I did some checking

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I did some checking

Postby don novicki » Sat Nov 27, 2021 9:22 am

and its really scary. I started looking at the USFWS annual duck surveys and frankly the birds, and subsequently the hunters are in trouble. Below is a list of bird counts for their annual surveys:

2016- 48.363 million breeding pairs

2017- 47.26 million

2018- 41.2 million

2019- 38.9 million

There are 10 million + missing ducks from 2016- 2019. I do not believe that hunting alone can account for that type of number of ducks. In fact almost every time you hear that hunting has little effect on populations so its something else. I also believe that I either read or heard that somewhere around 38 million is the cut off number where the Feds close the duck season. Frankly I think they have already had way too many liberal seasons but that is water over the dam now.

Pa.'s waterfowl symposium is in March and it will be very interesting. The Feds are going to have to do a survey this year,as last year they didn't do one due to covid. When that survey comes out I think us hunters are in for a shock, not only at the low duck numbers but how bad things really are. If they don't close the season then they ought to reduce it to 3-30. We are losing our ducks and after the drought this year out west I'm predicting we will be lucky to go duck hunting again in our lifetime.

Keep in mind that the U.S. lost over 3 billion song birds since 1970, its not a stretch to think something on a smaller scale is happening to ducks.

Roundup is one of the main problems IMO. Its used everywhere in agriculture and it can't be good. P.S. as a side note I haven't seen squat for grasshoppers anymore and they used to be everywhere. Thanks Monsanto.
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Duck Engr » Sat Nov 27, 2021 9:35 am

Birds are the canary in the coal mine. Not sure what’s killing all the birds, but isn’t a good sign for sure.
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Re: I did some checking

Postby DComeaux » Mon Nov 29, 2021 9:21 am

Very Interesting. Time to shut down the free for all.
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Re: I did some checking

Postby don novicki » Thu Dec 09, 2021 6:43 am

I have scoured the net looking for info about how the Feds would close the duck season if they need to. I have not found anything that shows what the criteria would be except for some minor mention of brood status and pond counts. I did read that DU does not get involved with those types of things as that is not their mission. There mission is habitat only as I read in one of their articles. So what does it take to close the season? I really cant find any hard data. However if you go back and look at when they closed goose season back in the 90's it seems that they took input from sportsmen but made a decision based on the science and what biologist told them. Makes sense. I guess we wait until March or so and then see what way the wind blows. One thing for sure they need a lot of water in the PPR for next year. Another year of drought and we are all going to be in trouble.
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Rick » Thu Dec 09, 2021 7:28 am

Perhaps Larry will be along with some management answers, but I can tell you DU most certainly did get involved in management politics by lobbying against the point system's reduction at the end of the five year stabilized management period on the grounds that lowering limits would lower financial support for the birds. I interviewed their then PR head, Jim Dudas, on the topic, and he was soon out of that job when I quoted him as noting that there was no historical precedent for that argument. (Field & Stream's then conservation editor, George Reiger crunched the numbers and really sliced and diced DU over it.)
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Rick » Thu Dec 09, 2021 7:32 am

Perhaps Larry will be along with some management answers, but I can tell you DU most certainly did get involved in management politics by lobbying against the point system's reduction at the end of its five year stabilized management period on the grounds that lowering limits would lower financial support for the birds. I interviewed their then PR head, Jim Dudas, on the topic, and he was soon out of that job when I quoted him as noting that there was no historical precedent for that argument.

Field & Stream's then conservation editor, George Reiger crunched the numbers and really sliced and diced DU over it. And it tickled me some to learn that the late USFWS Special Agent, Dave Hall, was mistakenly hauled onto the carpet by our then Senator John Breaux and others over my article, and reportedly told them he wished he had written it.
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Re: I did some checking

Postby don novicki » Thu Dec 09, 2021 7:32 pm

That's good to know.
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Ricky Spanish » Thu Jul 14, 2022 6:47 am

What I saw at Big Lake was holy shit tons of drake mallards with very few hens.
Seriously it was 100:1 drake:hen.
Never seen anything like it and sure I am concerned just from watching the national wildlife refuge.
I'm sort of blessed in that I kind of live there for 30 days a year.
It's not good
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Ducaholic » Thu Jul 14, 2022 8:38 am

Ricky Spanish wrote:What I saw at Big Lake was holy shit tons of drake mallards with very few hens.
Seriously it was 100:1 drake:hen.
Never seen anything like it and sure I am concerned just from watching the national wildlife refuge.
I'm sort of blessed in that I kind of live there for 30 days a year.
It's not good



Summer Molting Period Perhaps?
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Ricky Spanish » Thu Jul 14, 2022 9:53 am

Ducaholic wrote:
Ricky Spanish wrote:What I saw at Big Lake was holy shit tons of drake mallards with very few hens.
Seriously it was 100:1 drake:hen.
Never seen anything like it and sure I am concerned just from watching the national wildlife refuge.
I'm sort of blessed in that I kind of live there for 30 days a year.
It's not good



Summer Molting Period Perhaps?
The January molt?
It was around the 5th.
They're usually pairing up then.
Last season? Uhhhh. Yeah
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Ducaholic » Thu Jul 14, 2022 10:44 am

Ricky Spanish wrote:
Ducaholic wrote:
Ricky Spanish wrote:What I saw at Big Lake was holy shit tons of drake mallards with very few hens.
Seriously it was 100:1 drake:hen.
Never seen anything like it and sure I am concerned just from watching the national wildlife refuge.
I'm sort of blessed in that I kind of live there for 30 days a year.
It's not good



Summer Molting Period Perhaps?
The January molt?
It was around the 5th.
They're usually pairing up then.
Last season? Uhhhh. Yeah



My bad I assumed your observations were recent.
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Ricky Spanish » Thu Jul 14, 2022 4:39 pm

Ducaholic wrote:
Ricky Spanish wrote:
Ducaholic wrote:
Ricky Spanish wrote:What I saw at Big Lake was holy shit tons of drake mallards with very few hens.
Seriously it was 100:1 drake:hen.
Never seen anything like it and sure I am concerned just from watching the national wildlife refuge.
I'm sort of blessed in that I kind of live there for 30 days a year.
It's not good



Summer Molting Period Perhaps?
The January molt?
It was around the 5th.
They're usually pairing up then.
Last season? Uhhhh. Yeah



My bad I assumed your observations were recent.

I don't see lots of ducks in summer because I'm not even looking. Around mid August I start looking for honkers kind of. It's a duck desert here. Couple park ducks.
"Here" is Champaign, IL.
East Central Illinois. Not on a Flyway
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Ricky Spanish » Fri Jul 15, 2022 7:27 am

To be friendly I'll go into way more detail on my mallard drake to hen ratio thing.

I drive a road called 7-mile. It borders a national wildlife refuge in northeast Arkansas. One day the ditch along that road was packed with newly arrived greenheads.
I'm thinking "Gamo air rifle"...lol. dumb!
I pretend stalked them in my truck. Could have limited quick. I may have taken video but I can't find it.
If I had that video it'd prove what I'm saying is true.
I've never seen anything like it. Hundreds of drakes with a pair of hens. And it was not just one bunch.
Thousands of mallards and a handful of hens.
Something is really messing up birds.
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Rick » Fri Jul 15, 2022 10:26 am

Not nearly so dramatic, but a couple years back, while capturing for a coastal mallard telemetry study, two of our captures ran 15:1 and 32:2 drakes to hens. Which was spooky enough without adding: and no immature birds.
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Re: I did some checking

Postby Ricky Spanish » Fri Jul 15, 2022 3:42 pm

Rick wrote:Not nearly so dramatic, but a couple years back, while capturing for a coastal mallard telemetry study, two of our captures ran 15:1 and 32:2 drakes to hens. Which was spooky enough without adding: and no immature birds.

I recall thinking that with all them horny drakes there were bound to be some mallard cross chicks this spring.
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