I've been following with ever fluctuating emotions the recent debate
on cats and feel unable to avoid the temptation to add my chirp to
the babbling chorus. Every time I encounter these debates on the net
(frequently) I am amazed by how birders, presumably also birdlovers,
manage to cubbyhole their emotions.
By this I mean it is astounding how someone who loves birds can have
such hatred of other forms of life, so much so as to advocate and
actively support blowing away cats or feral birds. What is it that
they actually love about their indigenous birds? Is it just the
identification of the bird species with Australia and hence a
feeling of national pride, or is it a genuine far deeper love of
birds in general.
I find it impossible to relate to the outpourings of hatred with
regard to feral birds and cats that you see so often on the net. I
love birds for their freedom of flight, for their songs, for their
characters (yeah, I know, anthropomorphism) and for their living,
and I can't find a way to switch off these feelings when it comes to
feral birds. Surely it demonstrates a degree of hippocracy to love
birds but in the same breath to want to wipe all ferals off the face
of the continent.
How does one define a feral bird, or an introduced bird, or an
unacceptable species? Does it require an obvious assistance by
mankind in it's establishment in a new area, or is it simply a
species that previously didn't occur in the area? Is it an
unacceptable species if it has arrived from an area a few hundreds
of kilometres distant, or does it have to arrive from another country
to qualify? In our assessment of what constitutes a unacceptable
species, do we consider the known bird distributions at a given date
as the acceptable base, and consider any deviation from that as a
dangerous trend? Do we accept birds that sing sweetly and look pretty
as long as they don't compete with our local favourites, but
eradicate all species that are more competitive or nest in unhygienic
areas? Are birds allowed to indulge in their own experimentation in
distribution patterns, or must there be a human stamp of approval to
any changes in distribution?
OK, I'm sorry, I know I'm going over the top here, but bird
movements are not as straightforward as they're often cracked up to
be. There are continual changes in population patterns, and they
certainly don't take political boundaries into consideration.
Here in Cape Town, the birding community was recently astounded to
discover a small, but seemingly viable breeding population of Leach's
Storm Petrel on an island a kilometre from the shore, and about 100km
from Cape Town. The birds were breeding in a loose stone wall behind
the island keeper's cottage, and have been present for at least two
years. Leach's Storm Petrels have never, to my knowledge, been found
breeding south of the equator, but here they were at 34 degrees
south. They do, however, migrate to the waters off the continental
shelf for the northern winter.
What do we do? Are these birds acceptable immigrants? They have used
a breeding location created by humans, the stone wall, so surely we
carry some degree of guilt in their introduction. After all, they
are breeding on the wrong side of the world as far as established
principles are concerned. Should we be concerned? Maybe because
there don't appear to be any local species for them to interfere
with we can accept them and get all excited about the implications
to knowledge and science.
I can understand the concern about human introduced birds that
endanger the viability of indigenous birds through competition or
interbreeding, and despite my cynical comments above, I realise
humans have to interfere in such a situation, but what does one do
when an indigenous species is endangered by a natural expansion of
another species' range?? Here in South Africa a lot of range
expansions are caused by human interference through the
establishment of artificial habitats which suit the expanding
species, so maybe there is still an obligation on humans to effect
some control??
On a related issue, I recently posted a rather inflammatory comment
on the cage bird trade and the keeping of cage birds, which upsets me
deeply, but there was not a single reply !!!!! Was this an incredibly
well orchestrated decision to avoid discussing yet another
possibly emotively loaded topic on the net, or does no-one have any
strong thoughts about catching and keeping birds? Seeing as escaped
cage birds play a large part in the establishment of feral
populations, I'd be interested to hear some comment on the moral
issues behind the keeping of cage birds.
Cheers
John.
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.~~. John Graham
{ OO} Lakeside, Cape Town
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