Thursday, September 25, 2008
Duck season good or bad? Depends on the weather
Bill Cochran
Recent columns
Few wildlife species are impacted more by the weather than ducks. It takes plenty of rain in the northern nesting areas for them to produce a decent crop. Then it takes cold weather to send them south to Virginia in the fall and winter. If it is warm, they stay to our north.
So, what can you say for certain about the 2008-09 waterfowl hunting season, considering that the weather is such a fickle thing? Here are some things you can take to the bank:
THE HUNTING DATES: The season is split. First there is the Oct. 9-13 portion, which allows hunters to take advantage of homegrown wood ducks and early migrating teal before they leave the state. Add to that, it can be a good time to hunt resident mallards.
The October dates this season are a week earlier than last year, and they encompass Columbus Day, which is important if you have a bank or government job and get the day off.
Next comes youth waterfowl hunting day on Oct. 25, when youngsters and their mentors can have duck hunting all to themselves.
This is followed by Nov. 15-29 dates which give hunters the opportunity to be afield during the Thanksgiving Day holiday when school and college kids often have some free time to hunt.
The final portion of the season is Dec.6-Jan. 24, which is the heart of the season, a time when the weather should have gotten cold enough to lure flights out of the north. It likely would be even better if you could hunt deeper into January, but this is as late as Virginia could set the season under federal guidelines. If I had to pick my preferred duck hunting time I would reserve the early October dates and the last two weeks of the season.
THE BAG LIMITS: The daily limit is five. Federal regulations would allow six, but Virginia hunters think five is enough. At least, that is what wildlife officials will tell you.
The limit “is based on the preference of our hunters,” said Bob Ellis, wildlife chief of the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries.
But when pressed, Ellis said it has been a long while since hunters were surveyed on the matter, and that probably needs to be done. Look for a survey before long, along with a possible increase in the limit.
The five-per-day limit includes some conditions. For example, you only can kill four mallards, and only two of them can be hens.
New this year, the limit on wood ducks is three. It was two last season. This should make October hunters happy. The feds provided the increase, even though wood duck numbers are reported to be lower this year than last in Virginia.
On the real down side, the canvasback season has been closed. That population is reported to be off by 44 percent from last year. The closure will hurt hunting in the Chesapeake Bay area, a popular canvasback habitat.
THE POPULATION: Dry weather in the important mid-continent nesting region hampered production this year, although probably not enough for hunters to notice. Federal officials estimated the breeding population was down 9 percent from last year. Even so, it still was 11-percent above the long time average.
Mallards are the most popular duck species in Virginia. Their breeding population this season was down 7 percent. Meanwhile, the mallard kill last season was 19 percent above the previous year.
Of the 10 most common duck species, only green-winged teal (up 3 percent) and redheads (up 5 percent) showed gains.
There were some double digit losses in addition to canvasbacks. Gadwalls were down 19 percent; American wigeons, 11 percent; northern shovelers, 23 percent and pintails, 22 percent.
THE HUNTERS: The number of waterfowl hunters in Virginia has remained stable since the late 1990s. The sale of federal duck stamps, required of waterfowl hunters, has been averaging about 24,000 annually.
Last season, cool temperatures in late November provided good duck hunting at the front end of the season, then it grew balmy and the migration slowed. Even so, hunters reported killing more ducks than the previous season. Last year’s take was five percent above the 5-year average.
THE GEESE: If you goose hunt during the Sept. 1-25 season, better take a wheelbarrow with you. The daily bag limit is 10, twice that of last year. Ever try to carry that many Canada geese? The bag limit also has been increased from two to three during the mid-November to mid-January western zone season.
If you get the idea that wildlife officials would like to see more resident geese kill, you’d be right. The population peaked in the late '90s, and then hunting seasons knocked it back. It has been easing back up.
The population of migrant geese in the eastern section of the state also has rebounded from alarming lows in the mid-'90s. Production has been promising this year, following a bad year in 2007.
DGIF officials turned down a request from the Virginia Farm Bureau to increase the daily limit on geese in the eastern zone from two to three in order to address agriculture depredation.
In summary, hunting for resident Canada geese should be excellent this season, but in many cases only if you can find a landowner willing to let you hunt.
