Get while the getting’s good
It is said that every black cloud has a silver lining.
That’s true, but so is the opposite: Every silver lining has a black cloud.
In early July, duck hunters were handed a whole bucket full of silver. Waterfowl counts this year soared because of record snow and rainfall in the breeding grounds. Prairie Canada was 17 percent wetter than a year ago and 5 percent wetter than the long-term average. Even more amazingly, the U.S. side of the breeding grounds had a whopping 108 percent increase in wetlands over a year ago, and was 87 percent wetter than the long-term average.
Those are truly staggering statistics, and they led to a 13 percent increase in duck numbers from 37.3 million in 2008 to 42 million in 2009.
When daylight begins to creep over the horizon on a chilly morning in early November, Louisiana duck hunters will find plenty of wide-eyed, wet-behind-the-ears yearling ducks cupping in their decoys.
Those young birds make us all feel like we’ve got the skills of Eli Haydel.
But the nation’s duck managers are warning hunters to enjoy it while it lasts. There’s a giant black cloud brewing, and it will lead to leaner days in the future.
Because of the skyrocketing cost of corn and other grains, farmers across the breeding grounds are converting wetlands into dry land on which they can grow crops.
That’s great news for their bottom lines, but for ducks, it’s like their collective subprime loans are being called in by the lender, and foreclosure is right around the corner.
In the past, farmers were content to leave those wetlands alone and receive government money through the Conservation Reserve Program. Now, however, with the price of corn skyrocketing because of zany ethanol subsidies, farmers are better off clearing those wetlands and raising crops.
“Things look great now,” said John Devney, senior vice president of Delta Waterfowl. “But hunters need to remember that we’ve lost more than a million acres of CRP just since 2007, and more contracts will expire this year.
“On top of that, we’ve been losing native prairie at an alarming rate, and several million more acres are at risk.
“If we can’t find a way to preserve existing upland cover, we simply won’t enjoy this kind of production in the future.”
Dry years are going to come. It’s just part of the natural ebb and flow of climates.
When they do, we’ll be telling our children and grandchildren about the duck-filled skies of 2009.
Contact Todd Masson at toddm@lasmag.com
