Good Monday all,

I've recently had two encounters where people have looked to the
"established" bird-watching community for help. I've felt pleasantly
obligated to live up to a perceived responsibility, and am asking tweeters
about their feelings in these matters. I'll relate them both:
1) Local homeowner saw me counting ducks at suburban Martha Lake
(Snohomish County, WA.) and asked if I was doing this for the Audubon
Society - I modestly declined the complement, then ran down the list of
ducks seen, good field guides, reasons for keeping notes about
observations (particularly for a homeowner on a suburban lake!), etc.
Quite a pleasant interchange for a normally quite lunch-hour.

2) Heard the story of a young woman working for a Sam's club in San
Bernadino California. They had a "small hawk" fly into the warehouse
pursuing the House Sparrows. It was apparently trapped inside the
warehouse. This young lady (I'll confess - my step-sister :-) called the
local Audubon Society four times, asking for help getting the hawk out. It
ate all the sparrows and eventually died. I was distressed to hear that
the local Audubon did no more than offer advice (which didn't work - "open
the doors and it'll fly out"). Here, I know that there are many banders
who would have gladly trapped the bird (and banded it ;-) and released it.

So, what do tweeters think our obligations are? If she had asked me while
the hawk was still alive, I would have taken the initiative to contact the
local banding community and get them involved. On the other hand, are we
now so complacent that we feel no obligation to help? Basically, I think
this is a very poor public relations event for the "established"
bird-watching community.

Michael H. Patrick ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
mpatrick at eskimo.com + diversity is essential for healthy systems +
Seattle, Washington ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++