DUCKS UNLIMITED   September 1975

Any person who is interested in hunting, or even in birds and wildlife has heard of the organization known as ‘Ducks Unlimited.’ This group was formed some years ago with the objective and aim of helping migratory birds, or perhaps I should say ducks, geese and those birds that provide hunting sport in the fall. Since a great proportion of the ducks nest in north-western Canada, it is only natural that activities would be in that area.

First this project is not costing the Canadian taxpayer one red cent. In fact, since most of the men employed are Canadians, there is a financial gain, not to mention that all are also sharing in the successful increase in the productivity  (“pro-duck-tivity” – Ed.) of ducks and geese.

So far, if the information in the circulars is correct, there has been spent so far in Canada, over $30,000,000. That is a lot of money, and just about 95% of this has been supplied by groups in the U.S.A. While most of this money has been spent in western Canada there are smaller projects in nearly every province. Only recently the press carried a news item of such an undertaking in Ontario. I was told that so far the results have exceeded expectations and as the work goes along there is always improvement in operations.

The main idea is producing more ducks, and this can only be done by making the nesting habitats better.

Last winter, on my trip to Saskatchewan, I met with one group that was working on Cumberland Marsh. Naturally I asked a lot of questions, and the more I talked with these people the more interested I got. There was a good-sized crew, and every morning they left in different directions. There were engineers in charge, but most of the working crew were local men. I did get to see some of the things they had done. We saw small dams with metal gates to control the flow of water. I saw a canal, about eight to ten feet wide, and perhaps more than a mile long. This was to help the flow from the higher lake. This work was done by hand as it would hardly be possible to get heavy machinery in to such a location. It was more than ten miles to the highway and the area is mostly marsh so work has to be manpower.

Cumberland Marsh is an area more than half a million acres. There are many lakes, or perhaps marshes would be better. Some of these quite large, one I was on must have been six miles across. It is a fine area for muskrats. Estimates are that there were ten thousand muskrat houses on the marsh. This is on water that drains mostly into Manitoba.

 The ‘rats’ are smaller than those we see in this area, but so many of them! I was told an annual harvest of 30,000 ‘rats’  would not be too high.

One of the local trappers told me of the great number of ducks that nest in these marshy lakes. He said that anyone who had not seen them would hardly believe that there would be that many ducks in any one area. Too, I was told that on one of the lakes the pike are so plentiful and so large that many small ducks are taken by these underwater predators.

One of the engineers told me that in the next five years they had plans to install dams, big drainage canals and other work to regulate the water levels of fifteen large marshes and lakes. The work is all being done by local men, and the engineers are all Canadian. And, as I said, the money all comes from south of the border. The Cumberland Marsh project will have an over-all cost of almost five million dollars. I also learned that soon there would be similar work – they hoped – on a large marsh in the northwest corner of Alberta, near Hay Lake. In one of the late bulletins which I receive it has been stated that this work is soon to start. If the success of the last few years is a criterion we can be certain that the duck population is being well looked after. And it is costing Canada very little.

 Several years ago a duck licence was imposed on the hunters in Canada. Only two dollars for each of us, but that, too, is being well-spent, helping to make certain that ducks are being well cared for, and even with heavy hunting they are holding their own.

Wouldn’t it be nice if someone could finally realize that there should be something done to help our fast dwindling deer herd?