Jay,
Yes, I expect there will be unforeseen consequences to this technology. Though,
I expect that even at the most, the numbers of birders using thermal imaging to
look at otherwise obscure birds will be small in the overall picture. At least
the technology is passive – it doesn’t shine any lights around the scene. I
also don’t expect many people to be wandering the woods in the dark of night
just to observe blobs of light.
I share your concern about thermal imaging being used by poachers, and your
observation that it can also be used to catch poachers. There are so many
applications to this. I recently met-up with a friend who is a Coast Guard
rescue swimmer. They use thermal imaging to locate people floating in the ocean
– it’s a literal life saver; he recounted many occasions where a person would
quite literally have died if not for thermal imaging. Funny that he also said
the high-end device in their helicopter didn’t have the ability to change color
palettes (it’s just white-hot), and he thought it would be super helpful to use
other varieties.
When I was reading-up on this, one of the few other studies/posts I saw was
someone using thermal imaging to count nighttime migrants. I don’t know all the
details though.
I guess the ship has already sailed to some extent. These devices exist. It’s
up to all of us to try to get ahead of the curve and set ethical guidelines.
-Jonathan
From: Jay Withgott <withgott@xxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:withgott@xxxxxxxxxxx> >
Subject: [obol] Re: Northern Pygmy-owl at Vedanta & thermal imaging
Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2023 10:38:10 -0700
Jonathan, thank you for your post — I read your very informative blog entry
just now with great interest. I had thought about the possibility of thermal
imaging for birding from time to time, but was not aware of the current state
of the technology; I'd been underwhelmed with night-vision tech many years ago
but clearly from your description it’s a different world today. I can see
this potentially bringing great changes to birding, at least under certain
circumstances (as you describe nicely in your blog). I wonder in particular
about the ability to better document nocturnal migration by gathering thermal
data and cross-referencing it with auditory information.
Cutting edges cut both ways, though, as they say, and like any technology,
I’d expect this one to have both positive and negative implications.
The ability to find cryptic birds such as roosting owls should greatly increase
the detectability of these types of birds, and for recreational birding, that
is a wonderful thing. It could also help increase sample sizes and perhaps
accuracy in scientific surveys for certain types of birds. Such impacts would
be even greater for mammals, I’d expect. From a conservation perspective,
there would be some upsides, such as better science and in some cases reduced
disturbance in the ways that Steve Kornfeld mentions.
However, I fear that the negatives for biodiversity conservation will far
outweigh the positives. Many animals, especially nocturnal mammals, are hanging
on in this world only because they can hide from us humans pretty effectively.
The prospect for abuse of thermal technology by poachers, especially in
megadiverse tropical regions, is a bit terrifying to me. I see that thermal
tech is being used to fight poaching (of rhinos, for instance), but I expect it
is benefiting the poachers still more.
As birders, it will be incumbent on us to use this technology responsibly.
Finding a screech-owl concealed inside a tree cavity will be a thrilling new
capability, but one that we’ll need to be very careful in using.
Thanks again, Jonathan, for putting this fascinating new tool on the table for
exploration and discussion!
Jay Withgott
Portland
