Please reconsider your…

Please reconsider your proposal for an open hunt on the Double-crested Cormorant. This bird is a native species to the Great Lake region that should be celebrated for its ability to recover from near extinction many years ago according to Cornell Labs All About Birds:

“Double-crested Cormorant populations have rebounded from persecution and pesticides over the past couple centuries, and today they are a widespread and abundant species. Populations increased steadily between 1966 and 2015, according to the North American Breeding bird Survey. The North American Waterbird Conservation Plan estimates a continental population of over 740,000 breeding birds. In the 1800s and early 1900s, cormorants were frequently shot, and their numbers declined with westward settlement. They also suffered greatly from pesticides used in the mid-20th century, such as DDT, which cormorants ingested from the fish they ate. The pesticides caused thin eggshells."

There is so much more that we can learn from this bird before we eradicate it for good, which will surely be the result if hunters are allowed to shoot this bird under the guidelines you are permitting. Please allow more time for thorough research and complete scientific studies on this bird.

We need to consider a more careful review of the facts when addressing concerns about the amount of fish cormorants consume. Anglers often argue that cormorants are eating fish that otherwise humans might consume and when addressing this questions, a Toronto Star article by Thomas Walkom, a National Affairs Columnist from June 20, 2016 has some compelling findings.

"In fact, according to the federal government’s Canadian Wildlife Service, that’s not true. Studies show that less than two per cent of a cormorant’s diet consists of sport fish, such as lake trout or salmon. And less than one per cent of a cormorant’s diet is made up of the fish that sport fish eat. Cormorants do eat a lot. That’s true. But they tend to eat fish that humans don’t want. As the federal environment department notes in one publication: “Studies have repeatedly shown that, in a natural environment, cormorants feed primarily on small, non-commercial, shallow-water fish.

In the book ”In The Devil’s Cormorant", author Richard King provides an opportunity for us to learn more about this remarkable and resilient bird that in one of the world’s most misunderstood waterfowl.

"Behold the cormorant: silent, still, cruciform, and brooding; flashing, soaring, quick as a snake. Evolution has crafted the only creature on Earth that can migrate the length of a continent, dive and hunt deep underwater, perch comfortably on a branch or a wire, walk on land, climb up cliff faces, feed on thousands of different species, and live beside both fresh and salt water in a vast global range of temperatures and altitudes, often in close proximity to man. Long a symbol of gluttony, greed, bad luck, and evil, the cormorant has led a troubled existence in human history, myth, and literature. The birds have been prized as a source of mineral wealth in Peru, hunted to extinction in the Arctic, trained by the Japanese to catch fish, demonized by Milton in Paradise Lost, and reviled, despised, and exterminated by sport and commercial fishermen from Israel to Indianapolis, Toronto to Tierra del Fuego."

As a concerned citizen, I am asking that we allow a little more time to consider all of the perspectives at hand before we cave in to pressure and eradicate this unique species of bird.