They are though. Biloxi Marsh holds substantially less birds now than it did prior to the duck dynasty revolution, and I mean substantially less. Like very noticeably for those of us who have hunted the area our whole lives. Same with the Wax. I don't ever hunt PAC, so I don't know how the pressure is down there, but the pressure Biloxi Marsh gets has been unreal the last few years.

I respect the other side of the argument for sure, and I don't profess to have perfect knowledge about WMAs I've never hunted, but I've seen that happen firsthand.

ETA: The same thing applies to a lot of the "private" land areas that are glorified public land now, like Delacroix. I've gotten to where I'd rather hunt public land than deal with the shitshow that private land duck hunting has turned into in a lot of St. Bernard.

This post was edited on 10/14/16 at 9:54 am

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Posted by gorillacoco

Baton Rouge

Member since Oct 2009

5320 posts

Posted on 10/14/16 at 9:55 am to bluemoons

It's no surprise that the average take in limited access areas are much higher than the rest of the WMAs.

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Posted by Cowboyfan89

Member since Sep 2015

12723 posts

Posted on 10/14/16 at 10:07 am to bluemoons

I guess that part gets alittle fuzzier to me. Are there more ducks being killed on nearby areas with less pressure? I don't doubt what you are saying. I'm just not sure about the effect on the migration.

I think it would be much harder to attribute migration patterns at the flyway scale to localized hunting pressure when weather and agricultural practices are much clearer in the way they impact migration.

At the local level, no doubt, I can understand how it impacts the birds. Birds that can sit on an area devoid of hunting pressure are going to sit there. But at the Flyway level, which I believe is the focal point of this discussion, I don't think it has as much impact.

As for the invasives, I think it is, again a local issue, and a very significant one at that. The problem with Maurepas is the lack of freshwater input, which has enabled invasives to take over.

I think there are a lot more factors that affect waterfowl on the local level. I'm not sure how much that impacts the flyway migration though, especially when you have two overwhelming factors, two landscape level factors that are obviously acting on the migration in changing weather patterns and changing agricultural practices.

This post was edited on 10/14/16 at 10:10 am

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