2015’s JackAss Of The Year

This is a magnificent creature.

This, meine damen und herren, is a male moustached kingfisher.

AMNH @AMNH These are the 1st-ever photos of a male moustached kingfisher! More on this “ghost” species: http://trib.al/YBbdc1U 5:47 PM – 23 Sep 2015

Wow.

This thing is rare.

Sets new standards for rare.

So elusive in fact that this is the first and only one of its kind ever photographed!

Living in bliss this bird was…

until it met this guy:

Filardy holding a male mustached kingfisher for a photo – the first such footage ever. The bird was killed not long after. Image: American Museum of Natural History

This is Chris Filardy, most deserving recipient of the WATT 2015 JackAss Of The Year Award.

From www.zmescience.com ← click that to read the original article

To read a good discussion click this.

a reply to: infolurker

There was litterally no reason to do this from a scientific stand point except to study stomach content’s as a small blood and tissue sample for dna analysis would have sufficed, he could then have released this animal back into the wild and it would have been somewhat wiser to avoid idiot’s like him in future.

I suspect most of his colleagues will be utterly appalled at this idiotic and unscientific behaviour not to mention that if the animal is endangered then the solomin islands government may have grounds to launch a prosecution, indeed if the animal fall’s into the endangered species catagory then there are several international body’s whom may very well likely do so as this was not a case of natural hunting but a supposedly educated man acting recklessly with deliberate abandon and cruel behaviour toward this species, for example we do not know it’s mating habit or it’s population base which is apparently very small, it may be like some avien species one that mates for life meaning that it’s mate may well now remain chickless as a result.

Cruel, Idiotic and utterly unscientific.
What an utter disgrace to the scientific community and what a total and utter prat, the david cameron of science whom will probably claim he saved his profession next.

– LABTECH767

Biologist takes first ever picture with ultra rare bird, then kills it ‘for science’

For the past two weeks the scientific community was stirred by news that a biologist captured a male mustached kingfisher, took the first ever picture of a male from the species…… then killed the bird shortly after! Chris Filardi, director of Pacific Programs at the American Museum of Natural History, was out in the Solomon Islands with other researchers surveying bird species. Eventually, Filardy heard the unmistakable call of the kingfisher, a bird so rare it’s often called ‘the ghost’. Seeing how this was the first male kingfisher reported by a scientist, Filardy reasoned that it was acceptable to dissect the animal.

Chris Filardi, director of Pacific Programs at the American Museum of Natural History, was out in the Solomon Islands with other researchers surveying bird species. Eventually, Filardy heard the unmistakable call of the kingfisher, a bird so rare it’s often called ‘the ghost’. Seeing how this was the first male kingfisher reported by a scientist, Filardy reasoned that it was acceptable to dissect the animal. Other scientists disagree, and claim what Filardi did was unethical.

‘When I came upon the netted bird in the cool shadowy light of the forest I gasped aloud, “Oh my god, the kingfisher.” One of the most poorly known birds in the world was there, in front of me, like a creature of myth come to life. We now have the first photos ever taken of the bird, as well as the first definitive recordings of its unmistakable call,’ wrote Filardi in a post before eventually killing the creature.