards away. Then I setup my 600mm lens and snapped a few shots, then crawled away - the animal never saw me!"

<p>

That's not always the case, of course. Animals get spooked, but then they just fly or run away, they're afraid of you, that's natural. When you bait an animal, you stress it because it doesn't want to get any closer to you than it has to. But, it's putting that natural fear aside to get food. Kinda like putting a briefcase full of cash in the middle of a 4 lane highway - it just gets messy!

<p>

I love the feeling of getting within range of an animal without it knowing I'm there. It's satisfying, it's a joy to get so close to nature in a purely natural way, as if I were just another plant or animal. Sharing that experience through photos is what nature photography is all about.

<p>

When someone goes to the lengths of the photographer in question to get a photo of an animal, they're not doing it for their own satisfaction or to get a shot for themselves - they're doing it to get a good frame they can sell for good $$$ to some otherwise ignorant newspaper or magazine. Nature <i>exploiter</i>, not nature photographer.

I'd suggest that if anyone is a frequent contributor to birder lists and they see photographers getting trashed, you might want to reference this thread. At least it may show the birders that it's a tiny minority of photographers who give them grief and most photographers are responsible and try to cause as little disturbance and disruption as possible.

 

If anyone had video of this particular photographer it might be interesting to see if any laws were broken. The migratory birds act for example or trespass laws (though I think that requires a civil action). There are laws about baiting and/or harassing wildlife but I'm not familar with their extent or applicability in this case. However I'd bet there's someone out there with video. You can't set foot outside your house these days without being caught on video and a large number of both photographers and birders carry video with them.

I'm not really a "bird" photographer, but do take hundreds of shots of them since there are millions of them where I live and opportunites are unlimited. I'm also a -hardcore- duck and pheasant hunter! Believe it or not, I get much more respect from dedicated birders when I tell them I'm a duckhunter than when they think I'm a "nature photographer." This kind of stuff is probably why.

 

If I had been there, and was irritated enough, I might well have walked over and stomped on his stupid mice, LOL! I've done similar outrageous things in response to such gross rudeness before.

 

 

Kent in SD

So, did you take his picture doing this?<BR><BR>

Bob Keefer<BR>

Keefer Photography<BR>

www.bkpix.com

I read the birder thread - how embarassing.

 

While everyone was observing the photographer, did anyone pull him aside and explain to him what he was doing wrong? The crowd was offering up their words of disapproval, but did anyone approach him and try to make him understand?

 

It is entirely possible that he did not know the real consequences of his actions. While that's almost unimagineable, it is possible and everyone deserves the benefit-of-doubt.

 

Just because you're dressed like a pro and have all the gear doesn't mean you know diddly. Have you ever done something wrong of which you were not aware until later? I do it about once a week.

 

We assume the person was knowingly acting in an unethical way but in reality he could simply have been oblivious. Instead of black-balling the guy, we should try to contact him and really reach him. It's better for us, better for him and most certainly better for his subjects. IMO, this is a really negative way to go about this Jeff.

Gloria-

 

we spent 15 minutes explaining to him why this was inappropriate. He refused and told us to mind our own business. We continued to ask him not to do this.

 

Jeff

Hey Gloria,

 

i get your point, but i hate it when people pull the "ignorance" card...ppl have to be responsible for their actions, period...

 

i do however ask myself the question why everybody is so shocked about this kind of behaviour...on fe NPN most people don't seem to mind baiting animals at all...why is baiting in general pretty much accepted but this isn't?

 

cheers,

Luc

Ah - then he was very foolish to admit that he's a member of this group. I don't know what I would have done with a person like that. It's pretty depressing to know they are out there.

 

In that case I take back the "negative" part. If he has that attitude then I think your notifying folks keeps the ethics issues in our minds and hearts and thanks for doing so :)

 

G

Luc:

 

One answer to your question is that the guy had this bird's attention. The bird thinks it's going to get food so it doesn't look elsewhere for food. In the end the bird was never fed and all that time it could have been securing its next meal. What if that bird had chicks in the nest waiting to be fed? The guy was severely messing with the bird's eating pattern and to me, that's pretty bad.

 

Not only that, he was eating away at the bird's fear of man, which is a whole other discussion...

If there are people on NPN who "don't seem to mind baiting animals at all," I think that raises more questions about the people on NPN than it answers about this person.

Just wanted to clarify something in my last post. I consider what this person is doing to be baiting. There is a difference between taking advantage of birds that visit a bird feeder, pond drip, birdbath, suet feeder or other set-up device. The birds come and go as they please and eat if they want. I don't consider that harmful in the least. What this guy was doing was very different and very harmful as far as I'm concerned. I believe *that* is the difference and what I really meant to say :)

Just writing to say how irritating it is to hear of that type of behaviour, especially speaking as an ecologist.

 

I am relatively new to photography, and recently I have decided to take it more seriously. To this end, I have just been reading several "how-to" books on nature photography. Every one of them had a chapter or comments on the ethics of nature photography, particularly people like Art Morris, and Andy Rouse. I remember thinking, "talk about stating the obvious", but unfortunately guy's like the one you describe illustrate the necessity for articles like that.

 

I agree with several of the other contributors in saying you should post this guy's picture, and/or send on his name if possible to the authorities, as I'm certain he has violated some laws. It may at least serve as a warning to others in the future.

 

Speaking as someone who has passed up several excellent photo opportunities for moral reasons, I can't abide idiots like that.

 

Nice one Jeff for bringing it to everyone's attention.

As I noted on the NPN site when I initially read about this incident, this is an unfortunate reminder of why photographers face restrictions. There is an attitude often displayed on several photo.net forums that the right of the photographer to photograph as he pleases is sacred. As long as this type of arrogance is endorsed, more photographers will act irresponsibly and more limitations will be placed on photography.

"on fe NPN most people don't seem to mind baiting animals at all"

 

What? Be specific in details. Exactly how do they bait animals?

Thank you Jeffrey for bringing this all too common type of incident to every one's attention. It's refreshing to witness the level of outcry on photo.net & Sean's link to the virtual birder postings.

 

David Crossley/Crossley Photography....

 

 

www.davidcrossley.com

<P>Greg, I'm not sure what Luc is referring to specifically in his comments, but I think Gloria described it quite well, including the difference between setting up a backyard bird feeder and the individual's behavior as described by Jeff.</P>

 

<P>It's unfortaunate that in every walk of life, there are those who are as inconsiderate and unthoughtful as the individual described. That said, nature photography forums such as this one and those on NPN can be and should be used for the promotion of field ethics and responsible behavior. While the fine line between what is acceptable and what is not acceptable behavior may be debateable (some may feel that backyard bird feeders are unethical), common sense dictates that this person's actions were well over the line.</P>

 

<P>As Gloria stated, education is paramount, as is being held accountable for one's actions.</P>

 

<P>Jim Erhardt<BR>

<a href="http://www.naturephotographers.net">www.naturephotographers.net</a></P>

Jeffrey,

 

Ive seen this many times, its called pet photography........

 

BTW. There are people who just throw a net over a bird and hold it in front of a macro lens 8((

 

David,

 

"If there are people on NPN who "don't seem to mind baiting animals at all," I think that raises more questions about the people on NPN than it answers about this person."

 

Well my experience over at NPN did confirm they dont care about feeding wildlife. Personally i think "eye-candy" is too often sold off as being naturephotography. On the other hand if someone wants to make a living photographing animals.......

 

Personally i see too many "birds-on-a-stick" and too little habitat and behavour in most shots.

 

There was a discussion about feeding birds over at NPN, look and see for yourself.

 

http://forums.naturephotographers.net/6/ubb.x?a=tpc&s=8306088241&f=8556005841&m=6766016481