Bird Photography Ethics - what is your standard?

Lately I have received comments from some folks concerned with the general attitude toward anything to "get the shot." The live baiting is one subject beaten to death but what about comments such as "If you walk close to the nest the birds will dive bomb you and you can get shots like this" or "when you approach they will fly off but if you wait long enough they sometimes come back" ?

Do these kinds of attitudes and practices concern you? Your thoughts welcomed!

Looking to start a fight are you? LOL

Personally, I keep my intrusions on wildlife as minimal as I can. After all, birds expend a great deal of energy eluding prey, establishing and defending territory, attracting a mate and rearing young, all while feeding and caring for themselves. Then there is the migration to contend with, or winter if they do not migrate.

So, I elect to shoot from greater distances and when I do disturb them I try to keep that face time at a minimum.

The more one is out and learning of their subjects, the more you are able to identify when you are beginning to intrude in their space, making them uncomfortable.

That others may not have the same respect for wildlife that I have bothers me only slightly and I am sure some would think that I intrude too much even with the extra care that I take.

No fight - notice the post is in the forum of a question and not coming from any sort of "position."

I really HAVE gotten a lot of emails - one as recent as this morning, on this subject...

I do not believe in baiting the birds in any form. There are several well known photographers who make it a habit and justify it by saying that they need to do it to make a living!!

If that is how you have to make your living then find another way to earn an income.

I believe in using the various government park systems and abiding by their rules. THe rules vary from one location to another.

I enjoy meeting other photographers who have the same standards.

I e-mailed Greg about this subject, and I think that's what prompted him to start this up.

The two photographs of Long-tailed Jaegers posted recently are what prompted me to e-mail Greg. They are absolutely beautiful shots, but it seems obvious to me that the photographers who posted and took these shots went too far. The behavior by the birds in these pictures only happens when one gets too close to the bird on a nest.

Birds, and all other living creatures, expend a huge amount of energy in defending their nests and/or young from intruders. In addition, when parent birds are leaving their nest and/or young, the eggs and/or young are tremendously vulnerable to all kinds of bad things.

Here's a link to the American Birding Association's "Birding Code of Ethics":
http://www.aba.org/about/ethics.html

I am not trying to accuse anyone of anything or stir up a hornet's nest, but it seems to me that if all of us who enjoy photographing birds tried to adhere to the principles of this code there would probably be more birds to photograph and there would probably be fewer people who feel that bird photographers do not always behave appropriately.

Thanks for reading. Just my two cents worth.

The animals welfare is always at the top of my list. I always back off if I feel the animals behavior suddenly changes I do not believe in getting the shot at any cost. I have found backing off, especially in a kayak, does reduce the tension I might of caused by my presence and often by doing this its amazing how close the birds approach me of their own accord, as they do not see me as a threat. Its not uncommon for me to lower my camera and just watch in owe as these other species allow me to observe them. I feel there's a lot more to being a wildlife photographer than pressing the shutter.

I have been looking for a workshop to take and one consideration would be the ethics of the photographer offering the workshop.
I don't bait but have been able to capture a snowy coming in for a mouse and many short-eareds with prey. I want those great shots but I won't compromise the welfare of the animal/bird.
It's sad that some photographers think it is necessary to approach a nesting bird (20 feet?) in order to provoke a shot.

I have not used live bait, but have blinds on waterholes and have put out corn, sunflower seed, and oranges. Technically that is baiting and I personally don't have a problem with it.

Scaring birds off a nest is not something I would do on purpose. The only nests I have photographed the parents came and went feeding the fledglings. If I inadvertantly frighten a bird off the nest I'll back off.

A few times , I have quietly set up my tripod ( D300 & 300mm VR )...about 40 feet from a bluebird nest box.
Connected to my camera was a Phottix receiver...and the camera was pre-focussed on the front edge of the box.

Manually set at F2.8, usually ...and 1/2000 sec.

I was hidden away , at about another 50 feet near some bushes, with my little transmitter in hand......and got decent flight shots of the male and female , flying into to feed the young.
I would fire off a series of shots ...tricky work ...and maybe get one or two good ones , out of a 7 or 8 shot series....since the birds often flew in at an angle.
I've done this , third year running ...for my enjoyment ...and as part of bluebird box monitoring for my bird club.
The birds may fly off as I approach to set up...which only takes a few seconds ...because the gear is already prepared ahead of time ....so a quick focussing ...then I hide and wait. Feeding then resumes on a continuous basis .....I leave after a short while

Some of the recent shots can be viewed at:

http://www.pbase.com/hootpix/thrushes


Chuck Kling.

Bruce Sherman wrote:The two photographs of Long-tailed Jaegers posted recently are what prompted me to e-mail Greg. They are absolutely beautiful shots, but it seems obvious to me that the photographers who posted and took these shots went too far. The behavior by the birds in these pictures only happens when one gets too close to the bird on a nest.

What two photos are you referring to? Link?

OntPhoto wrote:

Bruce Sherman wrote:The two photographs of Long-tailed Jaegers posted recently are what prompted me to e-mail Greg. They are absolutely beautiful shots, but it seems obvious to me that the photographers who posted and took these shots went too far. The behavior by the birds in these pictures only happens when one gets too close to the bird on a nest.

What two photos are you referring to? Link?

There are two photos of Long-tailed Jaegers - both posted in the Birds Forum on July 14, 2011. One was posted at 3:44AM and the other was posted at 8:56AM.

Like most of us I have accidently gone farther than I should and on a few occasions looked back and realized I went over the line intentionally and not accidentally. I am fortunate to live in an area that has fewer people and I spend most of my time where other people do not go. I have also spent most of my life in an outdoor setting and have both experience and education that supports my outdoor pursuits. I think our goal should always be to impact as little as possible; no image is worth impacting the bird. Having been raised in a Forest Service family and having many friends in conservation type jobs I also know well the reputation that photographers have as a group and I will tell you it is not very good. I am a strong advocate for documented standards. It is was saved climbing, river running, mountain biking and many other sports that started to have unacceptable levels of impact. It also helps control the bad actors that ruin it for all and create a reputation we all have to live with. You can not have freedom if you do not have ethics.

First let me say that I always do my best to put the welfare of my photo subject above all else. I almost never use calls, only use seeds and maybe meal worms as bait for small animals that would not be put at risk by being fed healthy food by humans (and even this sort of baiting I do very rarely), do my best to be aware of the stress reactions of my photo subjects so I know when to back off or leave etc etc.

Second, let me say that my experience with skuas, the southern hemisphere equivalent of the jaegers under discussion in some of the posts on this thread, is that they will fly straight at you even if you are a fair distance from their nests and they will fly closer to you than just about any other irrate bird I have ever encountered. There were several times on the Falkland Islands when I had no idea there was a skua nest anywhere near until a kamikaze skua came flying straight at my head from over 200 yards away. I had to hold my tripod in front of my face in self-defence as they were very aggressive, and go quite a long ways out of my way to avoid them. And I never did have any clear idea of exactly where the nest was - I just kept going at right angles to the way I had been going when they attacked until they gave up and left me alone, and then made a parallel track at that distance to head in my originally intended direction.

So if jaegers are anything like their southern counterpart, it would be possible to be a long way from a nest and fairly easy to get a flight shot with a wide angle lens when they attacked. If a photographer took a quick shot and then vacated the area right away without prolonging their disturbance, then ethically that seems to me more like an unintentional, stumbled-across-an-upset-bird sort of interference than anything truly egregious and troubling.

Of course, terns and many other species will also fly toward you when their nests are disturbed, but often that can be avoided as the locations of tern colonies, for example, are generally easy to locate at some great distance what with all the noise they make - and you generally have to be closer to them than to skuas to get a reaction. (And the white terns on Midway Atoll will hover over you for minutes at a time even when you are nowhere near their nests - they just seem to be checking you out - and so it is very possible to get flight shots of them with a wide angle lens without causing them any stress at all. Well, they don't actually make nests, but they certainly seemed unreactive when they were approached while incubating their single nest-less egg.)

I guess what I am saying here is that it is not always possible to discern from a specific image what level of disturbance was involved in getting that image. Maybe a quick shot of an attacking jaeger who was then left alone represents less disturbance than a shot of a bird who appears outwardly calm in the image but whose heart rate and cortisol levels were elevated due to the presence of the photographer, who of course would not likely be aware of those hard-to-discern measures of stress.

Perhaps the photographers who photographed the jaegers can provide some insight into the circumstances under which their recently posted images were obtained.

Roberta Olenick
Vancouver, BC
www.neverspook.com

I think all of us, in our own minds, are well intentioned and will argue we cause little or no stress to our wildlife subjects. The problem is we don't know what we don't know. Take loons for example. If you're a kayaker or canoeist, check out a common loon with your binoculars when you're still a couple hundred yards away, and look at the shape of its head, specifically its forehead. If nothing is stressing the loon, the shape of its forehead will be smooth and streamlined in shape; there won't be any squared-off shape to the forehead. As you get closer with the boat, say 100 feet away, take another look. Odds will be high that the loon's forehead has now taken on a squared shape because the loon puffed-up its forehead feathers. It's your presence that is causing that – the loon is showing signs of agitation, concern or stress. Don't believe it? Back off to a couple hundred yards again and look again. Most loon photos you'll see show various degrees of this squared-off forehead appearance because most photographers don't know how to read loons. And just because other birds don't telegraph their emotions like a loon doesn't mean we aren't causing some level of stress before we get to within the photographing distance we'd like to be.

Some might argue stress is part of life for all creatures. We might rationalize causing a tiny bit of stress isn't a big deal. But stress is cumulative, and we don't know what other stressors were at play earlier in the day for that particular animal. Our added little bit of stress might be the stress that sends the subject over the edge and causes a nesting failure. We owe it to ourselves, to our subjects, and to our fellow wildlife photographers to learn as much as we can about our subjects before we begin photographing them so we can avoid stressing our subjects. And then when we do photograph them, we need to have an open mind about looking for any messages that our subject might be trying to telegraph to us. And we should back off when we receive that message. My $.02.

Hi Greg, Great discussion topic. Since I do a lot of nest photography, all with raptors, I thought I would give you my opinion. The vast majority of nest photography I have done or seen causes some sort of distress to the parents and maybe the young, no doubt about. I work with a number of biologists and we talk about this a lot. That said, nest photography is possible with little or no impact if done correctly. The more one understands each birds behavior, the better this can be done. Probably takes years of study and patience to do it right. I would say "don't be in a hurry to get the shot"... some of my images have taken years to get. If the parents are visibly angry or irritated, ie. "calling" as I read on a recent post, you are where you shouldn't be. Of course I could just barge in and probably get all the images I want real quick if I did not care about my subject's welfare, but I do. In general, from my experience photographers have a POOR reputation with biologists. They want nothing to do with us. To break the ice, offer to volunteer your services and images for their work.

My own personal guide is to cause no physical harm to the bird or its nesting success. To think that we can photograph birds and other animals without causing stress at all is, IMO, naive. In my area of the country, I obviously stress a lot of birds just scouting around, because almost every great blue heron, kingfisher, red-tailed hawk, or wood duck that even sees me in my car or on foot at a great distance flies off. The only way not to stress them is to stay home. Birds and animals are used to disturbances. It is a part of their daily life. Fishermen, bicyclists, hikers, hedge trimmers, picnickers, predators, rivals, weather, etc. all cause stress and disturbance. The problem is not disturbance or stress itself, but repeated and prolonged disturbance that prevents the normal behavior of animals in feeding and raising young. Care must be used to minimize disturbance, and if the birds do not accept you, you must be ready and willing to back off. Also, in heavily visited areas, one has to be conscious of the potential cumulative effect of other photographers, birders, etc. I do a lot of photography at nest boxes. I have eighteen on my land and monitor another 36 on a nearby nature refuge. Nesting success in this type of housing (with predator guards) is much higher than in their natural nest cavities. To me it is a mutually beneficial situation, they get nice housing and higher reproductive success and I get photo opportunities. My photography efforts will often cause momentary disturbance (the setting up of a blind or remote camera, etc.), but is nearly always readily quickly accepted. If not I will abort the session. Let your conscience be your guide. One of my favorite quotes is: "Life's greatest battles are fought every day within the silent chambers of our own hearts."

As for baiting, the great naturalist and photographer Leonard L. Rue once wrote, "I have always advocated using bait to photograph every species that can be baited, where it is legal." I have no problems using earthworms, crickets, mealworms, seed or fruit. Personally I won't bait with live mammals. And one has to be conscious of the potential effects of prolonged or repeated baiting and the possible alteration of the normal routine of the animal.

Ed-
I know this sounds like an off-the-wall question and off the subject a bit - but you said that the birds see you coming from a long distance when you are in your car. What color is your car? (at some point I may be in market for car again but spent my money on a 500 )
The reason I ask is that where I am located you pretty much have to drive for hours and miles to locate anything and then I often shoot from the car. When I am in the maroon car I can't get close. When I am in my silver car I can often get within 15 feet (I think - I am somewhat distance challenged). I have had numerous short-eared owls hunt and eat in front of me (I don't bait) - flying from the original perch and coming back even tho I am there.
Again just curious.

dhanson,
I don't think it is the color of the vehicles that matter:it occurred with my previous blue jeep cherokee and my present silver/white Toyoto FJ Cruiser. One of the favorite places I photograph is a 3000 acre nature refuge about 30 minutes away (where I do volunteer work and monitor their nestboxes). The roads are dirt roads and really don't get a lot of travel, so the wildlife don't get accustomed to cars. The wildlife are skittish and stalking generally doesn't work. I usually find where the birds frequent and use a blind.
Ed

Peter: Regarding the Loon's square head - is there somewhere where this info is documented? I am just curious as I photograph a lot of loons and have been searching for that info too before but have always come up empty - a birder of 30 years even told me and others it was a m/f thing - males having squarer heads - but I don't think that is correct from my experience.

FWIW I have photographed loons sitting on a nest from 30 feet with a round head so I really would like to see documentation that the square head means stress and is not just an alert posture which would be different.

Regarding Kayaks:

At Lac le Jeune if anyone is in a kayak nearby the loons literally go bananas - the do NOT like kayaks there - my theory is it's because of the paddles. We were photographing a very cooperative loon last year in a john boat from a distance with long lenses. The loon was with a chick and basically feeding and going about it's business. And here comes a woman slowly working her way towards the loon in a kayak and the loon started calling and flapping etc and we asked her to get out of there...I have seen this before with Kayaks on the same lake but it could just be an individual thing.

P.S. I have had the same experience with Jaegers near nests but have also photographed them sitting on eggs as a result of a slow and low approach so it can be done. Of course just walking around the tundra upright with a camera is going to freak out any bird on a nest in the area so one has to be careful and know what to look for. I have encountered a lot of ignorant photographers on the tundra - one standing practically on top of a plover nest without even realizing it. I personally don't think photographers who are not experienced with their subject's behavior, and the consequences of their presence and actions, have any business walking around near nesting grounds....

Thanks! And great discussion!

Nick Dunlop wrote:The more one understands each birds behavior, the better this can be done. Probably takes years of study and patience to do it right. I would say "don't be in a hurry to get the shot"... some of my images have taken years to get.

Nick

This was a very insightful comment. I've seen a number of people come and go on the forums that really don't know their subject very well. They learn a few tricks that gets the reaction they want, but deep down have no clue.

I had an old friend from high school comment on my photos asking how I get them. I told her some are easy, but some take years of planning and lot of luck to capture.