Great photo.
I suggest we stay away a fair distance from juveniles. Else it may affect their health.
HF Cheung
[ Last edited by HFCheung at 1/06/2011 20:24 ] Author: tomatofamily Time: 2/06/2011 09:15
Hi, HF Cheung.
Can you elaborate more on how "it" may affect its health?
I have recently seen a lot of babies and juveniles in HK Park and Victoria Park. They are Greattit, Starling, Violet Whistling Thrush,Common Magpie, etc. And there are a lot of people walking, janitors using their brushes to brush the leaves on the floor making a quite of lot of noise. What happen to the babies and juveniles? Maybe that make them more strong and alert and be able to survive. On the contrary, those who has not been with people (like those on the mountain, prone to be weak in the sense). That would be the reason we need to be away from them. Author: subbuteo Time: 2/06/2011 09:41
I would seem obvious that chicks need to be fed by their parents. If the parents are disturbed by humans encroaching the nest the parents will flee and feed less or even abandon the nest. In urban areas some birds have flourished eg tree sparrows, domestic pigeons and some starling species. These birds are more likely to be habituated to human contact and be much more tolerant of disturbance. In more rural areas, birds are much less tolerant of disturbance. I have to avoid going onto the roof of my house at the moment as black-necked starlings nest in a palm nearby and will not fly to the nest with food. They will sit and wait until I have gone out of sight before moving to the nest. They are clearly agitated, perching watching me, flying in circles calling and returning to the same perch. My presence disturbs the nest and endangers the chicks so I avoid the roof.
If you are aware of bird's normal behaviour it easy to see when they become agitated.
Dylan Author: tomatofamily Time: 2/06/2011 12:49
They would also become agitated too when a kite such of kind flies over them. It could be more destructive. See, when we look at this issue in a macro way, I would not worry about our behaviour, i.e. walk closer to have a look or take a nice photo of the babies and the juveniles. You know, my wife said about lesser butterflies this year. I hypothesized that more birds' babies born, lesser butterflies, since the babies of the butterflies have gone to the bellies of the birds' babies (just like more fruit on tree, less crops in the field, since lesser rain falling). Those who love butterflies may not love birds. Author: HKBWS Vicky Time: 2/06/2011 13:19
In order to protect bird nest and juvenile, bird watchers and photographers are NOT encouraged to approach bird nest and chick and juvenile birds. I know you may encounter this chick during your visit and you do not mean to disturb it. However, from your reply above, especially the sentence "See, when we look at this issue in a macro way, I would not worry about our behaviour, i.e. walk closer to have a look or take a nice photo of the babies and the juveniles.", I think this would mislead other members in this forum that human approaching nests and chicks is an acceptable behaviour.
We would like to clarify that HKBWS do not encourage people to approach breeding birds, nests, eggs, chicks and juvenile birds so as to minimize human disturbance to them.
It is often not a problem when people are close to birds nests or young birds. As tomoatofamily mentions, birds breeding in urban parks often have large numbers of people nearby. However, the great majority of these people walk straight past the nest or baby - the adult can sit nearby for a short time and then return to feed the chick or shelter the eggs. This does not make the chicks 'stronger and more able to survive', it is just that they become less scared by the presence of people.
The problem is that it is often very difficult to judge when you are causing disturbance. Imagine you see a nest or a chick and go closer to take a look. Maybe you don't notice the adult nearby, so you spend a lot of time near a chick - all the time the adult is sitting close by with food that it does not bring to the chick - if this happens too often the chick will not get enough food to survive. Maybe you have not noticed that there is a cat or a bird of prey nearby - as you go to the nest or chick, the predator watches you, and then knows exactly where to go to eat the chick.
Often the presence of people near breeding birds is not a problem, but sometimes it can be a disaster for the birds. It is always in the best interest of the bird that people spend as little time as possible close to breeding birds. For this reason, I recommend that you do not attempt to photograph nests or chicks.
EricB recently posted details of a recent code of conduct for bird photography which provides advice to minimise disturbance. Check this link: http://www.hkbws.org.hk/BBS/view ... &extra=page%3D1Author: tomatofamily Time: 2/06/2011 22:35
Dear Vicky, our HKBWS Officer,
As a member of the HKBWS, I dare not to disturb the babies in the nest or the juveniles. I am the bird lover too. However, it is difficult to measure how close is too close and considered to be disturbance. Say, I was standing with the camera under the ten yard height tree and watching the juvenile birds enjoying the feeding from the parents. Was I too close to them. I have only so far seen one nest built near ground (most them I would guess far from reach), which you probably have seen that, it was the Greattit nest with five babies inside (I posted here). I did walk close to it but I did not realize it was so close to me; I was attracted by the babies sound. As soon as I found the nest, I was back away about five yards behind one of the cars and took my camera to take some of the photos. The mother was able to feed them several times, which may signify this family was not disturbed.
But I am confused when I was told not to take pictures of the nests; but there is forum called Home Sweet Home, discussing/displaying difficult kind of birds nests. What is all about that? I AM cautious about not mentioning the places of the nests though.
Thanks anyway for the advise.
member of the HKBWS Author: tomatofamily Time: 2/06/2011 22:59
Hi, ajohn.
How could you interpret the present of the people around the birds "not making the chicks stronger and be able to survive". My meaning is the mechanism of alertness they would build. This is the mechanism all animals including human being should equip with in order to be survived. I am not talking about stronger. those stronger without brain die first. Author: EricB Time: 3/06/2011 04:54
I'm sure there's some evidence in this article http://www.sciencedirect.com/sci ... i/S0301479708800023 - but I'm not up for spending US$ 40 for the pleasure!
The 2nd paragraph of the abstract 'Human-induced disturbance can have a significant negative effect on breeding success by causing nest abandonment and increased predation' and some common sense ,is enough for most of us to realise that most of the time we should try to minimise the stress to nesting birds & their young when possible.I 'm sure many of us will have first hand experience of the stress involved in rearing children or will be able to acknowledge the stress we caused our own parents at times!
Interestingly there are other articles relating long term stress and future breeding.http://esciencenews.com/articles ... eding.success.birds
I think the bottom line in the latter article,is that stressed birds produce less offspring because they are more focussed on survival rather than reproduction.
Eric
[ Last edited by EricB at 4/06/2011 02:08 ] Author: HKBWS Vicky Time: 3/06/2011 15:06
Dear Tomatofamily,
I think you did the right thing that to walk back from the nest once you discovered it. No one know which distance is far enough, every nest differs. However, the most easiest way to know if you are getting too close or not is the behaviour of the adult birds. If they can continue visiting the nest and feeding their babies without any anxiety or hesitation, the distance show be fine for observation and photo taking.
For the issue of taking nest picture, I think it is okay if you're taking the photo in a suitable distance (mentioned above). The Home Sweet Home section of the forum is to share the observation of the growth of birds' next generation so that we can know more about the breeding ecology of birds. This part is done by assigned volunteers to ensure the nests are not disturbed.
It is difficult but challenging. I hope you enjoy it!
Vicky Author: ajohn Time: 3/06/2011 17:40
To make it clear, I am not saying that all human activity around nests is a problem. But I am aware that there are many members of the society and many visitors to this forum who are new to bird watching and may not understand how their behaviour affects birds. Also, with little experience they may not be able to recognise the normal behaviour of a particular species, in which case they may not know whether they are causng disturbance i.e. they can't recognise the 'safe distance'. In my experience, birds around nests are often disturbed at a much greater distance than you expect (I have seen adult birds nervous to visit a nest when I have been hidden in vegetation at a distance of over 50m). It is for this reason that I am always so keen to remind people of the possible disturbance that they may cause around nests - OK, some people on this forum do have the experience to know when there is a problem, but many don't.
As for nests photography, a single photograph of a nest where the adults are habituated to the presence of people is unlikely to be a problem. Spending a long time close to a nest probably will cause a problem. Again, many people are new to the hobby and don't know where the dividing line will be. For this reason I try to remind everyone not to take photos of nests.
Personally I think the problem is made worse by posting pictures of nests on a public forum, so that all readers see the pictures and think 'If they can take the photo, that means it will be OK for me to take a photo as well.' I therefore think that there should be no photos of nests posted onto a public forum such as this, and I have publicly stated this on a number of occasions. And for the record, this includes the 'Home Sweet Home' forum, which I personally think sets a bad example for new birdwatchers and I have not liked since it started a year or two ago. Author: maobb Time: 4/06/2011 00:07
照片是朋友行山時拍攝,我會提醒朋友的.
謝謝
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