I’m so glad this topic is being discussed!

A few years ago, I was on the Hellcat boardwalk on Plum Island. From a distance, two of us watched a woman using her iPod to call a Marsh Wren from the reeds. The woman kept playing the song, over and over, watching the agitated wren as if flew out chattering and scolding. After the bird had flown at the woman six or seven times, I couldn’t stand it anymore and went to talk with her. I felt like running at her, yelling, calling her an idiot and a moron and worse, and asking her if she wanted the blankety-blank bird to actually fly into her blankey-blank pocket for Pete’s sake!! But I took several deep breaths and then in the mildest tone I could muster asked the woman if she knew that the bird was in nesting season and would need a great deal of energy to finish building the nest (which I showed the woman), growing and laying eggs, and feeding young. I said that defending the nest against a presumed intruder (the playback) was diverting the bird’s energy from very important jobs. I pointed out that Hellcat is visited by hundreds, maybe thousands of birders each spring; if even a tenth of them called the wren out it might affect the bird’s breeding success. The woman was completely appalled. She had no idea that she might be disturbing the bird. She kept saying how much fun her “new toy” was and how cool it was to see birds she’d only heard before.

I think that most birders who jumped on the playback bandwagon in the last few years had/have no intention of harming birds. They’d be just as upset as that woman if they realized that they might affect a bird’s health or stamina or status or reproductive success. I get really nervous about possible confrontation – but I’ve come to believe it’s up to all of us to educate people in an unthreatening and nonconfrontational manner. We can share our love of birds, and agree that it’s “cool” to draw birds out so we can see them clearly, while also talking about ethics and sharing what we know about all the important tasks that birds should be concentrating on instead of spending their energies flying out to confront taped intruders.

Maeve Kim
Jericho Center