Laura Erickson's For the Birds

During the time I was writing about the Gulf oil spill in 2010, I received an anonymous email from a hotmail account reminding me that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) had the power to rescind my permit to keep my education owl, Archimedes, if I wasn’t “careful.”

Then I got a phone call from a person I very much respect at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology telling me that, because some people were associating my name with the Lab, someone at the USFWS or U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) had told them to ask me to tone down my postings. I’d never suggested that I was collaborating with or still associated with the Lab—I’d left my job a few days before the Deepwater Horizon explosion. The Lab did not pressure me in any way to stop writing about the spill, though it sounded as if they themselves must have been pressured to call me. I did promise I would publicly correct any errors I made in any posts, but that wasn’t an issue.

The Cornell Lab, along with other organizations, produces a State of the Birds report every few years in collaboration with the USGS and USFWS. And the Lab, like virtually every non-profit and educational institution that bands or satellite-tracks birds or other wildlife or conducts research on marine life, must have various federal permits from the USFWS, USGS, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, U.S. Navy, and/or other governmental entities—permits that may be revoked at any time at the discretion of those agencies.

These kinds of projects are a key element of many organizations’ and research institutions’ fundamental mission—the very reason for their existence. My friend Marge Gibson, director of one of the finest rehab centers in America, was outright threatened by a USFWS employee that her permits to trap, handle, and treat injured, oiled, sick, or orphaned wild birds would be revoked if she went anywhere near the Gulf, so I know that threat was real.

The Cornell Lab and other research and educational organizations would have risked virtually all their valuable work, and even their existence, if they didn’t abide by the 5-year moratorium suddenly imposed on the publication of ANY studies, videos, photos, or observations of oiled wildlife in the Gulf without approval. Too much was at stake to resist publicly, but the Lab and others continued to collect data that would eventually be publicized.

My mantra since college has been “To sin by silence when one should protest makes cowards of men,” but “cowardice” can only be understood in the context of a long continuum between courage and complicity. In the ongoing war to protect birds and our environment, surviving to fight another day is a valid strategy.

The American Birding Association (ABA) was the one organization that showed astonishing courage during this horrible time. They supported Drew Wheelan and published his accounts on the organization’s blog even in the face of attacks on his veracity from many fronts as well as opposition by some of their own members. Fortunately, ABA wasn’t facing an existential threat; it needs no federal grants, permits, or collaborations to fulfill its mission, which is simply to help people find, learn about, and enjoy birds.

Had EVERY educational institution and non-profit organization studying birds on the Gulf joined forces to publicize, or at least leak, information about everything going on, it’s still doubtful they could have mustered the massive public support the Obama administration would have needed to defy BP’s dictates. BP had a wealth of lawyers to fight the government every inch of the way, professional scientists willing to deny the truth, and the legal right to clean up their mess the way they wanted to. I think Cornell and the American Bird Conservancy did as much good as they could.

One organization went much further than just abiding by the moratorium—it publicly parroted every one of BP’s ridiculous claims about the oil disappearing and the spill not being so bad, and personally attacked, in a major public forum, Drew Wheelan, the most courageous individual speaking out about the spill’s effects on birds. This organization—ironically, the one whose name is most associated by the American people with bird protection and conservation—rolled down that slippery slope, passing courage, quiet resistance, just trying to survive, and even outright cowardice. This organization kept sliding and sliding, all the way down to complicity. I’ll talk about them next time.