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dgibson
PostPosted: Mon Jan 09, 2012 8:33 pm 
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A small town in Quebec has taken a stand and banned the feeding of snowy owls. Saint-Vallier, concerned over the practice and the negative effects on the owls, is forbidding the feeding/baiting of owls and posted signs in the popular owl areas about the ban.

The original article is here (in French only): http://www.cyberpresse.ca/le-soleil/mai ... rfangs.php

Here is the bad Goggle translation.

Quote:
Jacques Samson, Special
The Sun

(Quebec) The small town of Saint-Vallier, Bellechasse in, decided to take action and ban the "paparazzi" to feed the snowy owls. In recent weeks, two signs prohibiting this practice decried by any self-respecting ornithologist appeared on the rise of the station, cross road that leads from the village to Highway 20.

This is a very busy place where photographers link unscrupulous pockets full of mice they launch to attract owls in order to make spectacular photos.

It is a practice widely condemned in the middle bird. And by feeding the owls, it makes them dependent and vulnerable. The owl is a wild bird to be fed only to survive in nature when it is fed to photograph, he lost his reflexes and dangerous hunting for survival.

Also, feeding, it makes it no longer afraid of the man and then it becomes dangerous for him. A snowy owl was hit by a car because his presence made her more afraid, on the contrary, he knew it was a good lunch maybe.

I suspect that Saint-Vallier is a leader with the ban, and I sincerely hope other municipalities will follow suit.

Reached by telephone, the mayor of Saint-Vallier, Vallieres Gilbert, states that the municipality has not only forbidden to feed the owls, but people also crisscross the country to educate offenders. There are also talks with wildlife officials to see how we can eradicate this scourge.

DG
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BaRTiMuS
PostPosted: Mon Jan 09, 2012 9:08 pm 
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Haha, the "A snowy owl was hit by a car because his presence made her more afraid, on the contrary, he knew it was a good lunch maybe" part is funny. I'm sure they have good intentions and know what is best; but its funny. Even if you were to translate it correctly, I don't understand how an Owl could mistake a car for lunch. Unless people are hand feeding the owl from inside the vehicle.
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fizbot
PostPosted: Tue Jan 10, 2012 6:22 pm 
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It will be interesting in 6 months when all the hotels, B&B's and restaurants all complain that they are going under because all the winter traffic of tourist photographers making the trip out to see the owls is gone.

I also think that many birders make and propagate unfounded claims that human interaction increases the death of these animals. ie. They claim that an animal fed by photographers will loose their ability to hunt in the wild! what BS! If this was true there would be no ability for the reverse, where an animal in captivity is released and learns how to hunt in the wild.

Also, the baiters are not there 7x24, they come on sunny warm weekends and are not there during the week and during times of extremely ugly weather. The Birds all survive as they need to still feed themselves during the week and during periods when the people are not around. This is true of all birds. Also, don't forget that these are guys that migrate tens of thousands of KM's in a year, so if they are particularity bothered by people in one area, then they certainly have the capability to fly a couple fields over to get away or even hundreds of KM's in a day.
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Vilk
PostPosted: Tue Jan 10, 2012 6:31 pm 
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what's the poor photog to do but give the middle bird to the educators crisscrossing the country...
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Carlton
PostPosted: Tue Jan 10, 2012 11:05 pm 
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Not to mention all the pet shops with surplus mice now! :P

I can see the animals associating humans with having food and I think the big risk is the owls becoming targets for unscrupulous people.
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fizbot
PostPosted: Wed Jan 11, 2012 11:58 am 
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An interesting fact that I learned from the Handlers at Mountsberg Raptor center, is that the reason why you see so many hawks along the 401 is that there is a huge amount of mice and voles and other rodents along the side of the highway because of all the trash that people throw out of their cars. The biologists have actually tracked trash levels and snow-cover of the trash to the number of hawks around and have directly correlated the increased number and proliferation of the hawks to the trash. ie. if we were cleaner, there would be less food supply and few hawks around.

Perhaps in this Quebec town after they run off all the photographers, then they will see the Owls disappear too as they head to better feeding grounds. Of course they will blame that on the photographers as well, but for entirely the wrong reasons.
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Kiteguy
PostPosted: Fri Jan 13, 2012 3:10 am 
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The problem has come to Ontario.

http://www.thestar.com/news/article/111 ... e-ont?bn=1
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