It kind of disturbs me seeing men complain that we have too many refuges for the ducks, therefore they can't shoot any.
Plain and simple, here is why that is a farce.
In the point system days, we had just over half the ducks we have today.
And the delta was covered up with ducks.
So the refuge system could be holding 30,000,000 ducks, and there would still be as many ducks as there were in those days elsewhere in the migration system.
Since obviously they are NOT holding 30,000,000 in the system or even close to it, there is another explanation for the problem.
"Too Many Refuges" a Farce
"Too Many Refuges" a Farce
Give Me Ambiguity Or Give Me Something Else
I'm all for the refuge system ! Don't blame it at all for "lack of hunter success", Never will !
Just would like to be able to stir up these no-hunting zones from, time to time ! I think it would just keep the ducks what they should be !
WILD !
I know very well, putting a little pressure on refuges (no hunting zones), would not "fix our problem", but it might at least, make the ducks get up so we could look at em every now and then !
Rip Em !
Just would like to be able to stir up these no-hunting zones from, time to time ! I think it would just keep the ducks what they should be !
WILD !
I know very well, putting a little pressure on refuges (no hunting zones), would not "fix our problem", but it might at least, make the ducks get up so we could look at em every now and then !
Rip Em !
OFFSEASON ?,..... Ain't no such thing !
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Super Black Eagle
- Duck South Addict
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Benny - If you are saying the lack of hunter success is a result of increased hunting pressure on the birds; therefore forcing them into the areas of refuge, And by reducing the pressure on surrounding areas, we can allow the birds to start working thier way out in to the public areas. Thus, providing more oppurtunities for greater hunting success. Then I agree.
If this is not what you are saying, then you need to rethink it.
hehehehee
SBE
If this is not what you are saying, then you need to rethink it.
hehehehee
SBE
Last edited by Super Black Eagle on Thu Jan 29, 2004 11:56 am, edited 1 time in total.
O.k. Jim I' ll bite on this one and give you my thinking on the subject. Mabey there aren't enough refuges I can agree with that. Do you agree with the fact that ducks will often congregate in areas with the least pressure? Any pressure i.e. mother nature: they move from areas with more ice/snow/heat to places more comfortable, no? Predation or areas where they could be most vunerable to predation ducks will try and avoid. As well as hunting pressure which impacts them greatly over short periods of time i.e. hunting the same hole three days in a row. you may fire a gun but it will be at some wary birds if you do at all.
With that in mind I have witnessed ducks sitting on refuges all year long with out a care in the world - unless they leave that refuge. But how can you make them leave?
Here's my proposition.
State and federal wildlife services hold a raffle if you will. This raffle sells tickets for say $25 bucks to residents $75 for non. Purchasers of said tickets register for a chance to win a hunt one predetermined weekend day during the season which your two best buddies get to accompany you on. Having hunts three to six weekends throughout the season on refuges in one of the refuges blinds. Just a big drawing for all refuges or purchase tickets to specific ones either or. With proceedes going directly back to the refuge and wma system.
What this will do is make ducks look for other places to go. Fear man again if you will because the refuges now make them get used to not getting mucked with in certain locations. I'll use the Ross Barnett for example as I live in jackson and hunt it during the week out of conveince mostly. I can go out there any given day with the right (good) conditions and not SEE fitty ducks mabey a hundred and thats alot. Then on the way out drive by the refuge and see anywhere from 2500 to 8000 ducks in the highly visible areas, whose to say whats in the flooded timbre. I'm not saying get in there and blast the refuges every weekend mabey just three weekends out of the six. Have blinds set up far enough away from each other so people don't sky bust each others ducks nor highball them away and three people max in each.
With that in mind I have witnessed ducks sitting on refuges all year long with out a care in the world - unless they leave that refuge. But how can you make them leave?
Here's my proposition.
State and federal wildlife services hold a raffle if you will. This raffle sells tickets for say $25 bucks to residents $75 for non. Purchasers of said tickets register for a chance to win a hunt one predetermined weekend day during the season which your two best buddies get to accompany you on. Having hunts three to six weekends throughout the season on refuges in one of the refuges blinds. Just a big drawing for all refuges or purchase tickets to specific ones either or. With proceedes going directly back to the refuge and wma system.
What this will do is make ducks look for other places to go. Fear man again if you will because the refuges now make them get used to not getting mucked with in certain locations. I'll use the Ross Barnett for example as I live in jackson and hunt it during the week out of conveince mostly. I can go out there any given day with the right (good) conditions and not SEE fitty ducks mabey a hundred and thats alot. Then on the way out drive by the refuge and see anywhere from 2500 to 8000 ducks in the highly visible areas, whose to say whats in the flooded timbre. I'm not saying get in there and blast the refuges every weekend mabey just three weekends out of the six. Have blinds set up far enough away from each other so people don't sky bust each others ducks nor highball them away and three people max in each.
It was a good post and I enjoy reading creative solutions to just about anything. Unfortunately this solution is designed to let you get at them ducks!
HE HE HE HE HE
There aint enough refuge for all the ducks we have, and you dont need to shoot the ones that are using them.
We need to let the ducks use other areas and take some of the pressure off of them so they will begin to do the same thing in those places as they do on the refuges, and it must be multi generational to show any real results, and it must be managed afterward to keep their usage numbers high.
Something that intrigues me is that hunters see NO DIFFERENCE in terms of their OWN personal impact, no difference between hunting ducks when there has been almost NO rain, and there is NO surface water, as they do if we have had Noah's flood. They view it the exact same.
The difference between those two conditions is akin to trying to crack an 8 ball with a sledge hammer, or trying to crack an egg with it.
You can run ALL the ducks off if you put enough pressure on them.
When we have NO water, we are swinging a slege hammer at an egg, and we act like it's a solid steel ball bearing and will be no worse for wear.
When you apply X amount of pressure, to X amount of water, you reach a point of saturation at which ALL ducks collectively will not use a place.
We have reached that X, and we got there because of NO WATER for 6 years at the same time we got a LOT more hunters.
People just dont want to believe that this can happen, but Im tellin ya, when you see birds movin like I have seen for the last 4 years, it's not for lack of water. It's from lack of KNOWLEDGE. When they don't know the area, it only takes one volley, and they are WAY GONE, because they dont know enough to survive it, and their chances are the same going somewhere else.
Ducks like most others are keenly aware of risk, I have used this against them more than once by tricking them with it.
Once we get a deep flooding year, things will begin to improve but it will be slow because what we do have will be spread out to hell and yonder.
It's going to take several years to recover from this IMHO.
HE HE HE HE HE
There aint enough refuge for all the ducks we have, and you dont need to shoot the ones that are using them.
We need to let the ducks use other areas and take some of the pressure off of them so they will begin to do the same thing in those places as they do on the refuges, and it must be multi generational to show any real results, and it must be managed afterward to keep their usage numbers high.
Something that intrigues me is that hunters see NO DIFFERENCE in terms of their OWN personal impact, no difference between hunting ducks when there has been almost NO rain, and there is NO surface water, as they do if we have had Noah's flood. They view it the exact same.
The difference between those two conditions is akin to trying to crack an 8 ball with a sledge hammer, or trying to crack an egg with it.
You can run ALL the ducks off if you put enough pressure on them.
When we have NO water, we are swinging a slege hammer at an egg, and we act like it's a solid steel ball bearing and will be no worse for wear.
When you apply X amount of pressure, to X amount of water, you reach a point of saturation at which ALL ducks collectively will not use a place.
We have reached that X, and we got there because of NO WATER for 6 years at the same time we got a LOT more hunters.
People just dont want to believe that this can happen, but Im tellin ya, when you see birds movin like I have seen for the last 4 years, it's not for lack of water. It's from lack of KNOWLEDGE. When they don't know the area, it only takes one volley, and they are WAY GONE, because they dont know enough to survive it, and their chances are the same going somewhere else.
Ducks like most others are keenly aware of risk, I have used this against them more than once by tricking them with it.
Once we get a deep flooding year, things will begin to improve but it will be slow because what we do have will be spread out to hell and yonder.
It's going to take several years to recover from this IMHO.
Give Me Ambiguity Or Give Me Something Else
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torch
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Since 1937 Du has saved MILLIONS of acres. We have installed a National Refuge Sysytem. When the real declines from the 50's 60's and 70's were from what else? DDT... All the conservationists want us to think it was from loss of habitat..... BULLSH!T. Ducks made a comeback along with the American Bald Eagle after DDT was banned.
I am not aware of any correlation between DDT and egg failure in waterfowl and if that is true I would like to see some official documentation of it.
I was under the impression El Nino conditions and arid nesting areas were responsible for that.
I thought DDT only effected carnivores or raptors that eat meat.
TORCH did you not get that avatar I sent you or did you not like it?
I was under the impression El Nino conditions and arid nesting areas were responsible for that.
I thought DDT only effected carnivores or raptors that eat meat.
TORCH did you not get that avatar I sent you or did you not like it?
Give Me Ambiguity Or Give Me Something Else
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torch
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Benny, DDT affects the egg ie the shell to be exact and the embrio inside.
Conservation has been preached to ya'll so long that it has brain washed you. Just sit and think about a while it is all a concpiracy theory.
Conservation has been preached to ya'll so long that it has brain washed you. Just sit and think about a while it is all a concpiracy theory.
Last edited by torch on Thu Jan 29, 2004 12:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Keep it coming JW,..... I'm not being hard headed ! Even tho my Dad would beg to differ ! 
I certaianly see what you are sayin !
You certainly may be correct !
I absolutely love the debate !
I will remain open minded !
Do you think a good dose of 30/3, would help ? Curb the fly-by-niters and Johnny-come-lately's ?
This comes from your "no ducks" article ! I think !
What are ya thoughts on gettin it back to the good old days !
Rip Em !
I certaianly see what you are sayin !
You certainly may be correct !
I absolutely love the debate !
I will remain open minded !
Do you think a good dose of 30/3, would help ? Curb the fly-by-niters and Johnny-come-lately's ?
This comes from your "no ducks" article ! I think !
What are ya thoughts on gettin it back to the good old days !
Rip Em !
OFFSEASON ?,..... Ain't no such thing !
Torch I thought the egg shells were softened causing almost total nest mortality and it was picked up eating fish and animals from the farming regions of the country, is that not right?
Rip I think 30/3 and a lot of water is the fastest way back to "the good ole days" but with ducks and regional economics being synonymous these days you will be hard pressed to get that unless the FWS thinks we need it.
That is to say I don't think it's going to get much better.
A LOT of water will certainly help, and of course snow up north, but it will still take a LONG time to recover. It doesn't just happen because ONE good push moves major ducks. There has to be plenty of water, and we just havent had it. Otherwise they sail into HELL and quickly sail back out again.
Something that I think is really a major factor in the perpetuation of this pattern is something that is hard to verbalize. It's about how ducks ACT.
Ever seen ducks get up, you look up in the sky, they are on the MOVE, and they werent 3 hours before that. There is no change in weather, none in wind, to all visible appearances nothing has changed in that three hours.
And all of a sudden, they aint THINKIN about working your blocks.
They on a mission......
Ducks reach that "mission" level for many reasons I think, and one of them is risk. Once they hit "mission" they are going to fly for a good long time. In no water conditions, the delta looks to them to be a desert with a few oasis in it. When they try a couple of the oasis and get shot at, the desert looks to them to be nothing but high risk. So they hit a mission to get out of here. Just because they may pass over a slough with 4,000 birds in it does not mean they are going to stop, they are reacting to the OVERALL CONDITIONS of the general area and saying F-it --- were outta here.
There has to be x amount of visible ducks on the water spread out across an area before they will try with some determination to stay in the area. If they get up and it is a desert, and they get shot at a couple times, that is all it takes. They are outta here and gone to La or the river or someplace else, because there is no visible incentive to stay there, and the risks are too high.
ANYWAY---------
Rip I think 30/3 and a lot of water is the fastest way back to "the good ole days" but with ducks and regional economics being synonymous these days you will be hard pressed to get that unless the FWS thinks we need it.
That is to say I don't think it's going to get much better.
A LOT of water will certainly help, and of course snow up north, but it will still take a LONG time to recover. It doesn't just happen because ONE good push moves major ducks. There has to be plenty of water, and we just havent had it. Otherwise they sail into HELL and quickly sail back out again.
Something that I think is really a major factor in the perpetuation of this pattern is something that is hard to verbalize. It's about how ducks ACT.
Ever seen ducks get up, you look up in the sky, they are on the MOVE, and they werent 3 hours before that. There is no change in weather, none in wind, to all visible appearances nothing has changed in that three hours.
And all of a sudden, they aint THINKIN about working your blocks.
They on a mission......
Ducks reach that "mission" level for many reasons I think, and one of them is risk. Once they hit "mission" they are going to fly for a good long time. In no water conditions, the delta looks to them to be a desert with a few oasis in it. When they try a couple of the oasis and get shot at, the desert looks to them to be nothing but high risk. So they hit a mission to get out of here. Just because they may pass over a slough with 4,000 birds in it does not mean they are going to stop, they are reacting to the OVERALL CONDITIONS of the general area and saying F-it --- were outta here.
There has to be x amount of visible ducks on the water spread out across an area before they will try with some determination to stay in the area. If they get up and it is a desert, and they get shot at a couple times, that is all it takes. They are outta here and gone to La or the river or someplace else, because there is no visible incentive to stay there, and the risks are too high.
ANYWAY---------
Give Me Ambiguity Or Give Me Something Else
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