Nesting Bird - Ethical Question

[Lance Peters]

Here is a situation - Would you take the shot??? (Real life)

Multiple choice sin the poll allowed!!!

You are at a spot that has many man made lakes and is on the edge of a bay - all the lakes are circled by very small dirt tracks that you drive your cars along, Access is by permit only but generally it is quite busy.

A black wing stilt has nested and laid three eggs about three feet from the edge of the track (In the water) the traffic is of course causing the mum to vacate the nest at intervals - this cant be helped as by the time you see the nesting bird - there is no other avenue to avoid her.

Now you are stopped as the car n front of you has stopped to have a peak.
Surveying the situation you think there is a nice image presenting itself.

What do you do???

[Harshad Barve]

I will try to convince next person to move on and not to disturb bird. If he/she dont listen I will inform authorities. BTW I do not support images which may disturb nest , so for me no question of images

[Lance Peters]

I will try to convince next person to move on and not to disturb bird. If he/she dont listen I will inform authorities. BTW I do not support images which may disturb nest , so for me no question of images

hi Harshad - every car that drives past disturbs the bird - no way to know (at present) that the bird is there.

[Don Hamilton Jr.]

Sorry, but if the car in front of me is stopped, and i'm stopped, i'd take some from my car,as i'm not going anywhere fast; if i'm not causing any further issues.However if i was the lead car, i wouldn't stop either! Truthfully, sounds like the traffic should not be allowed, since the bird's nest is so close... no exiting the car allowed, and challenging the front car,this would cause more bird issues.
Hopefully a sign erected before the nest, could ask drivers to not stop, and please make every effort to not disturb the nesting mom.
Don

[Joel Eade]

I don't believe in harrassing or disturbing birds either but....would a bird build a nest in an area that is so heavily travelled by humans in vehicles if it really was disturbed by that sort of thing? We have robins and doves that build every spring under the front porch eaves and they fly away almost every time I go in or out of the house...they still successfully reproduce. So if a bird nests close to humans maybe it just doesn't bother them too much:)

[Ed Cordes]

I don't think taking a shot while already stopped is harassing the birds. Granted it would have been better if no one stopped at all; but they did. The Mom bird chose to nest where there is a lot of traffic, so she must be OK with it. I would not get out of the car.

[William Malacarne]

I think for me there iare two answers......If stopped I would take a photo but I would still talk to authorities to see if something could be done. I did not enter the poll cause of my two answeres.

Bill

[Lance Peters]

I think for me there iare two answers......If stopped I would take a photo but I would still talk to authorities to see if something could be done. I did not enter the poll cause of my two answeres.

Bill

Multiple choices are allowed in the poll.

[Lance Peters]

I don't believe in harrassing or disturbing birds either but....would a bird build a nest in an area that is so heavily travelled by humans in vehicles if it really was disturbed by that sort of thing? We have robins and doves that build every spring under the front porch eaves and they fly away almost every time I go in or out of the house...they still successfully reproduce. So if a bird nests close to humans maybe it just doesn't bother them too much:)

Hi Joel - ohh she was disturbed by it all right -leaving the nest and continually making alarm calls.

[Joel Eade]

Sorry Lance...of course I wasn't there and I don't know the area....I just would think that she probably had an opportunity to nest in a more secluded spot but chose to be right next to a heavily travelled road. How would one explain it? Maybe just a mom with less than the greatest instinct on where to nest, I'm sure there are individual variances on that sort of thing. At any rate, I would favor not making any disturbance if possible. I'm on your side.

I was just thinking that when you look at the exploding popularity and the subsequent business dollars generated because of interest in birds {photographers, birders, naturalists etc...} maybe the birds are altering human behavior a lot more than we're altering theirs?;)

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Sorry Lance...of course I wasn't there and I don't know the area....I just would think that she probably had an opportunity to nest in a more secluded spot but chose to be right next to a heavily travelled road. How would one explain it? Maybe just a mom with less than the greatest instinct on where to nest, I'm sure there are individual variances on that sort of thing. At any rate, I would favor not making any disturbance if possible. I'm on your side.

I was just thinking that when you look at the exploding popularity and the subsequent business dollars generated because of interest in birds {photographers, birders, naturalists etc...} maybe the birds are altering human behavior a lot more than we're altering theirs?;)

Some birds are really good at picking bad nesting sites. It might be a good spot minus the foot/car traffic.

[adrian dancy]

Of course it might be argued that it is unethical to encourage a nesting bird to nest in a place that ordinarily it would be better off not nesting in. Birds can and do learn.

We had a pair of Black winged stilts (very rare breeder in England) nest on a site in Lancashire and special measures were taken to protect them....of course the foxes or some other predator got to the nest.No photographer would have been allowed any where near and rightly so. However on another site we had a pair of eagle owls breeding close to a public footpath on one of our upland moorlands...the path was closed to protect the public from being attacked by the birds!

In the present scenario I see nothing wrong in taking a photograph if you are forced to stop.

[Lance Peters]

Interesting responses - so assuming you take the photograph
What are you going to do with it???
Post it on any site and I can imagine the outcry - regardless of the circumstances.

[Ramon M. Casares]

A shot of a nesting bird in the ground from the car wouldn´t look good enought in my opnion and that is only why I wouldn´t take the shot, if th chances of getting a nice shot were better I would definetely do it.
Sometimes birds choose these strange places to nest as it is very likely that there will be fewer predators near people.

[adrian dancy]

Sometimes birds choose these strange places to nest as it is very likely that there will be fewer predators near people.

That might be an argument to make photographing a bird at the nest compulsory

[David Stephens]

Interesting responses - so assuming you take the photograph
What are you going to do with it???
Post it on any site and I can imagine the outcry - regardless of the circumstances.

Why would I care about an "outcry"?

If I'm convinced that I didn't stress the animal, then I don't care what others say. Maybe some people are more sensitive, but the issue is between me and the bird, IMHO. I look to these forums for suggestions on how to avoid stressing, including using my car-blind, but ultimately I need to take responsibility for my own actions. Some of these arguments are kind of like chosing a religion. It's guaranteed, no matter what you chose, some people will disagree.

What about hawks. If you're wandering around a meadow looking for subjects and a hawk starts screeing at you, haven't you stressed it? Now, I often have not seen the hawk before it starts screeing. I'm sorry, but I feel free to take a picture. He's screeing at me whether or not I point my lens at him. Usually a screeing hawk will soon fly and I'll have a chance at a good flight shot. More often, I see a hawk or eagle and set up at some distance and wait 15 to 30-minutes for him to fly when he gets tired of that particular perch. I may try not to, but I'll always have instances when I accidentally get into a hawk's or pheasant's comfort zone wihtout knowing it and they're soon a-flyin'. My thought at that point is, "try to get a shot."

Dave

[Jeff Donald]

If you believe in Darwin's theory of evolution, that bird probably shouldn't pass on it's genes. What will the next generation do, nest in the middle of the road? Unless the species is endangered, I really don't see the harm in photographing the bird, unless it violates any of the rules, as posted, by the park.

[Jim Neiger]

Sounds like Werribee. If the bird chose to nest near the road, it is likely quite used to people. I would pause for a moment and take a few shots and then move on hoping that others will do the same.

[Lance Peters]

Sounds like Werribee. If the bird chose to nest near the road, it is likely quite used to people. I would pause for a moment and take a few shots and then move on hoping that others will do the same.

Hi Jim - yes you are correct - Werribee indeed.