Article on owl photography/baiting

The seemingly unsolvable issue is just where the parameters of ethical wildlife photography should be placed and who gets to place them.  Solid data on the effects of human disturbance to wildlife are often without a well-defined data base and may involve only a single study.  Opinions are often speculative; tend to be highly variable as to the time and place; and often are anthropomorphic and not species-specific  As a biologist and photographer I have observed (and been involved) in disturbing activities and have my personal set of rules as to what is and isn’t  but  I have been in a situations where I realized I had inadvertently crossed into a highly disturbing action and as many times where I have been astonished at how little an individual wild animal was affected by my presence.  However, I have colleagues that will disagree with me on several aspects and their professional evaluation is as good as mine.  And, we all often tend to disregard habituation and/or multiple stress factor effects.

The term “baiting” is as much applicable to hummingbird feeders as it is to mouse-baiting of owls and there are logical arguments for and against each.  Unfortunately, because of the paucity of real data, these discussions are primarily speculative and emotional.  Regulations often have broad-brush effects while their purpose is specific.  One could speculate that one photographer mouse-baiting has a limited effect where fifty is way too many.  As Pogo famously said, “We have met the enemy and it is us!”

Oh, oh.  :)