Waterfowl and Other Wildlife

Forest and Bird, Issue 59, 1 February 1941, Page 1

Waterfowl and Other Wildlife

EDITOR I A L

AFTER many authoritative statements have been given that there would be no shooting season this year, the Department of Internal Affairs has now bent to pressure from the shooting fraternity and decided to allow a season of two weeks. The fact that we are now ———* at war and that ammunition is urgently required should surely have restrained all who have the interest of this country at heart from inflicting death and wounds on inoffensive and particularly valuable wildlife. Many statements quite devoid of verification have been put forward by hunting organisations to attain their end, such as that ducks are increasing, that ducks have bred well during the past nesting season, and that many pairs have had a second brood. If ducks are increasing under the present method of wildlife management and under the present parlous condition of their food supply, shelter and protection, then it is an unheard-of happening, while the fact that ducks are endeavouring to rear a second brood is an indication that the first brood was lost. The past nesting season has, moreover, been an exceptionally late one, generally speaking, and when shooting commences it will not be a matter of surprise to learn that many immature birds are being shot. A two weeks’ season may appear to be a concession to the ducks, but the object is undoubtedly revenue, and no great respite will result to the sorely-pressed waterfowl, because more ducks are killed on the first two or three days of the shooting season than during the remaining part of the season. On the opening day, especially, nearly all waters are manned by shooters and the unfortunate birds are killed as they alight by hidden gunners. Some remnants finally seek rest at sea, if the weather permits. But are short seasons or even closed seasons likely to be permanently helpful in preventing the extermination of some species of waterfowl? On account of the weak manner in which the game laws are administered in New Zealand they are probably not likely to be so, but would result merely in bigger bags the following season despite bag limit regulations. What worth-while attempts have been made in New Zealand at conservation? Considerable sums of money (license-holders’ money) have been spent on killing predators, natural and unnatural, much on the least harmful hawk and none on the more harmful rat, which is the common prey of the hawk, and probably the greatest destroyer of ducklings. The result to date is that upland game birds are almost a thing of the past and waterfowl are steadily declining in numbers. No research of the slightest worth-while nature has been undertaken, and thus any steps taken with a view to increasing the stock of game birds have been the result of mere guesswork and surmise. How do the past methods adopted in this country, where the problems are of a comparatively simple nature, compare with the methods of other countries, where the problems are of a much more complex nature owing to non-isolation, a cosmopolitan people and complex forms of government, as for example the United States of America? There it was realised in 1930 that wildlife, especially waterfowl, was rapidly declining in numbers. A special committee of six experts with a senator as chairman and a secretary was immediately set up under Senate Resolution 246, to investigate all matters pertaining to the replacement and conservation of wildlife (including aquatic and all bird life) with the object of determining the most appropriate methods for carrying out restoration. It was recognised that wildlife is dependent on its environment for food, shelter and a place to breed and rear its young. The Special Committee, early in its investigations, concluded that if waterfowl were not to be exterminated, a national refuge system would immediately have to be undertaken, consisting of strategically placed sanctuaries throughout the lan d on lines similar to those suggested by the Forest and Bird Protection Society of New Zealand. (A chain of efficiently managed sanctuaries throughout this country was suggested in February, 1938, as the correct procedure for preventing the extermination of our native waterfowl.) President Roosevelt was approached. He immediately recognised the urgent need for sanctuaries and set aside one million dollars to inaugurate the scheme at once.

That was in 1933. Other funds were later set aside by Congress as needed by the requirements. To-day, seven years later, the programme is more than half completed.

The Special Committee made personal investigations of some of the more acute problems. They recognised that research in the wildlife field was indispensible because all the factors affecting problems had to be understood before a comprehensive wildlife restoration plan could be inaugurated. Research is tedious and painful and sometimes requires many years before all the factors become known. Food, habits, disease, migrations, soil and climatic conditions, predators and many other factors influencing wildlife have been and are being carefully examined by the Biological Survey and other organisations.

The results achieved so far are that, despite the rapidly increasing number of hunters in the United States, shooting seasons are being extended, not curtailed, while the sanctuaries set up as waterfowl refuges have proved to be the saving factor in preventing the extermination of some expiring species of non-game birds.

The secretary of the Special Committee states in his report: —

“ Wildlife is an organic resource, a product of the soil inseparable from the land. It depends upon the land for its nourishment, its protection and its very existence, and these essential requirements can be produced only through the wise use of land and water resources. Fortunately wildlife is one perishable natural resource which readily responds to sound management, and many practices which are beneficial to the soil provide the very things needed in wildlife conservation.”

Once again therefore we return to the all-essential topsoil and its protector, the native vegetation, in the form of strategically placed native forest and other native plant life, which forms an affinity with the soil and prevents its destruction by erosion.

Let us hope that some day the shooters, fishermen and indeed all those interested in wildlife will recognise that the well-being of each of their particular spheres hinges on the conservation of the topsoil and its protecting factors, that natural resources are inextricably interallied in matters of conservation, and that the work of unravelling the many problems arising is a job for one efficient organisation staffed by a skilled and enthusiastic personnel, whose aim would be to work for the common good. Such an organisation would be found in an efficiently managed Department of Conservation. The need for action is here to-day, nay, the time for action is long overdue. The preservation of the topsoil, upon which all life depends, should have prior attention to anything else and calls urgently for the best brains procurable, or, to put it in the words of a writer in “British Empire,” “the greatest problem of all facing the Empire to-day is not political or racial, or is it essential defence by armaments; it is geological, for without arable lands and a good water supply the British Empire would soon cease to exist.”