Good point craigd. If we are truly below sustainability levels, then we could be one dryer than normal spring away from disaster. Killing even one puts the declining population in jeopardy. In that event, a total closure of harvesting mallards would be justified... if the data was real.
sus·tain·a·bil·i·ty-- the ability to be maintained at a certain rate or level
This part of Grey Man's link from virginia.gov jumped out at me:
A long-term decline means that either survival or production (or both) is too low to maintain the population size. However, banding data indicate that eastern mallard survival rates are not measurably different now than they were in the 1990s, when the population was stable. Production estimates obtained from the USFWS Parts Collection Survey have not decreased from that time either. Yet the population decline is evident. This indicates there is a problem
with either one or both critical data streams.
Seriously??? So production rates have not decreased from the 1990's, and neither have survival rates. Hunter numbers have continued to fall, and mallard harvest has decreased by about 40% in that time period. Yet bag limits need to be reduced by 50%??? This is getting interesting, even though I'm not a duck hunter. All I know about it is what I've read here, and the numbers of mallards I see in my little corner of the world. I don't need any biologists to tell me that grouse populations have declined, and that ringneck pheasants should probably be on the endangered species list in my state. I see it myself when I am hunting them or taking my guns for a walk. Those of you who spend a lot of time hunting ducks hopefully will tell us if mallards are really getting scarce, or if there is something else going on here. At this point, it would be easy to blame a decline on wounding from steel shot, and toxicity from tungsten or bismuth, and to call for bans on those too.
I wouldn't be so skeptical and cynical about Fake News if there wasn't so much Fake News.
Some of those "relatively few Grey Men" who saved public waterfowl hunting for the unwashed masses ought to be able to fill in the blanks.
