Do you agree with this? I saw this article in the Wall Street Journal awhile back. It is quite disturbing. The Spotted Owl is an endangered species. And there are a group of ornithologists ( I cannot remember if it was DNR or something else) that want to start SHOOTING Barred Owls in order to save the Spotted Owl. The reason being that the Barred Owl is a competitor of the Spotted. Because other efforts have failed to try and save the Spotted Owl. It continues to decline. I do not agree with this plan. I think you can try to defend a bird to a point. But when you cross the line in trying to save one bird is starting to kill another. This is definitely crossing the line for me. Mind you this is only going to happen in the Spotted Owl's territory in the West. Comment below and state your opinion. Kill Barred Owl to ATTEMPT to save Spotted? Or don't shoot Barred Owls.
Spotted Barred
VS
Spotted Owl Image from classbrain.com Barred Owl Image from stevecreek.com
I just pulled them from google images and these links were attached.
I personally say that it depends. 1. How did the barreds get to the pacific northwest in the first place? If naturally, then I'm not sure if there is much we can do. I would say there is not much hope, but if people really want to, go ahead and trap, but definitely DO NOT kill the barred owls, and transport them to the east coast or put them in a raptor center, etc. I agree that though barred owls are highly invasive, it should not come to the point of shooting them like common game birds. If they came to the spotted owl's habitat because of something we did, we should intensively trap them. No birds have to die this way, and both can be benefited potentially.
ReplyDeleteAlso, we should think about if saving the spotted owl really helps the local ecosystem as a whole. What if we can't save it? I say we should try to save them to a certain point, and if this fails, maybe there is nothing we can really do.
ReplyDeleteYou are correct John. I don't think we will be able to save it. But I don't think that putting them in a raptor center would be right. Really your not supposed to capture a bird and put it in a cage unless it's injured. The Barred Owl's got their naturally. The Barred Owl is a good adapter to different habitats. It hs just been spreading so fast. And the consequences would be great if the shooting of the Barred's did nothing to help the Spotted. Thanks for the comment John.
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