birding-aus

Black Noddy ethics

To: "Birding-aus \(E-mail\)" <>
Subject: Black Noddy ethics
From: "Philip Veerman" <>
Date: Thu, 10 May 2007 17:06:40 +1000
Hi all. I am amazed how much interest this has raised. My reaction to the 
subject was: why should a Black Noddy have any ethics, that is a new one on me. 
So I read it.

Dave asked a reasonable question but then labelled it as a matter of ethics! I 
don't think it has anything to do with ethics. The subject matter is personal 
bird lists. This is something that is each person's choice. I question how that 
can that be as important as ethics. To me it matters not what I or another 
person thinks, about how Dave maintains his list. So I would say to him, make 
your own rules. The issue to me is what learning experience and emotive 
pleasure he gets from the observation. Also whether it matters to us if the 
Black Noddy gets included on his list on that particular day (there will be 
other days and other birds). I perceive from his story a situation of humour or 
irony. If he is doing a serious survey and the identification is clear, of 
course it goes on his data list. It may be that the telling of the story and 
the amusement value it creates is more important to him than a simple 
observation. It has certainly created more chat on this line than a simple 
observation. Are some of us confused about the fun and random luck parts of the 
hobby and the serious data collection and study and conservation parts? They 
have separate outcomes and we shouldn't get too serious about the inevitable 
interconnections.

One thing I do care about though is to make the point that the plural of Noddy 
is Noddies (or even by stretch of grammar, Noddys) It is not however and never 
could be Noddy's (which is of course incomprehensible if intended as a plural).

Philip
  -----Original Message-----
  > > From: 
  > >  On Behalf Of David Stowe
  > > Sent: Tuesday, 8 May 2007 9:46 PM
  > > To: Birding-aus Aus
  > > Subject: [Birding-Aus] Black Noddy ethics
  > >
  > > Some of you may have read my recent posts about a trip to Michelmas
  > > Cay last week and the fact that i didn't see any Black Noddy's.
  > > Well I am just going through my photos in more detail and i have
  > > found a Black Noddy in a photo!!
  > > Does it count as a tick or not??
  > > I know Bob Inglis has an opinion on this as he was in a similar
  > > predicament recently whilst photographing Stints and finding a
  > > Sanderling later (which was potentially a tick) in the background of
  > > his photos. I have heard people's thoughts on that situation from
  > > OZbirdpix but would be interested in what the Birding-Aus community
  > > reckons?
  > > I was admittedly taking alot of photos of the Noddy's in case i had
  > > missed a Black one - there were only about a million to look at!!! So
  > > it wasn't like I wasn't aware of the situation. I was indeed
  > > specifically looking for them.
  > > For those interested it was on one of the reef cruise tender boats
  > > moored just off the Cay. This was also the reason i was photographing
  > > the birds on the boat as it was hard to use bins from the front of a
  > > tinny! (No i'm not any good on pelagic trips either!)
  > > Interested to hear people's thoughts.
  > >
  > > Cheers
  > > Dave
==============================www.birding-aus.org
birding-aus.blogspot.com

To unsubscribe from this mailing list,
send the message:
unsubscribe
(in the body of the message, with no Subject line)
to: 
=============================
<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>
Admin

The University of NSW School of Computer and Engineering takes no responsibility for the contents of this archive. It is purely a compilation of material sent by many people to the birding-aus mailing list. It has not been checked for accuracy nor its content verified in any way. If you wish to get material removed from the archive or have other queries about the archive e-mail Andrew Taylor at this address: andrewt@cse.unsw.EDU.AU