WilliamM Adams’s scientific contributions

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Publications (1)


Human Bycatch: Conservation Surveillance and the Social Implications of Camera Traps
  • Article

October 2018

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189 Reads

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52 Citations

Conservation and Society

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WilliamM Adams

Camera traps are widely used in conservation research and practice. They can capture images of people ('human bycatch'), but little is known about how often this happens, or the implications for human rights, wellbeing, or conservation. We surveyed authors of published ecology and conservation studies that used camera traps. Over 90 percent of respondents reported that their projects had captured images of people, in most cases unintentionally. Despite this, images of people were widely used to inform conservation practice, demonstrating that camera traps are a key tool in emerging regimes of conservation surveillance. Human behaviour caught on camera included illegal activities and acts of protest. Some respondents reported positive conservation impacts of human bycatch, for example in law enforcement. However, others reported negative social impacts, such as infringing privacy and creating fear. We argue that these findings reveal a breach of commitment to do no harm and could undermine conservation success if they exacerbate conflict. Over 75 percent of respondents reported objections to or direct interference with camera traps, confirming opposition to their deployment. Many respondents recognise and take steps to mitigate these issues, but they are rarely discussed in the literature. Policy guidelines are needed to ensure the use of camera traps is ethically appropriate.

Citations (1)


... consideration when developing strategies to manage supplementary feeding in wildlife. Other methods such as camera traps, or drone observations might prove to be reliable, but these methods also present ethical issues in areas of public access 53,54 and limitations in terms of designing a sampling strategy to quantify potentially spatially-biased behaviours such as human feeding in a highly mobile species 55,56 . Finally, we provide the first quantification of human feeding of waterfowl outside of Australia 41 through standardised behavioural observations, with 22% of observations including swans being fed by humans during observation periods. ...

Reference:

Community science as a potential tool to monitor animal demography and human-animal interactions
Human Bycatch: Conservation Surveillance and the Social Implications of Camera Traps
  • Citing Article
  • October 2018

Conservation and Society