re: Fascinating Duck Study on Pressure

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I know of a refuge a 18 miles from me that doesn’t allow a single person to duck hunt it. There are a bunch of them, even in the South.
I thought like you once, but I wanted them on rotations. Always having refuges where you couldn’t hunt and they could rest, but every 3-5 years switch the ones you could and couldn’t hunt. The ducks would figure out where it was safe, but I’m not convinced that the best management plan is to do that. We can’t just kill all of them just because we can. Some people don’t know the difference between hunting and extermination. I bet you have heard or said it yourself, “Man, back in the day we would kill truck loads of mallards whenever we wanted to. Now, there ain’t no ducks. They are all up North where they are short stopping because of DU.” Well, Maybe those older hunters shouldn’t have been killing truck loads of ducks.

You say it is because of lack of resources, but maybe they are just trying to make sure the ducks have a large enough population to breed.

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I am pretty certain most management is done to ensure there are enough birds to breed. The birds certainly need refuges, especially in the wintering grounds because food can become scarce on the wintering grounds in a hurry and winter is hard under the best of conditions. I am not talking about hunting refuges....I am talking about hunting areas AROUND and in the general area of refuges that are owned by the public but closed to hunting. These areas are not being managed in any meaningful manner other than simply being closed to hunting. Most of these areas would not be overly productive if they were open or not except when conditions were ideal...a good front passing through, for example. They could provide hunting opportunities for some and at times could provide high quality hunts for some...but they are simply closed.

An example of what I am talking about is a vast area of public land and private land leased to the state in the Columbia River Valley in Washington. Area is LOADED with geese. Goose hunting is closed during the regular season on all land, public or private, except for Mondays and Saturdays. Hunters in that area are footing the bill for thousands of acres to hunt, not to mention the Federal areas that are being funded by everyone in the nation. In this same area there are 4 MASSIVE federal refuges and several state refuges not to mention thousands of acres in private ownership that act as refuges. The chances of killing a goose on any of that public land IF it were open any day during the regular season is pretty slim EXCEPT for those rare days when conditions are ideal...limiting that already rare event to 2 days a week means there are almost no geese taken ANYWHERE in the area, private of public land either one. IN the case of snow geese in the area it is well understood that they are a disaster waiting to happen and when it happens it is going to spread to other species...not to mention the pressure their numbers put on the resources...but those areas are closed to ALL hunting because they do not have the resources to police them....their word, not mine, properly. Has nothing to do with management and everything to do with making certain that people are all ganged up where they can keep an eye on them. This is not unusual....I know of several areas in Southern Illinois that is exactly the same, Indiana, Virginia and Maryland, Oregon, California, Colorado....in fact every mountain state has many acres where this practice is common. It is not as common in our area because we wouldn't abide by it if it were but we do have areas around refuges in the south that are simply closed because there are not enough resources to police it...I know of another in one of the best areas of waterfowl numbers in the country in South Carolina. They are numerous. If the land is owned by the public and it is not specifically being managed but is suitable for hunting it should be open to the public. Most of the time those areas would not be overly productive but many hunters would do well on them even with fewer birds by scouting and getting away from crowds and simply working harder. They can't because they are closed.

Refuges are vitally important. The hunting of them should managed in a manner that provides as high a quality experience for hunters as possible. That may mean being flexible on open days depending on conditions. It may mean opening up new areas and closing old ones occasionally. It certainly means maintaining blinds in a proper fashion. It should mean limiting hunters to 10 - 12 shells and checking. Even if it means closing them completely I would trust the biologists to make that call. What should not happen is suitable land that is owned by the public be limited by regulation simply because of a lack of resources. That goes for ALL use of public lands.