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New Zealand demise of duck.


gunsmoke
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New report out for New Zealand, The Approaching demise of duck in NZ, By Neil Hayes

 

I tried to add the report to this post but it was too big to upload. I have added to the 'Save our lead Shot' facebook group.

 

The way I read the report is that Neil Hayes says that the demise of duck is because they use steel shot.

 

Could that be happening in the UK?

 

Mallard numbers in 1999 500,000 the year of the lead ban, 10 years later in 2010 the number had dropped to 180,000 mallard. Figures from the BTO.

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The reason for the drop in wintering UK mallard is because of the recent run of mild winters we have had over the past 20 years (with a few exceptions) encourage mallard to" short stop" in other words they are no longer migrating so far south west because the weather is not cold enough to force them to. 50 years ago mallard were a rare bird in Scandinavia because the winters were too cold , today they are common in winter and many of the rivers that used to freeze up are now open through the winter. The same thing is happening with some of our geese ( white fronts and bean ) .

 

In contrast our breeding resident population of mallard is slightly increasing. If steel shot was causing a problem both our resident and wintering populations would be effected. Its more likely that drainage , agricultrial developement and perhaps over shooting is the problem. I frequently see videos and photos of excessive bags which cant be good for the sport.

 

 

Just another smokescreen from the pro lead lobby.

Edited by anser2
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Having just read the report its not worth the paper its written on. He makes a number of claims , but they are clearly personal opinions . None of these claims have been reffrenced.

 

However what he clearly does outline is the pressures that have been put on New Zealand’s duck population from hunters. They are listed below.

 

 

 

Hunting seasons were expanded from four weeks to three months in most

districts

 

Pond feeding restrictions were eliminated

 

Daily bag limits were substantially increased

 

Electronic decoys were introduced (I vividly remember two of us

shooting a Wairarapa pond on opening day in 2008 with both of us

using revolving winged electronic decoys for the first time. The limit

was 12 each and by 6.50am we had 24 mallards in the bag and we

were off!)

 

The use of semi-auto 12 gauge shotguns with high cartridge magazine

capacity became widespread

 

Electronic duck calls were introduced

 

Intentional and non-intentional poisoning of waterfowl by farmers has

played its part in the decline

 

A major reduction in the number of wetland sanctuaries has also played a

part, but even at the well known Pauatahanui Inlet sanctuary, just north of

Wellington – once renowned for over 8,000 mallards taking up residence

during the duck season – there have been few, if any, mallards there during

the last three shooting seasons!

 

Its not surprising that any population of waterfowl being hit with so many changes to the hunting rules would go into steep decline. And New Zealand always had a small duck population compared to Europe .

Edited by anser2
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This is not the best written report but the way I read it, Neil Hayes is saying that because they have a bag limit and shooter are using more cartridges to get their bag limit. Birds are hit but do not drop. So the wounding rate with steel shot has gone up in New Zealand and that is way the numbers are falling.

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ready to be shot down in flames over this but here goes

has anyone looked into the long term effects of wounding with steel shot, when I was in fabrication if I got a steel splinter it soon turned nasty, corroded inside my skin, festered and raised a small cyst which made them easier to pop and pull the splinter out (luckily never turned into a serious infection),, lead. being fairly inert surely just heals over and does not cause long term problems, most poisoning cases seem to be from eating the stuff, after all that was why the ban was introduced in the first place??

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This is not the best written report but the way I read it, Neil Hayes is saying that because they have a bag limit and shooter are using more cartridges to get their bag limit. Birds are hit but do not drop. So the wounding rate with steel shot has gone up in New Zealand and that is way the numbers are falling.

In which case why is are not the UK resident mallard effected in the same way? As for the argument that they are wounding more ducks because of bag limits. What rubbish. If they did not have bag limits then they would shoot more ducks , shoot more shells and wound more birds.

 

If the NZ shooters are wounding so many ducks then there is a simple reason , they are shooting at them out of range or they are using the wrong shells. I shot a lot of duck and geese with steel , both on the foreshore and inland up to ranges of 45 yards and recon my average is the same as in the old days when we used to use lead. Shot within range steel produces clean kills with very few wounded birds. Its my prefered shot for all my shooting today game , pigeons and wildfowl. The problem with steel is too many people treat it like lead and if you do you will not get such good results. Use fast loads , pellets 2-3 times bigger than you would in lead and get chokes to match the size of pellet you are using and do not shoot at birds beyond range ( 45 yards ) and you will wonder what all the fuss is about. Make no mistake about it steel kills , kills cleanly and kills well.

Edited by anser2
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ready to be shot down in flames over this but here goes

has anyone looked into the long term effects of wounding with steel shot, when I was in fabrication if I got a steel splinter it soon turned nasty, corroded inside my skin, festered and raised a small cyst which made them easier to pop and pull the splinter out (luckily never turned into a serious infection),, lead. being fairly inert surely just heals over and does not cause long term problems, most poisoning cases seem to be from eating the stuff, after all that was why the ban was introduced in the first place??

In my experience I found the same, but as far as I know no studies have been carried out to this aim. There is no doubt lead is toxic, but the question still remains as to the extent that toxicity has on our environment, our wildlife and human health in the amounts referred to in shooting game.

 

 

Having just read the report its not worth the paper its written on.

 

 

Just another smokescreen from the pro lead lobby.

I find these remarks annoying really. While I don't agree with the causes of the fate of New Zealand ducks as Gunsmoke claims, the anti lead lobby aren't averse to laying down smoke in their attempts to further their agenda, and haven't exactly enshrined themselves in fact based glory. Likewise, your link to a study where ducks were force fed lead via a tube as indicative of how it is fatal to wildfowl and other claims that duck deaths were brought about by one shot aren't exactly convincing either.

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Scully rear a few mallard , keep them in a pen with a pond , scattter the contents of one lead cartridge in the shallow water and see how many ducks you have alive after a couple of months . Then try and tell me that lead does not posion ducks.

 

There are also studies where captive ducks picked up lead pellets naturaly and became posioned. I speak to a lot of shooters who have never fired steel and yet are some of the loudest to condem it. Wildfowlers need a cartridge that kills at decent range and kills some of the biggest and difficult to kill birds and today most are very happy to use steel.

 

90% of the problem is tradition , most shooters have always used lead and they do not want to change. Some may have used steel when it first came out andhad bad experiances with it , that was my experiance at the time and I hated the stuff with a vengence. But watching a friend pluck duck after duck out of the sky at 50 yards with modern steel I experminted with the new shells, changed my chokes , updated my idear on shot sizes , changed my guns for guns built for the job and found that in reality steel will do all I want for wildfowling.

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You keep harping on about rearing ducks and deliberately feeding them lead. I have no doubt if you deliberately fed lead to anything it would eventually be poisoned, and have no intention of doing so. In my experience it doesn't happen in the wild.

At the rare breeds sanctuary I worked at which held the occasional clay shoot it didn't happen and on the two ponds we have on our rough shoot which must have been heavily shot over for decades, it isn't happening, nor on the other three ponds on a large shoot I used to beat on. In all the years we've been shooting our land, and feeding ducks on our ponds, we have never come across a single duck showing signs of ailing anything. Not a single one. Nor have we found a carcass of a duck. Given the claims to the contrary I remain sceptical.

Lead is toxic, no one is denying that, but is it having the effect on our environment, human health and our wildlife to the extent it is detrimental to its collective well being? Like I said, I am very sceptical.

I'm not condemning steel; I use it myself to great effect, but only because I have to.

Have any studies into the long term effects of steel, bismuth, tungsten etc been carried out?

Most shooters don't want to change because they see no reason why they should. It works well, and has done for hundreds of years.

Unlike you I never hated steel, I was reluctant to use it only because of the horror stories I heard about scored barrels, and even having a gun 'built for the job' wont prevent that.

The science regarding the claimed effect lead shot has on human health has been quashed, and on the others remains spurious and riddled with agenda bias in my opinion, and that is why I oppose it.

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