Methods
Don Stap describes Parker's method: walking slowly down a trail, pausing after every step, and watching and listening. In this way he gained his knowledge of both detail and "common patterns in behavior or vocalizations or community structure across the continent", which led Jon Fjeldså and Niels Krabbe to call him "by far the greatest specialist on the life histories of neotropical birds there ever was". Stap also notes that Parker generally did not shoot birds for study, a normal method of field ornithology.
When leading tours, Parker would lure flocks in by recording their sounds as he heard them and then immediately playing the tape back; he would predict where the flock would come into sight and arrange his clients to give each a good view. The flock would appear as predicted.
Read more about this topic: Theodore A. Parker III
Famous quotes containing the word methods:
“I conceive that the leading characteristic of the nineteenth century has been the rapid growth of the scientific spirit, the consequent application of scientific methods of investigation to all the problems with which the human mind is occupied, and the correlative rejection of traditional beliefs which have proved their incompetence to bear such investigation.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)
“The ancient bitter opposition to improved methods [of production] on the ancient theory that it more than temporarily deprives men of employment ... has no place in the gospel of American progress.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)
“I think it is a wise course for laborers to unite to defend their interests.... I think the employer who declines to deal with organized labor and to recognize it as a proper element in the settlement of wage controversies is behind the times.... Of course, when organized labor permits itself to sympathize with violent methods or undue duress, it is not entitled to our sympathy.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)