The commercial fishing…

The commercial fishing industry's findings should be reviewed, and only properly founded evidence should be used in the deciding process of the details in this proposal. There is usually more pieces to the puzzle when identifying fish stock declines and population fluctuations, and only identifying one bird species as a root cause sounds a bit like a witch hunt, or scapegoat.

Culls are a bandaid solution, and more effort needs to be put into identifying and resolving the root cause of their recent population fluctuations. Too often is hunting used as wildlife management's only tool to deal with the imbalances in nature we Canadians have created, with solutions to the root of problems often overlooked or passed up for easier methods. Why not first look at ways of reducing the populations of invasive fish species that are supporting the cormorant population?

There is already legislation in place for property owners to protect their properties from pests, so rewriting/duplicating regulations on the same subject is a waste of time. Let the original regulations stand and be used.

The Fish and Wildlife Act prohibits anyone from allowing game wildlife meat to spoil for good reason. Hunting without recovery is just senseless, and promotes unfavourable hunting practices. Why should cormorants be any different?

The limit of 50 birds per day is too high if there are no restrictions on the maximum number of cormorants killed in a season, and could easily swing the cormorant population too far to the other end of the spectrum. There should also be a restriction on hunting them at nesting sites, as other bird species often share the same sites and would be affected negatively by the cormorant hunting. If other birds populations are not able to nest comfortably while the cormorant hunt is happening, then the positive effects on terns and herons are going to be largely negated.