Naturally I was excited as anyone to hear of the first photos of Night Parrot;
I congratulate John Young and look forward to seeing the video footage. And
naturally I have a few comments:
Any notion that the public (read: birdwatchers) should be prevented from seeing
NPs is bound to be counter-productive. It should be obvious that only a limited
number of people would be prepared to travel to SW Qld to look for Night
Parrots (which may continue to be elusive), not ‘slavering hordes of
twitchers’, to paraphrase someone else on this forum. (I am always amused by
the notion that any rare bird sighting in Australia will automatically trigger
an invasion of ‘twitchers’. This is not the UK – birdwatchers simply do not
exist in the same numbers here. The most so-called twitchers (all of them
scientists or bona fide researchers, as well as birdwatchers) I have ever seen
in one place was on the Strzelecki Track, shortly after the whereabouts of
Chestnut-breasted Whitefaces became generally known (again, thanks to the
efforts of a largely solo, dedicated birder), where a ‘horde’ of 14 people
descended to look at the birds for a few minutes.)
Which brings me to a fact that is still true today as it was then (more than 20
years ago) when I first started birding – public interest in birds, while
increasing, is still minimal in Australia. The vast majority of the country
hasn’t heard of, and probably doesn’t give two hoots about, the Night Parrot.
The unfortunate corollary of this is that birders, ornithologists and bird
conservations are too few to put any real pressure on politicians to allocate
funding and resources for Night Parrot research or conservation.
In my view, if these birds prove to be resident then the area should be managed
by an organisation such as Australian Wildlife Conservancy (AWC), which fences
some of its reserves and intensively controls feral animals. Night Parrots are
already protected under state and federal legislation; government
decision-making is slow and subject to available funds and political whims; and
governments have already demonstrated a lack of resources and will in matters
such as the extinction of the Christmas Island Pipistrelle and the recent
decimation of Bilbies at Currawinya.
Justifiably, birdwatchers (me included) will want to see this amazing bird for
themselves. And of course Mr Young is entitled to profit by his find: the
practice of paying to be shown exciting birds and other wildlife by local
experts is well established around the world; I’m sure many people would be
happy to pay to watch Night Parrots. Disturbance to Night Parrots has been
self-regulating for decades and a few – even a few dozen – ‘twitchers’ are
unlikely to cause any lasting harm if managed sensibly. But if birders are
prevented from seeing the bird (and what would be the point of that?) the
recent sightings will probably only cause intensified searching elsewhere,
possibly with undesirable or unforeseen consequences.
In further defence of the comparatively benign practice of birding, in my
experience photographers have recently become a more intrusive presence at some
sites than birders armed only with binoculars. With the advent of cheap digital
SLRs it is easier than ever to photograph birds. However, it is just as hard as
ever to obtain a good bird photo, a fact which doesn’t seem to stop both
amateurs and professionals from trying. Recently, I have encountered
photographers (comically attired in heavy camouflage gear) playing Gurney’s
Pitta calls loudly and incessantly in Thailand (no sign of the pittas,
unsurprisingly); a kindly and concerned lodge operator in India who refused to
take anyone to see a den of Desert Cats because photographers constantly and
blatantly ignored requests to keep their distance; and a female Snow Leopard
forced to stare down the barrels of literally dozens of telephoto lenses or
risk abandoning her kill at a remote valley in the Himalaya. In my experience,
birdwatchers tend to look and move on; photographers continually strive for the
best possible shot (even when hopelessly under-equipped and often to the
detriment of the subject) and may spend hours or days in its pursuit.
(Naturally there are exceptions to these generalisations but please don’t write
in.)
Even if there is a flurry of ‘twitchers’ wanting to see Night Parrots, interest
will soon die down and the alleged ‘flood’ will quickly slow to a trickle. The
birds themselves will continue to stymie the efforts of casual birders, even if
the call becomes well-known (I’m betting it won’t).
Ideally John would allow other responsible people also to see the parrots, but
even that won’t stop people looking anyway; it won’t prevent accidental or
serendipitous discoveries of this or other populations; and the nature of the
bird’s ecology will probably keep it safe for some time yet, slavering
twitchers notwithstanding.
Happy trails,
David Andrew
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