I just wanted to make a note regarding the opinion below that was posted today:
"I think catching bats and birds in nets, removing chicks from nest, opening snakes and putting tracking devices inside their bodies, cutting notches or holes in the carpace of turtles and many other common research methods cause as much if not more truama than anything Steve Irwin did." Aside from the Steve Irwin discussion, those wildlife research field methods mentioned above (handling, marking, radio-tagging, among many others) undoubtedly induce stress for the subject organism. HOWEVER, I argue that these techniques are completely warranted by having produced invaluable data, discovery, direction, and progress in wildlife ecology, management, and conservation for over a century now. In this case, the sampling and potential distress (or even lowered survival rates) of the few provides for the management and conservation of the many. Matt Giovanni Graduate Research and Teaching Assistant Department of Agronomy and Horticulture 357 Keim Hall School of Natural Resources 228 Hardin Hall University of Nebraska Lincoln, NE 68583-0915 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
