The culling of the Double…

The culling of the Double-crested Cormorant in Canada I believe to be necessary to protect habitat degradation, but I believe that an open season for most of the year is a bad idea. I will lay out some concerns and suggestions in the following opinion piece that I believe to be a safer and more gradual culling of the bird without the possibility of destroying the population and having indirect effects on other habitat and fish populations.

The idea of having a 50-head bag limit with no possession limit is extremely high and unnecessary. I believe the Ministry of Natural Resources does not understand the potential popularity of this cull. Hunters, from my personal experience, despise these birds, and having the opportunity to shoot 50 per day could become detrimental to the population very quickly. Furthermore, the hunting season is too long and should rather line up with the duck hunting seasons to be consistent in regulation for migratory birds. This will give the Double-Crested Cormorant a better survival chance. I do not believe that these regulations will allow for the population research to keep up with the death of the birds.

The Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunter’s is the largest proponent of the culling of the Double-Crested Cormorant. A July 2016 article released by the OFAH titled The Facts about cormorant control in Ontario lays out a list of sensationalized facts about the detrimental effects of the bird. In this article a few things pop out that raise more questions than answers. Firstly, the OFAH states that they commonly eat species like Alewife, Yellow Perch, Smallmouth Bass and Round Goby. They go on to say that even though they eat the detrimental invasive fish the Round Goby, there is “No research showing that cormorants offer significant control for the species” (OFAH 2016). That is not enough to convince me that they are not making an impact on their populations. Maybe the control is not significant but perhaps adequate and still making a difference.

The OFAH claims that the bird enjoys eating the popular game fish the Smallmouth Bass but there are scientists who refute this claim. An article by Nancy E. Seefelt entitled A Disconnect between Science and Management for Double-crested Cormorants in Northern Lake Michigan claims that “results indicated that the Double-crested Cormorants do not negatively impact smallmouth bass populations” (Seefelt 2018). The article goes on to say that because of the culling of Double-crested Cormorants in traditional colony sites on the ground they moved to tree nesting and in turn affected other co-nesting species (Seefelt 2018). This sediment is echoed by Wyman et al. in an article titled Great Lakes Double-Crested Cormorant Management Affects Co-Nester Colony Growth which concluded that cormorant management plans may not be neutral to co-nesters and any cormorant management plans must take this into consideration.

In conclusion I believe that we do not know enough about the positive impacts that Double-crested Cormorants have on invasive fish populations, their relationship to co-nesting bird species and how detrimental a large cull might be to their overall population. My suggestion is lower culling limits and conduct more research into the negative effects of the Double-crested Cormorant before wiping out their entire population. Allow for certain segments of populations that are detrimental to high risk susceptible habitats to be culled but restructure the proposed bill with the above concerns in mind.

WORKS CITED

Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters (2016) The Facts about Cormorant Control in Ontario: A backgrounder for bill 205: Fish and Wildlife Conservation Amendment Act 2016. Retrieved from https://www.ofah.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/facts-about-cormorant-c…

Seefelt, N. E. (2018). A Disconnect between Science and Management for Double-crested Cormorants (Phalacrocorax auritus) in Northern Lake Michigan, USA, 2000-2016. Waterbirds: The International Journal of Waterbird Biology, (2), 189. Retrieved from http://ra.ocls.ca/ra/login.aspx?inst=sandford&url=http://search.ebscoho…

Wyman, K. E., Wires, L. R., & Cuthbert, F. J. (2018). Great lakes double-crested cormorant management affects co-nester colony growth. The Journal of Wildlife Management, (1), 93. https://doi-org.eztest.ocls.ca/10.1002/jwmg.21343