The Birder's Paradox

What is a birder's paradox ?

"If a birder shared the location of a bird with other local birders for everyone else to see it, this itself in turn causes nobody else to see it".

This is easy to understand. For instance, when a not-so-common bird is spotted by a birder, he/she would post that information to a local birding mailing list so it can go on the official records and also give a chance for other local birders to go and see the bird.

Usually this results in lots of avid birdwatchers visiting the bird on the same day or on same week that posting was made. Many ornithologists agree that the presence of many humans closer to nesting birds, could cause the bird to get very stressed and eventually fly away, sometimes never to return back to the nest. This could also happen to a rare bird that fledges from a local area because of humans.

When this happens to a nesting bird or a rare bird, nobody else would get to see the bird. If the birder had never posted his finding in the first place, again nobody else would see it and the presence of the bird would be unknown to everyone else.

I call this the birder's paradox.

So, Why do I bring this up now ?

A local birder posted the location of a Barn owl family with 3 owlets nesting on a palm tree in Menlo park neighourhood to a local birding community mailing lists. Soon after, many people have been visiting the owls, both birders and bird photographers alike. The neigbhours whose houses are adjacent to the nesting palm trees complained that the presense of bird photographers at night near the owl's nest (which is on top of a palm tree), are causing a lot of stress to the owlets and they fear this might have a deterring effect on them.

There has been a flood of emails in the past week discussing this topic. Some complain that such nest details should've never been posted, and some chimed in saying they would not report any rare bird for that matter, there is also a mixed bag of arguments about whose fault this is.

Arguments aside, certain questions remain as puzzles in this case. How did we conclude that the birds are stressed by us when they are sleeping in our presence ? In my experience, and with talking to other experts, if the birds get stressed you would clearly see it in their actions. They would engage in fright displays, their behaviour would seem restless, they would make alarm calls or turn away from us.

The best way to understand birds is to take clues from their behaviour. Its the only way we can really understand them. When I was there to photograph the owlets, the owlets got a little curious to see me first, they took a quick peek at me for 30 seconds and then went on straight to sleep for hours. So this is an assurance to me that they feel comfortable enough to sleep around my presence. I've noticed the exact same behaviour with the Claremont ave Great-horned owlets as well, inspite of the commotion raised by few casual onlookers that our presence is causing stress to the owlets.

The last thing a photographer wants to do is to scare the bird away and lose an opportunity to take a picture. While a newbie photographer may make a mistake of approaching the birds too close and cause them to fly away, just like any newbie birder or a loud motorcyclist driving by on the street might, an expert photographer would always take caution, he/she would look for the signs when the bird takes the slightest note of the photographer and when it makes the slightest of behavior changes. When this is observed, the expert photographer would always certainly back off to ease the bird and give some space.

Talking to the neighbours of menlo park owls, I came to know that these owls have been nesting on these palm trees for over 30 years in a row. And from what I understand, in the previous years, birders have posted the presence of these Owls to south-bay-birders mailing list.If the birds were getting too stressed in this area, then why would they continue to choose the same palm tree to nest every year? Again, their behavior shows they get curious, but are not bothered by us.

Yet are we being unfair to the welfare of birds in anyway by revealing their location publicly ? Or If we don't report it, are we being too selfish ? What really should a birder or bird photographer do in this case ? The answers to these questions are not a simple yes or no, it depends on the situation. The truth of the matter is, every individual has to take few responsibilities in understanding what is correct and follow a simple set of rules. Always back off when you see the first signs of birds getting stressed. Birds welfare should come first before everything else.

If no one had reported the bird sightings several decades ago, today bird watching would have never been a well known outdoor activity that it is today. A part of the reason why many bird conservation projects have got successful was because of many volunteers who post the presence of rare species in the neighborhood when they see one and create an awareness within the birding community.

When individuals don't exercise caution and behave inappropriately the matter should be dealt with that person individually as it should be. There is no reason for the whole birding community to keep their findings a secret.

What good would it be to report only the mallards and blackbirds and lose out on exotic species? To lose that opportunity and go backwards towards all the progress that has been made would be a big shame.

One of the things I loved when I got into birding was that, the birders in the bay area were extremely helpful and forthcoming in sharing their findings, which encouraged me a lot to continue this hobby. So I would love to see the reports of rare bird sightings to continue so we all can enjoy birding and keep it fun for everyone, just like it is today!.

Good Birding.