Count the Bands "CRAZY"

[duckfvr]

I saw this on the way home and tried to get some pictures out of the truck window while i was coasting by without scaring them to bad. There was about 120 birds in this field and at least 30 of them were banded, but i did not get good pics of the whole flock just a piece of it. I had to get some pics cause i knew no one would beleive me!

[Galpster]

Not a bird hunter so forgive me when I ask this dumb question. What is it with bands?

[Axle]

Not a bird hunter so forgive me when I ask this dumb question. What is it with bands?

Too much of our money to play with.

[lokidog]

I used to make these bands for the Wildlife Ecology Department, University of WI Madison, when I was in college (1984-6).  They use different color combinations and number/letter sequences depending where they are tagged.  I think these birds will usually have a leg band as well.  The nice thing about the neck bands is that they can be identified w/o shooting the bird in no hunting areas.  This also allows the researchers to get multiple hits on a birds' location which might actually save research money.... 

I think a person can contact the same number for reporting tags as leg bands, but am not sure.  I think geese stick together more as a flock than ducks so when a group are banded, it is more likely to see them together later on.

[h2ofowlr]

I believe they banded over 300 on the east side in an effort to track the local decline.  If you head out to the coast you will see the similar.  Many white collars.

[turkey slayer]

They banded 100+ bird in the Weantchee area

[luvtohnt]

I was in on the banding of some birds a couple of years ago and they were trying to study the local populations. They are having problems with too many local geese that never leave the area. They were trying to see how many geese hang around all year. I am not sure what the results if any have be deduced from the research.

Brandon

[Dustin07]

Not a bird hunter so forgive me when I ask this dumb question. What is it with bands?

Too much of our money to play with.

don't mostly volunteers contribute to the banding?

[lokidog]

Even government volunteers cost taxpayers money.....    plus then they need data entry types, more computers, and lots of supervisors.

[Dustin07]

Even government volunteers cost taxpayers money.....    plus then they need data entry types, more computers, and lots of supervisors.

well the supervisors would be there anyways though, you can't have a successful operation without a 2:1 ratio of supervisors to workers. bands or not   

[teal101]

They banded 100+ bird in the Weantchee area

The majority of em sit on the Rock Island golf course taunting me.

[lokidog]

They banded 100+ bird in the Weantchee area

The majority of em sit on the Rock Island golf course taunting me.

You should see if you can find a member to introduce you to the club manager (or just go yourself) and see if they'll let you do some early depredation hunts, maybe with a bow if not a shotgun.

[teal101]

They banded 100+ bird in the Weantchee area

The majority of em sit on the Rock Island golf course taunting me.

You should see if you can find a member to introduce you to the club manager (or just go yourself) and see if they'll let you do some early depredation hunts, maybe with a bow if not a shotgun.

Problem is our local population is supposedly declining, hence the lack of an early goose season this year, so I doubt I'd get any support.  We know the fields around the area to target for them though.

[carpsniperg2]

thats 2 great

[woodywsu]

Actually WDFW's counts lead biologists to believe that counts are decreasing, but the truth is. The have realized that their approach is what is screwed up. They have been doing counts for years using the same locations and when they see those counts decrease, they ASSUME the population is decreasing. But what is happening, is that more local birds are moving to golf courses and other areas that are not targetted for counts, causing WDFW biologists to miss them or mis-count. I have discussed this issue with their lead waterfowl biologists. What is sad is that WDFW statistics are counts are so bad and biased, WDFW decides our bag limits based on other state's counts. Sounds pretty rediculous to me, let's hope they can get this figured out prior to next summer.