Netgarden-
I know what you mean. Some years ago I spent 5 days watching a grizzly in Glacier. It had a pattern that it followed every afternoon so I strategically set up hoping I get a pic & background I wanted, at a safe distance for both of us.
Sure enough the grizzly showed up walking along the river and a guy in a car saw it while driving by. Stopped about 1/4 mile in front of it, walked down to river w/point & shoot in hand. He cut off the bear from her cubs about 1/4 mile further up the road. Fortunate for him park rangers saw him and escorted him away, I watched it from a distance and couldn't believe it. Had no video at the time so its just a bad memory. Had the bear attacked she surely would have been destroyed for the lack of understanding of this guy.
Jude Perera wrote:
I am glad most of our National Parks (especially Yala) prohibits anybody to get down from their vehicles.
Did you consider the irony that your car is allowed in a national park?
That guys attempt to get the epic snowy owl picture of the season has turned in to a real dud. Now he's just a fool. A fool with little respect for nature. People without respect for nature always lose in the long run.
Doug Maclean wrote:
This thread is too funny.Why is the snowy so sacred?? it is not endangered.It tolerates people better then a kingfisher or even the cardinals in my backyard.If the guy crawling up did it without the consideration of others it would be rude.Still do not get the point??Please enlighten me.Anyone with a thought outside the echo chamber?? I asked 3 questions and no one seems to have an answer.If it is just following the rules of the park I understand. Doug
Doug, maybe if you paid attention to the sign posted in that park that was shown at the start of the video, you would have your answers.
The Snowy Owls in that area are migrating, and some can be starving and weak. They are in that area because it is on their migration route, and it is one of their prime hunting areas for food. Any bird or animal that is weak and starving will tolerate people more.
Those three photographers are morons, and as the sign points out, they are endangering the owls with such behaviour.
Re: Would this be any less of a concern if it were not a snowy owl?
Let's remember that snowy owls rely heavily on their sense of sound to locate and capture prey. Listening for the sounds of small rodents in vegetation or under snow can't be easy, even without human caused noise. Also, in order to track their prey they'll have to direct their head, and thus their eyes, towards the source. Keeping an eye on potentially threatening humans likely distracts from being able to hunt.
A little warbler might be equally bothered by our presence, but their foraging style allows them to "multi-task" a little more so than most owls. If a warbler sees a delicious caterpillar it just might snatch it up, even if it is also busy chiding you out for pishing!
user222 wrote:
Did you consider the irony that your car is allowed in a national park?
National Parks are very vast area. You cannot walk and cover the area. It is dangerous too. Especially wild elephants, leopards and bears can attack the visitors. There are limited roads built for safari jeeps to go. Between roads there are enough jungle for the animals to live. Nobody can get down from the jeeps. Hence, minimal disturbance for wildlife. Certain areas are prohibited for visitors (Eg: Yala Block II) only researchers with special prior approval can visit.
I HATE seeing stuff like this. It gives all us "bird photographers" a bad name. They have Big Lenses, and digital cameras have a crop factor also, so why do they have to get so close? Painful and upsetting to watch, but thanks for the link, Tony.
unclechuck wrote:
" Mark McAmish wrote:
Hopefully they approach bears in the same manner !"
These guys have earned the right to be told the old photographers secret of holding the cub so you can get a closeup of mom
Since that fellow was decked in camo duds head to tow, perhaps he thought he could sneak up to the owl real close undetected.
That type of wildlife photographers who even camo tape their tripods and invariably shoot at 10 FPS whether the target moves or not, has always made me nervous.
Hey man! Without camo I could not survive. It's my main tool. I'll let you in on a secret to get you up to speed. I only wear a camo hat so no one knows what I'm thinking. I've been married nearly 40 years and had I knew this early on, well I can't tell you how many times it would have bailed me out.
Proof It works, you could see him but you didn't know what he was thinkin.
Cymorg wrote:
Lets clarify this a little please, as you have spouted a pretty broad statement without much information, and that leads me to believe you don't really know what you are talking about.
Taking down all of the feeders and concentrating hundreds of hummingbirds on 1 feeder, and doing that for multiple days in a row, and then ignoring requests for the lodge owners and leaving feeders laying around...maybe that might be the cause...i.e. One or two very ignorant and completely boorish people (I know precisely who I am talking about...I have name(s) from several lodge owners in Ecuador, and you'd likely recognize them, though i don't recall any of the people I have in mind ever posting images here).
However, flash photography does nothing to impact the birds...optical studies have shown how birds react (or mostly don't react) to flash photography. A few species can be jumpy, and you probably don't want to use high powered flashes at night on a nocturnal owl, but I've found hummingbirds to generally ignore it. When one is responsible, it does nothing to change the behavior whatsoever. The lodge I shot at 2 years ago had some significantly bad experiences with one specific photographer, and was on the verge of banning photographers due to that individuals and their groups behavior. I spent a week there and they saw first hand the radical difference between responsible and ignorant, and they'd had other similar good experiences with other photographers (some whose names you'd recognize). By the way the evening before I left, there were more hummingbirds present at dusk than the day I got there, after 5 afternoon/evenings of flash photography at the same set of feeders.... Would you conclude then that flash photography increased the density in that case? Seriously, please try not to be so ignorant. ...Show more →
You sound like someone who, by putting me down, is trying to rationalized their own behavior.
Quote:
"We have WHITE-BELLIED and the rare PERUVIAN ANTPITTA coming to our feeder!
(only for guests, no flash photography)"
Imagemaster wrote:
Doug, maybe if you paid attention to the sign posted in that park that was shown at the start of the video, you would have your answers.
The Snowy Owls in that area are migrating, and some can be starving and weak. They are in that area because it is on their migration route, and it is one of their prime hunting areas for food. Any bird or animal that is weak and starving will tolerate people more.
Those three photographers are morons, and as the sign points out, they are endangering the owls with such behaviour.
Tony, My point is that you put out hummingbird feeders(as many of us do).Don't they influence there patterns and migration??.How many have you killed or stressed by doing so just to get a photograph?? How many birds have all of us blown out just by walking up on them in the woods??Not intentional but it happens over and over.Isn't that stressing them.Sort of like someone walking up behind you and screaming BOOOO!! Way more stressful then the person you see who gets too close and you get uncomfortable and can walk away at your own decision.
If you read my post I said other then the park rules on the sighn.Do I believe photographers should be chasing snowies and tackeling them..of course not. Doug
Alan Dean wrote:
Doug , sorry but I am a surprised by what appears to be your lack of concern for the subject matter, which is why as a naturalist I have commented that we need to have a lot more wildlife photo education programs out there so that individuals understand why you don't try to this close to a wild bird , and for that matter even a chipmunk. javascript:void(0);
kind of like the Audobon society eagle count, they arrive at the scene and begin socializing loudly. So, the eagles flyaway to escape the noise. So, no eagles.
Doug Maclean wrote:
Tony, My point is that you put out hummingbird feeders(as many of us do).Don't they influence there patterns and migration??.
Sure, most everything mankind does effects what birds do. However, feeding birds is in no way similar to an idiot deliberately scaring a migrating Snowy Owl in a park that has signs saying not to disturb the owls.
How many have you killed or stressed by doing so just to get a photograph??
Not a single one that I am aware of. Even when I photograph hummers with a macro lens, I am shooting from a blind. If I can get them to land on my finger, I would hardly say they are stressed out by me. I would say there must be a positive reason why several hundred Rufous Hummingbirds come all the way from Mexico to our property to nest and raise their young every year.
How many birds have all of us blown out just by walking up on them in the woods??Not intentional but it happens over and over.Isn't that stressing them.Sort of like someone walking up behind you and screaming BOOOO!!
That is hardly the same as someone screaming BOOOO!! and again has nothing to do with the subject of this thread.
If you read my post I said other then the park rules on the sighn. Doug
Again, this thread is specifically about the park rules on that sign.
I feel that I have to expand on my previous post a little. I suggested that flash photography is detrimental to seeing some species of hummingbirds. I know this from experience, having gone on a regular basis to lodges in Ecuador, both in the cloud forest and on the coast, for a number of years. Some species are more sensitive to humans, noise etc...including environmental factors such as flash. I was surprised to see someone pronounce this idea as ignorant. It would seem to be common sense that some species are more tolerant and that others might be driven away.
To illustrate what I am talking about I remembered and occasion and searched through my archives to find the following shot:
This is a Hermit hummingbird (probably Tawney-bellied). This little guy is sitting in the someone's hand because after he was "flashed" at a feeder he took off and hit a window. The good news was that after about 30 minutes he flew away. In this case I think it was fairly obvious that flash was very disturbing to the bird. The owner of this particular lodge has signs up that say "no flash", because he has observed that over time certain species were more sensitive than others and those birds became scarce. I trust the opinion of someone who is there watching bird behavior day in an day out rather than a tourist with a snapshot idea of what is going on. There are many species of hummingbird that are not bothered by flash at all, that is true. Because those species are not bothered then it is those types that people see most commonly. So it then appears, erroneously, that hummingbirds are not bothered at all. However, to suggest that flash is well tolerated for all species, well...that is ignorant.
With today's high ISO performance and new generation IS lenses, shooting even in the cloud forest does not require flash. It may take greater patience and better technique (also read more missed shots) to shoot without flash but the results are quite rewarding.
Do You shoot naked
Doug