From: "Rich Peet" <>
> I admit to having 15 lbs of bird seed in the back of the minivan for
> use in recording. With some species it is a great technique to drop
> a few pounds of seed in an area where the target was seen and set a
> mic near by.
Like the hunters around here who bait areas to provide deer to shoot.
> I can live with this as an exit point. Just don't expect me to be
> the one helping others in "good" playback as I can not do that. I
> see two main groups of abusers. The experienced guides and the new
> to the field watchers. I can't change the guides and they don't need
> help. I also wish to discourage the new and underexperienced. So far
> the photographers and videographers just are a non-factor. Most of
> the Gov. people abusing seem to always treat wildlife as property and
> no comment from anyone will influence them either.
Ummm, did you check out the links provided by Daniel? In there you will
find a study that set out expecting to scientifically document damage
due to playback and failed to do that. However it did document quite a
bit of damage by photographers. Probably because playback is mostly used
on males out in their territory and only for relatively short periods,
but photographers hover around nests for sometimes days. Nest
abandonment associated with photographers is documented.
Also not that in spite of the study they commissioned showing
photographers being a danger and failing to show playback being a
danger, the regulators regulated playback and did nothing about
photography. As I've noted, playback regulation is more emotionalism
than science.
> It's about the wildlife and should never be about peoples rights.
Nice thought, but in the end people pay the bills, so will expect some
return. This sort of attitude has insured lots of opposition to real
environmental needs as well as the less real ones. Regulation needs to
justify itself a lot better. One ill considered regulation often does
more harm in the end than dozens of well thought out regulations can do
good. People focus on the bad one and throw it all out. And often
proceed to quickly make sure it can't be regulated again. Like recently
happened when the courts tossed out a good chunk of the wetlands
protection. Everywhere landowners were quickly filling in and draining
the unprotected wetlands. And that can all be traced back to very poor
identification of wetlands in the first place.
Walt
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