I am totally opposed to the…

I am totally opposed to the proposed hunting season for Double-crested Cormorant (Cormorants) in Ontario for the following reasons:

Cormorants are native to Ontario and naturally abundant in Ontario. They declined dramatically in the mid 1900s due to 1- human persecution, and 2- like many other species, they were significantly negatively impacted by DDT which caused their eggshell to thin, which resulted in very low breeding success rate. Their numbers have since increased in number and stabilized.

The proposed hunting season is March 15 to December 31, it basically covers the entire time Cormorants can be found in Ontario.

It is proposed that a single hunter would be able to shoot 50 birds per day. As there are not any yearly limits, in one hunting season, a single individual hunter would be able to kill over 14,000 birds. Such numbers are not sustainable. Using these figures, a very small number of hunters (less than 100) could wipe out the entire Ontario Cormorant population in one hunting season. (Note that the North American population for cormorants is estimated at 2 million)

Cormorants are basically inedible but under this proposal they would be re-classified as game and their meat would be allowed to spoil. This is obvious not a sustainable hunt for game meat;, it is a legalized extermination of a native species.

With the proposed hunting dates, hunting would be permitted during the nesting season for both Cormorants and other protected birds that often nest with cormorants including, herons, egrets, terns, gulls.

During the breeding season, one or two hunters could go to a Cormorant breeding colony and wipe it out in a single day, shooting incubating adults on their nests and young birds still in their nest. This would certainly cause all of the other protected species that nest within or alongside Cormorants at that colony (such as herons, egrets, terns, gulls etc.) to abandon their nest or at the very least it would be severely impact their chances of having a successful nesting season.

The proposed hunting dates from March 15 to December 31, virtually the whole year, include spring, the entire summer and fall. This period includes when many Ontarians engage in peaceful activities like relaxing by a lake or river, paddle boarding, canoeing, boating, hiking along a waterway, birdwathching, etc. All these people will have their leisure activities negatively impacted by this ongoing proposed hunt. Consequently, this proposed hunt may well result in a decline of tourism for the province of Ontario as people from |Ontario, other provinces and US states will no longer view Ontario as a quiet and peaceful getaway to enjoy our many lakes and waterways in the summer.

Cormorants are not the only bird species that eat fish. Bald Eagles, Osprey, herons, egrets, gulls, terns, some ducts such as merganser, kingfishers, bitterns, night-herons, loons, grebes, etc. also eat fish. One has to wonder as to why this proposal is singling out only Cormorants.

Some species of fish may be declining but to blame it all on the Cormorant is a cop-out. Issues like past introduction on invasive fish species in both the Great Lakes and other Ontario lakes, species such as lamprey, Round Goby and Zebra Mussel (just to name a few), have had devastating effects on our Ontario water ecosystems. Other things that have also had significant impacts on fish stocks over the past decades include 1- the significant loss (and severe degradation) of shoreline marshes and shoreline habitat around the great lakes and other waterways, 2- continued agricultural and industrial runoff in our lakes and waterways, and 3- deforestation, change in land use, and urban sprawl near waterways, 4- climate change-global warming.

Unfortunately this proposed Cormorant hunt is not based on studies showing a need for a hunt; in fact no evidence is cited in support of the proposal or the way it is structured.

Our natural resources should be managed based on scientific evidence to ensure their sustainability. In fact, since early 2000 s, the latest information indicates that Great Lakes populations of Cormorants have since stabilized, or declined slightly. It should be stressed that a stable population is a sigh of natural equilibrium. Furthermore, having a hunting season that is permitted during the nesting season goes against sustainable conservation management.

If the proposed law is enacted it will set responsible conservation back in Ontario and cause ecological harm that will take decades to reverse.