kmatthew

Quote:

Original posted by fkm at 13/09/2008 09:00
I am wondering, after they trapped and have the bird in hand, they still do not know if it is a female or not?

I hope the bird did not get hurt and released properly thereafter.

fkm, I think you can trust the experts on that. You need to get a licence to trap birds for scientific research and all of these people are well trained to handle these birds. Also, there are species of birds which are really hard to identify even when hand held. There is a story in the UK where an expert trapped a warbler and said it was a willow, right after he released it the warbler flew on top of the tree and sang "chiff-chaff, chiff-chaff".

kmatthew

fkm, I can trust the volunteers and experts in HKBWS because I know they have the experience and knowledge to handle these trapped birds. I don't know about other part of the world but I am sure you still need a license to do the same??

There is nothing wrong with wanting to know, but I think next time you can use a more forgiving use of words...it just sounds like you think all the researches are wrong.

It is not easy to identify some birds even on hand, some birds are just so tricky to identify. As I say, even experienced birders can get it wrong sometimes. Books are just for reference, there are bound to be some mistakes in them. If you look at older birdguides, I am sure you will find mistakes in them. There are so many things still unknown to us in this natural world, this is why researches are so important.