As per your request, here is the entire article I wrote for Minnesota Outdoor News. I believe that reading it in its entirety, most will agree that the main thrust of the piece was to call attention to the problems facing wetlands...and the complicity of the present administration in allowing and even encouraging the wetland drainage. Read it all and I think it's safe to say I generall ripped my fellow duck hunters, not just North Dakotans, but southerners, Minnesotans, Iowans and yes, South Dakotans.
Truth is, few of them have stepped up to the plate to tackle this most critical issue of all.
Tony Dean
No Duck Season Next Fall
By Tony Dean
Bob Marshall wrote a great piece in the New Orleans Times Picayune about ducks and duck hunters, noting that most southern duck hunters were complaining this past season was one of their worst. And then he talked to Ron Reynolds, one of the brightest minds in waterfowl management. Reynolds, a Bismarck, ND waterfowl biologist employed by the US Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS), told Marshall that closed duck seasons might be ahead.
Reynolds bemoaned the fact that duck hunters probably don't appreciate how serious the situation is. No kidding. North Dakota duck hunters think the most serious problem is how to keep Minnesotans out while Minnesotans think it's figuring a way to draw a North Dakota license. But alas, hunters from both states think first of themselves, not ducks.
Reynolds thinks first about ducks.
And, he says, most of the serious problems that might lead to closed duck seasons have taken place within the past year. It began with the US Supreme Court stripping federal protection from the most important duck breeding habitat on the continent, the prairie potholes in the Dakotas, eastern Montana and what remains in western Minnesota.
The tragedy is, the Bush administration could have done something about it…and didn't. In fact, they took a bad situation for ducks…and made it worse.
Did you get that duck hunters? The President most of you voted for could have done a lot to secure a future for ducks…and didn't. In fact, he weighed in on the wrong side.
As of today, all that stands between wetlands that remain and drainage is Swampbuster, a Farm Bill provision that denies payments --- some call them subsidies --- to farmers who drain their wetlands. The truth is, because those Farm Bill payments are so important these days, Swampbuster has saved a lot of wetlands.
But in spite of Swampbuster, drainage is taking place in a big way and no one seems to complain. Farmers who drain aren't worried because they believe they have little to fear from the Corps or EPA and certainly not the Natural Resource Conservation Service. The point is, none of these agencies is currently enforcing Swampbuster or, unless someone tells me otherwise, keeping track of those who are draining at the risk of the loss of their Farm Bill payments.
Reynolds told Marshall that if there were any break in the protection that the Swambuster provision provides, we could easily lose 50 percent of our wetlands, which would not mean slow seasons.
It would mean NO seasons.
The only significant thing Reynolds missed in the good duck hunting equation is grass on the landscape. Yeah, CRP has been good, but in South Dakota, farm bill provisions that make it more profitable to plow than plant grass have surpassed the CRP gains. In the top ten duck production counties, the net loss of grass due to plowing prairie has exceeded that which has been gained by CRP.
Puddle ducks nest in grass. Without it, water alone will do little for puddlers.
Prior to January 2001, wetlands were protected by the Clean Water Act. It offered protection to wetlands that are easiest to drain, the small, isolated temporary ponds that are critical to most duck species. These are the same wetlands farmers often refer to as "nuisance" wetlands and they're important is that because they are very shallow and most are located in low areas of fields. When the sun hits them, they warm quickly and promote a rapid hatch of invertebrates, the major food source for ducks in the spring. Wetlands of this type have all but disappeared in western and southern Minnesota and all of Iowa, which explains why both states host so few breeding ducks.
About 80 percent of all wetlands in the Dakotas are less than an acre in size, and because they are not connected to each other or any navigable waterway, the Supreme Court decision ruled they lost their protection. And Reynolds says these tiny wetlands are responsible for about 70 percent of pothole duck production.
But most duck experts are plainly worried about the fate of these small, isolated wetlands. They'll be subject to drainage following the SWANCC decision by the conservative majority of the US Supreme Court --- the same wetlands the compassionately conservative Bush administration has decided not to protect.
But this is not the first time conservatives have attempted to facilitate the drainage of these important wet spots. No one ever accused Sen. Bob Dole of being a liberal and a few years back, he introduced legislation that failed, thankfully. It would have eliminated these small wetlands from Swampbuster protection. Dole should not have failed because Matt Connolly, then the Executive Director of Ducks Unlimited, gave him the cover he needed by referring to them as "bathtubs" and that the duck populations wouldn't come crashing down if they were eliminated. That statement became one more reason serious duck biologists do not seem to be as enamored of the self-proclaimed world leader in wetland conservation as they once were.
In Howell Raines delightful book, "Fly Fishing Your Way Through the Mid-Life Crisis," he quotes his friend, the late Dick Blalock, a liberal Washington fly fishing guru regarding the difference between the two political parties.
"The trouble with Republicans," said Blalock, "is that they'll trample over human rights to protect property rights. The good thing about Democrats is they'll trample over property rights to protect human rights."
Obviously, the truth lies somewhere in between.
But aside from those hunters who have embraced George Dubbya because he pledged to let us keep our guns, others have been wondering. After all, this same President appointed Gale Norton, a James Watt protégé. And most recently, following his habit of appointing people to regulate industries they came from, appointed Bruce Knight to head a key federal agency. Knight spent his pre-Bush days lobbying for the National Corn Growers Association, whose South Dakota affiliate lobbied hard to get the Natural Resources Conservation Service to lower the wetland delineation standards in Knight's native state. The effort ultimately failed because conservation groups and Indian tribes partnered up and beat them bloody, but guess which agency Knight now heads. You got it. He's in charge of the NRCS, and upon receiving the appointment, called himself a Teddy Roosevelt Republican.
Honest!
I'm not implying all corngrowers want to drain what wetlands remain. Some do, of course, but most Dakota farmers are decent conservationists and enjoy seeing wildlife around their places, even if some species occasionally are responsible for depredation. No, it's the leaders of these groups who cause the problems.
Almost from the day the NRCS State Conservationist (an oxymoron in some cases) announced his plans, some landowners began laying drain tile. Know how that works? A machine digs a narrow trench into which is inserted plastic pipe that is perforated on the top. It's covered and from that point on, there are no wet low spots in that field.
No more wetlands.
No more ducks.
Ever!
And duck hunters seem oblivious to this connection.
In the south, they drink toasts to Dubbya because he's defending our gun rights and showing Saddam where the bear does his business. And if there's a slow season again next year, the southern guys will blame those Yankees who are shortstopping the birds.
But they are no worse than some of us in the north.
In North Dakota, a vocal group of hunters think our duck hunting problems are all tied directly to Minnesota and Wisconsin hunters. Thus they have mobilized and as we go to print, seem to have the state legislature ready to tie non-resident numbers to a system the ND Game and Fish Department developed, and ought to be ashamed of. It lowers the number of non-resident hunters during dry periods with low duck numbers.
You need legislation to do that?
However that legislation makes no reference to the policies to be followed in years of no season.
In South Dakota, non-residents are also an issue and sportsmen there took time to fight a measure that would have allowed a additional 500 non-resident waterfowl licenses in northeastern South Dakota, an area where duck hunters are conspicuous --- by their nearly complete absence.
What you do not hear in the Dakotas, Minnesota or anywhere for that matter, is the outcry from duck hunters over what will likely be happening to our wetlands and in short order, our ducks. It might be that they aren't aware of it. Lord knows they can't depend on the outdoor press to bring it to them. The Big Three (Field & Stream, Outdoor Life and Sports Afield) steer clear of controversy. They'd rather cuddle up to lawmakers who all too often use membership in the Congressional Sportsman's Caucus as a means of suggesting to hunters back home that we're here watching out for you. Truth is, you have to depend on a few outdoor communicators like Marshall, Dennis Anderson and others, who unfortunately see their influence dwindle at the outer edge of their newspaper circulation area.
When the President entered the House floor to deliver his State of the Union, he began by hugging Congressman Bill Janklow, the former SD Governor. Never mind the fact that Janklow has been unable to parlay that close friendship with the President into getting drought relief for Dakota farmers and ranchers or a fair break in Missouri River water management. What I really fear is that Janklow and Bush are on the same wetland page.
After all, when the NRCS State Conservationist made his anti-wetland moves, we did not hear from the Game, Fish & Parks Department about what it could do to ducks and a whole host of other things.
That's because they were gagged --- by Bill Janklow.
And that reminds me of the courage of guys like Ron Reynolds, who though he works for George Bush's US Fish & Wildlife Service, at least points out to duck hunters what will happen if these bizarre wetland shenanigans do become American policy.
Janklow was convinced that the wetland issue was one of fairness; that South Dakota farmers should be able to drain just like their Minnesota counterparts did. This from a guy I once described as the smartest man to ever sit in the Governor's chair in South Dakota. The man who convinced him was state legislator Larry Diedrich, another pretty conservative face with a zeal for higher office and a desire to drain every wet spot.
If people like Bush, Janklow, Knight and Diedrich are successful, you won't see little pockets of open water in farm fields after a snow melt. You won't see any ducks either. And to those who say, well, you're just picking on conservatives, please name the "liberals" who are consistently voting in favor of drainage or of policies that aid and abet drainage.
What sad is that too many duck hunters do not worry about the future.
Whether they hail from the "anti-non-resident" Mecca of the Dakotas or belong to the ranks of the "hate the shortstopping Yankees" of the southern states, they have one thing in common. They worry about themselves and today. They are much like the Minnesota and Iowa duck hunters of a few years back. Why worry about draining these little puddles, I imagine they could have said, for as long as we have Canada and the Dakotas, we'll have plenty of ducks.
Over the past decade, Canadian duck production has become an oxymoron and if we allow the drainage of the Dakotas, well, hopefully you get the picture.
Ron Reynolds said his agency (USFWS) recently analyzed the consequences of congressional failure to bring back wetland protection under the Clean Water Act and if the Swampbuster program were to end. He said we'd be looking at about a 50 percent loss of duck production.
And Swampbuster has just 5 years left.
After that, maybe a year or two of duck hunting will remain.
Maybe.
uke: We ND's should be fighting for our hunting future, yet at the same time we need to embrace movements to preserve what we have. Mr. Dean does have a point that maybe we have the primary issue mixed up..... maybe they should at least engage 1/2 our time. My.02$. Tom
