I am glad this dialog has been started. I have wondered what the difference is between putting out seed etc vs providing appropriate meals for raptors (not to bate but to help survive). ..heck our bird feeders are grocery stores already for hungry hawks and that certainly isn't a natural situation. Haven't some songbird species ranges actually been affected by backyard feeders and may in part contribute to some species' extended ranges? Maybe the comparison isn't a good one?
I appreciate learning from this group and hope the dialog continues to educate in a respectful and meaningful way.
Liz Jaggers
Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S®4
-------- Original message --------
From: Steve Cagan <[log in to unmask]>
Date:12/19/2013 6:29 PM (GMT-05:00)
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Feeding Snowy Owls?
I was going to stay out of this one, but I think Bob's response is so
sensible--just plain sensible--that I wanted to second it!
Steve Cagan
Cuyahoga County
On 12/19/13 5:39 PM, "Robert Hinkle" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Let¹s get real, folks. The ABA ³rules² are guidelines, and the "no feeding
> raptors² part was meant to suggest that photographers and trip leaders
> (mostly) who would bait raptors for their own purposes and financial gain
> shouldn¹t be doing that. You and I both know that the vast majority of snowy
> owls coming down from Canada will starve to death this winter due to their
> inability to find suitable prey in suitable quantity to sustain them. The
> snowys are dumber than a box of rocks most of the time and the normal
> densities of their northern prey, such as lemmings and arctic voles, are
> higher where they came from than the densities of anything on the Cleveland
> Breakwall or almost anywhere else down here. And we have more snow than the
> place they came from. Hunting¹s easier there, tho perhaps a bit more windy and
> dark. Do folks REALLY think the break wall and airport are crawling with big
> tasty rats 365/24/7? The Ohio open field habitat matches their natal habitat,
> so that¹s where they sit and patiently hunt, or try to, and eventually most
> starve to death. They already arrive stressed and underweight. My personal
> sense of birding ethics says that if Joe has a snowy owl out in the boondocks
> where no one else will mob it with cameras and bins, and he wants to feed the
> thing, then BRAVO to Joe for doing it. Should it be done on Burke¹s runways?
> Probably not. This no doubt sounds like ³situational ethics² to some of you,
> and I freely admit that it is, but I for one am not offended by Joe¹s feeding
> ³his² snowy owl any more than I object to you putting suet out for your
> Carolina wrens. Blind obedience to a set of ³rules² without questioning the
> context in which they were created is folly. And Joe, I second the opinion of
> a previous poster. Just don¹t tell anyone next time.
>
> Bob Hinkle
> Chief Naturalist Emeritus
> Solon, Ohio
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--------------------------------------------
Steve Cagan, photographer
[log in to unmask]
www.stevecagan.com
www.elchocomining.net
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www.stevecagan.blogspot.com
http://socialdocumentary.net/photographer/stevecagan
216-932-2753 (USA)
______________________________________________________________________
Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society.
Please consider joining our Society, at www.ohiobirds.org/site/membership.php.
Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list.
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