A Banded Duck in the Hand is Worth Many, Many in the Water!!

If you waterfowl hunt, you are already well aware of the Federal Duck Banding Program. Those tiny little aluminum bands with a long string of seemingly random numbers are highly coveted by many waterfowlers. But most folks don't know why so much time and effort are put into adorning mallards, gadwalls, teal, and wood ducks (amongst others) with these shiny little bracelets. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the U.S. Geological Survey have been banding birds for a century now. And not just waterfowl are banded; song birds , birds of prey, and shorebirds are banded too. More than 63 million birds have been banded since the beginning of the program. At this very moment, there are about 1 and a quarter million birds banded. Banding occurs all over the world as well. But our focus is on birds that migrate through, nest in, or winter in Canada, the United States, Latin America, and South America. In the United States, each State wildlife agency does their part to help in this enormous effort (there are a lot of ducks out there!!). But why?? By placing a unique band on each duck captured shortly after the breeding season, biologists and wildlife managers are completing the First Step in unraveling the mystery of waterfowl migration. They are also using the bands to make population estimates for different waterfowl species. The Second Step comes when a skilled (or lucky) waterfowl hunter finds a band on a bird he or she harvested and turns in the band number to the State or to the Feds. The end result is that we get to know a few things about our harvested ducks. Because ducks are banded in July and August we know that they either nested in the same general area that they were banded in, or they were born in that very location. Many of the banded birds passing through our area were banded in Canada. Also, over time we may learn how long they survived, where they migrate to in autumn, and where they nested again in future years. In this international effort to monitor waterfowl populations 6.03 million mallards have been banded in the last century!! The Idaho Department of Fish and Game is a happy partner in the duck banding effort for the Panhandle Region. This year we banded 2209 birds in all. Mallards made up 1992 of the total count, wood ducks 193. The rest of the banded birds were largely teal with a few redhead and pintail thrown in. We band ducks every year! If you would like to learn about duck banding, or even help in the effort, call your local Wildlife Habitat Biologist, Carrie Chalcraft, at 689-3453. Banding begins in July, but she can tell you more about the process, about what to do with a banded bird, or put you on a list of people interested in contributing to the cause by splashing around and learning the process! You can also learn more by visiting the Bird Banding Lab Website at http://www.pwrc.usgs.gov/bbl/. If you have a band from a harvested bird, please call Carrie, or call the National Hotline to give your harvest information to the Bird Banding Lab in Patuxent, Maryland. That phone number is 1-800-327-BAND. If you provide your contact information when you turn in the band number, you will receive a certificate from the Bird Banding Lab telling you when and where your bird was banded! Carrie Chalcraft is a Wildlife Habitat Biologist for the Idaho Department of Fish and Game, and Manager of the Coeur d'Alene River Wildlife Management Area. She can be reached at 769-1414.