Thread: Whats your solutions to the duck decline?

Most of the shot duck population, around HB, get shot on opening weekend. I would suggest the same goes everywhere in NZ.
After that its a huge drop in numbers culled simply due to the lack of hunters.
Reducing the bag limit will help reduce this volume and will have the biggest effect on bird numbers.
They may get shot later in the season but I would suggest less likely as the majority of hunters have packed up.

Shortening the season is not the answer, as explained above.

Rain and food are the major contributors to survival.
HB has had a major drop in crops, what is been grown isn't what ducks like, volume is way less almost concentrated in one area as well.
When compared to Gisborne area where there is still heaps of grain crops the bird numbers are great.

We have been trapping around our pond and the changes have been good, but we are only defending our resident population, which get culled opening day in any case. So no real help with the population. Unless we all do our part.
So far our traps have taken out 14 feral cats, 4 stoats, numerous hedgehogs, similar volume of rats although they are less frequent now.