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Ethical Question (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Marty1
- Start date
Feeding them how? And what?
Andy Adcock
Worst person on Birdforum
You mean like Bill Clarke allegedly did to get some of his photos, tethering live prey. Don't know if this is true or not but I think in principle, it's reprehensible and several people have told me that this is how some shots were made possible?
They used to provide live goats for the tourists to watch ripped apart by Komodo Dragons, equally moronic and thankfully discontinued.
And anyway, why would you want to do this, are you a Falconer, photographer or just a sadist, en-route to full psychopathy?
A
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The food is trapped and dead field mice from the same open field they hunt in. I feed all the animals around my house, squirrels, deer, raccoons, and lots of different birds. The hawks are pretty well trained to come when I call them in the morning. The male will take food right out of my hand. Although the female is more timid about eating she allows me to get pretty close to her and often lands where ever I put the food and gives me the once over look. Nothing sadistic going on down here.
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Andy Adcock
Worst person on Birdforum
So that's how you got these shots, the food is already dead so it's not alive which is what came to mind when you said 'natural' food.
No different in this case to any other animal keeper who feeds their animals the same way, they do it with big cats in zoos.
A
No different in this case to any other animal keeper who feeds their animals the same way, they do it with big cats in zoos.
A
ChrisKten
It's true, I quite like Pigeons
In a rush, hopefully someone else will expand my reply a bit.
Raptors are intelligent hunters, the best (and often most innovative) hunters provide food for their young, thus producing the strongest offspring with the best chance of surviving their first (and most difficult) year. Hunting skills are not taught to young, but genes are transferred to young - an intelligent and strong hunter would produce the strongest young. Encouraging Hawks to neglect their skills ensures that the "survival of the fittest" rule no longer applies. To be blunt: you won't live forever, who will support this population with weak hunting skills then?
Raptors are intelligent hunters, the best (and often most innovative) hunters provide food for their young, thus producing the strongest offspring with the best chance of surviving their first (and most difficult) year. Hunting skills are not taught to young, but genes are transferred to young - an intelligent and strong hunter would produce the strongest young. Encouraging Hawks to neglect their skills ensures that the "survival of the fittest" rule no longer applies. To be blunt: you won't live forever, who will support this population with weak hunting skills then?
Nutcracker
Stop Brexit!
Not quite the same, but it seems some people are really dedicated to feeding wildlife #Karma 3
Not quite the same, but it seems some people are really dedicated to feeding wildlife #Karma 3
Now, now. . .don’t gloat. . ..
Agree, don’t think you’re doing any real harm. . ..
Farnboro John
Well-known member
I think Chris is probably nearest the mark as regards ethics, i.e. the important point is the effect on the bird species being fed.
All raptors hunt live prey which they kill as best they can, so providing live prey for them is not per se unethical, though it may be distasteful to some to see it done to further individual humans' agendae. Mealworms and locusts anybody?
I've seen pictures and video of habituated Great Grey and Hawk Owls coming to dead baits, which were wild rodents trapped to be killed (trapped using kill traps?) in order to provide food for the owls. This too was limited to supplementary feeding levels and in any case was not year round. I'm not completely sure I would approve of kill-trapping, as there is no way of knowing ante-mortem whether the trappee was feeding a family of young somewhere that would be destined to starve: maybe in winter that's not so much of an issue. It for sure is an issue in the case raised by the OP, unless they are buying their dead baits and not trapping them out of the wild.
Does anybody seriously believe the deer carcasses put out by the Springwatch team to attract eagles etc are roadkill that they just happened upon and said "oh good, that's lucky!" I think not.
John
All raptors hunt live prey which they kill as best they can, so providing live prey for them is not per se unethical, though it may be distasteful to some to see it done to further individual humans' agendae. Mealworms and locusts anybody?
I've seen pictures and video of habituated Great Grey and Hawk Owls coming to dead baits, which were wild rodents trapped to be killed (trapped using kill traps?) in order to provide food for the owls. This too was limited to supplementary feeding levels and in any case was not year round. I'm not completely sure I would approve of kill-trapping, as there is no way of knowing ante-mortem whether the trappee was feeding a family of young somewhere that would be destined to starve: maybe in winter that's not so much of an issue. It for sure is an issue in the case raised by the OP, unless they are buying their dead baits and not trapping them out of the wild.
Does anybody seriously believe the deer carcasses put out by the Springwatch team to attract eagles etc are roadkill that they just happened upon and said "oh good, that's lucky!" I think not.
John
Farnboro John
Well-known member
I'd agree with you: if hunting behaviour (as opposed to skills) was not innate, hacking birds back to the wild in conservation programmes wouldn't work. But of course in nature it is unlikely one size fits all.
John
DMW
Well-known member
Two hypothetical concerns. First, by habituating a raptor to humans, is there a possibility you are endangering the bird? Raptors are all-too-often used as target practice in many parts of the world - I guess you are best placed to judge whether that is a local concern in your area.
Second, supplementary feeding by humans can affect the population and behaviour of some species to the potential detriment of others. For example, corvid populations are likely higher than natural abundance in some areas thanks to anthropogenic food sources. Road kill, land fill etc etc. This potentially results in higher predation rates on nests etc.
Supplementary feeding of certain species of a generalist raptor might enable (year-round) occupation of an area that would formerly have been only suitable for more specialist species, which will be displaced.
Second, supplementary feeding by humans can affect the population and behaviour of some species to the potential detriment of others. For example, corvid populations are likely higher than natural abundance in some areas thanks to anthropogenic food sources. Road kill, land fill etc etc. This potentially results in higher predation rates on nests etc.
Supplementary feeding of certain species of a generalist raptor might enable (year-round) occupation of an area that would formerly have been only suitable for more specialist species, which will be displaced.
Animal cognition and learning is a hobby topic of mine, and indeed most of the books and papers I read on the subject, when concerning birds, focused on other birds than raptors (corvids or songbirds). But my impression is that science has tended to under-estimate the amount of learning going on in the animal kingdom. I'd treat existing literature as a lower bound on it, not the upper one
Farnboro John
Well-known member
Animal cognition and learning is a hobby topic of mine, and indeed most of the books and papers I read on the subject, when concerning birds, focused on other birds than raptors (corvids or songbirds). But my impression is that science has tended to under-estimate the amount of learning going on in the animal kingdom. I'd treat existing literature as a lower bound on it, not the upper one
I'm not arguing: that's one reason I differentiated between behaviour and skills. Hacking young raptors into the wild by providing just sufficient supplementary feeding to give them time to develop their hunting behaviours into effective hunting skills on their own evidences that the behaviours (with triggers for such behaviours) are innate.
However, developing those behaviours to become a sufficiently effective hunter for independence without external assistance almost certainly (I'll happily admit I'm speculating here) takes longer than being actively taught by an experienced hunter (and, in long-lived birds breeding in multiple seasons, an increasingly experienced instructor, not a factor to ignore!)
Food for thought.
John
Of course, there's no learning without bias (they made a theorem about that ).
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