Subject: Re: Wildlife Monograph - Skagit Bald Eagles
Date: Apr 20 23:41:07 1998
From: Michael Price - mprice at mindlink.bc.ca


Hi Tweets,

Jon Anderson quotes:

>"We recommend prohibiting recreational activity in the SRBENA during the
first 5 hours
>of daylight within 400 m of eagles to minimize disturbance of feeding
behavior, restricting
>foot traffic and the use of motorboats, enhancing chum salmon runs in
secluded river
>reaches, and providing public education to increase support for management
actions."

There may not be a need for such drastic and alienating options.

The Brits have invented a wonderful device which allows birders to look at
birds without the birds knowing they're being watched--it's called a
'blind'. Several of these devices, each at a strategic viewing location and
each allowing up to ten or fifteen birders at a time to view, can handle all
but the most dense non-boat traffic. They're even more efficient at
rendering birders invisible and therefore even less disturbing to the birds
if they're at the end of concealed approach paths, i.e., the approach path
parallels a dike. The Brits have also discovered that if the 'blinds' are
built sometime in the ten or eleven months of the year when the birds aren't
there, there's even *less* disturbance.

Perhaps there's funds available to study the use of these devices based on
the British experience, and their possible application to North American
viewing situations.

Michael Price A brave world, Sir,
Vancouver BC Canada full of religion, knavery and change;
mprice at mindlink.net we shall shortly see better days.
Aphra Behn (1640-1689)