Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!cmcl2!lanl!unm-la!unmvax!nmtsun!john
From: john@nmtsun.nmt.edu (John Shipman)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: Re: hunting
Summary: Rescuing SOME wildlife can be hazardous to your health
Message-ID: <1439@nmtsun.nmt.edu>
Date: 13 Nov 88 09:14:40 GMT
References: <8811101311.AA25068@decwrl.dec.com> <1285@inuxd.UUCP>
Organization: Zoological Data Processing
Lines: 56

In article <1285@inuxd.UUCP>, jla@inuxd.UUCP (Joyce Andrews) writes:
> ...a great white heron...flying around dragging a fishing pole...
> Last night I got to go for a moonlight swim to rescue another great
> white heron who was tangled in monofilament line...

Folks without experience in wildlife rescue should be cautious
about rescuing herons---it can be dangerous!  Consider this
passage from A. C. Bent's ``Life Histories of North American
Marsh Birds,'' p. 227, Dover edition, quoted without permission:

    About 1879, there was a young Indian living near Portage la
    Prairie, Manitoba.  In the spring, he went out shooting
    among the famous wild-fowl marshes of that section.  A
    [whooping] crane flew low within range and fell to a shot
    from his gun.  As it lay on the ground, wounded in both wing
    and leg, crippled and helpless, he reached forward to seize
    it.  But it drove its bill with all its force into his eye.
    The brain was pierced and the young hunter fell on the body
    of his victim.  Here next day, at the end of a long and
    anxious search, the young wife found them dead together and
    read the story of the tragedy.

Bent is talking about whooping cranes here, but the armament of
the large herons is basically similar: a dagger at the end of a
muscular whip.  From the same volume, in the section on the great
blue heron:

    There are very few birds or animals that dare to attack
    such a large and formidable antagonist as an adult great
    blue heron, for it is a courageous bird, armed with a
    powerful sharp bill that can inflict serious wounds.

Wildlife rescue is laudable, but be careful: some of the rescuees
are armed, and may not understand you're trying to help them.
Raptors rarely defend with their beaks, but watch out for their
feet!  Even small raptors like kestrels and owls have claws like
fish-hooks.

So how do you deal with this problem, Joyce?  A fencing mask and
a flak jacket?  Some biologists that work at peregrine falcon
nests wear a wraparound motorcycle helmet and a leather jacket,
as the falcons rip into anyone near the nest.

Thanks for your excellent posting about thoughtless hunters and
fishermen.  I try to be even-handed about hunters, but in
situations like duck season at the Palo Alto Baylands, where the
duck-busters come right up to the bayshore, shoot ducks over the
refuge, and send their retrievers into the refuge after the
victims, it's hard to stay neutral.  Many's the time we wished we
could bracket them with a few mortar rounds to give them some
idea what's it like to be a teal.
-- 
John Shipman/Zoological Data Processing/Socorro, New Mexico
USENET: ucbvax!unmvax!nmtsun!john  CSNET: john@nmtsun.nmt.edu ``A lesson from
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