October 19, 2007 - TOP STORIES
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Minnesotan wins Federal Duck Stamp Contest
Twin Cities suburbs turn to bow hunters to cull deer herds
Mille Lacs sees drop in walleye numbers
Pheasant hunters want more hard-to-get wildlife areas
13 men face total of $14,000 in fines and restitution
Minnesotan wins Federal Duck Stamp Contest
Joe Hautman named winner of the 75th Anniversary Federal Duck Stamp Contest in Sanibel, Fla.
See photos of the contest judging in the Oct 19 issue of Outdoors Weekly!
U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service Reports
Wildlife artist Joe Hautman of Plymouth, Minn., last Friday won the 2007 Federal Duck Stamp Art Contest - the oldest and most prestigious wildlife art competition in America - with his depiction of a pair of pintail ducks. Department of the Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne announced the winner in front of a crowd of 300 people at the contest, held at BIG Arts in Sanibel, Fla.
“It was a privilege for me to congratulate Joe Hautman when the judges chose his art to grace the 75th Duck Stamp,” said Secretary Kempthorne. ‘The Duck Stamp program is unique in the realm between art and conservation. This art will be transformed into an equally beautiful stamp and help protect wetlands by generating funding through the sale of that stamp to hunters, stamp-collectors and conservationists. People talk about how art can change the world, and the Duck Stamp is an excellent example. You just need to look at the more than five million acres of waterfowl habitat protected by their purchase using funds from the stamp for proof of the power of this art.”
Hautman’s painting - chosen from among 247 entries from artists across the country - will be featured on the 2008-2009 Federal Duck Stamp which will go on sale in late June 2008. Federal Duck Stamp sales raise about $25 million each year to fund wetland habitat acquisition for the National Wildlife Refuge System. The annual Federal Duck Stamp Contest is the only federally-sponsored juried art competition, and is run by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. This year’s contest crowns the winner of the 75th duck stamp since the program’s inception in 1934. Before 1949, a commission selected the design.
“This was the most exciting Duck Stamp contest in history,’ said H. Dale Hall, Director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “To have a three-way tie for first place, then to have the artist and his family right here in the audience, was fantastic. We’re going to continue to move this contest around the country to give the public a chance to own this.”
The competition was surrounded by a week of public events at J.N. “Ding” Darling National Wildlife Refuge and BIG Arts celebrating the life of artist, conservationist and creator of the Duck Stamp, J.N. “Ding” Darling. Born in 1876 in Michigan, Darling was a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner for his conservation-themed cartoons. He also served as Chief of the Bureau of Biological Survey, the forerunner of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, from 1934-1935. Darling’s conservation legacy remains the foundation for the broad-based support and strategic vision of North America’s successful waterfowl management efforts.
All waterfowl hunters age 16 and older are required to purchase and carry the current Migratory Bird Conservation and Hunting Stamp - commonly known as the Duck Stamp - but conservationists, stamp collectors and others also purchase the stamp in support of habitat conservation. Ninety-eight percent of the proceeds from the $15 Duck Stamp go to the Migratory Bird Conservation Fund, which supports the purchase of acres of wetlands for inclusion into the National Wildlife Refuge System.
To date, Duck Stamp funds have been used to acquire habitat at hundreds of refuges, in nearly every state in our nation. There are 548 national wildlife refuges spread across all 50 states and U.S. territories. A current Duck Stamp can be used for free admission to any national wildlife refuge open to the public. Refuges offer unparalleled recreational opportunities, including hunting, fishing, bird watching and photography.
Joe Hautman won the Federal Duck Stamp contest in 1992 and 2002. He has also won multiple state Duck Stamp contests. His brothers, Bob and Jim, are also multiple Federal Duck Stamp Contest winners.
Hautman attended the Federal Duck Stamp contest this year with his family. The audience gave him a standing ovation when his art was chosen as the winning piece.
“I’ve been to a lot of Duck Stamp contests, and this is the most exciting one I’ve been to,” Hautman said. “I’d like to thank my family, and the Fish and Wildlife Service, who turns this artwork into wetlands and ducks.”
Hautman’s winning art depicts two pintails--a male and female--nestled gracefully atop reeds in a marsh.
Second place went to Harold Roe, of Sylvania, Ohio, who painted an acrylic of a lone green-winged teal. Roe has previously placed highly in the Federal Duck Stamp Contest. Third place went to Scot Storm of Freeport, Minn., who painted a pair of mallards in acrylic. Storm’s work appeared on the 2004-2005 Federal Duck Stamp.
Eligible species for this year’s contest were the mallard, northern pintail, canvasback, green-winged teal and harlequin duck.
Although no cash prize is awarded for winning the Federal Duck Stamp Contest, the artist receives worldwide recognition and, because he or she retains the rights to the original art, can profit from the sale of limited edition prints.
Duck Stamps bearing this year’s winning design will go on sale at post offices, National Wildlife Refuges, some national retail chain stores, and various sporting-goods stores nationwide in late June of 2008. The 2008-2009 Duck Stamp will be available at select locations in both a self-adhesive format and the traditional gummed format. In addition, the Service recently started a three-year pilot program allowing the state fish and wildlife management agencies of Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Maryland, Minnesota, New York, Texas, and Wisconsin, to sell stamps electronically through their individual automated licensing systems, providing a special receipt as proof of purchase.
Twin Cities suburbs turn to bow hunters to cull deer herds
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) – Some Twins Cities suburbs are turning to bow hunters to reduce the number of deer that are coming onto their property.
In recent years, more communities have enlisted the help of Metro Bowhunters Resource Base, a nonprofit coalition of Minnesota archery groups that supplies qualified archers free of charge to thin out deer in urban areas.
The group, which has a membership of more than 500 archers, is involved with nearly 20 hunts this season in counties, cities and parks, said president Bob Whiting. Since 1995, he said, its archers have removed 2,000 deer at no cost to local governments.
“That’s 2,000 deer that didn’t get hit by cars,” said Whiting, who estimates that the group’s bowhunters take an average of 200 deer each year in the Twin Cities metropolitan area.
Whiting said that hunters with Metro Bowhunters use deer stands and almost always get the deer with their first arrow. If a deer is wounded, he said, the hunter will track it to the property line and notify local authorities.
Animal rights activists prefer nonlethal methods to combat the problem, such as planting greenery that doesn’t attract deer and using roadside reflectors to discourage them from crossing highways. And if lethal force must be used, they prefer guns over bows, said Michael Markarian, executive vice president of the Humane Society of the United States in Washington.
While sharpshooters using guns may be more effective at controlling deer, they’re also noisy, intimidating and often expensive (many are paid $250 to $300 per deer). And while modern arrows are as deadly as bullets, hunting with bows is generally considered safer than guns because it must be done within 150 feet of the target.
The Department of Natural Resources recommends no more than 20 deer per square mile in urban areas, said Bryan Leuth, the agency’s urban area wildlife manager said. Some suburbs average up to 80 deer per square mile.
“We’re finding that deer adapt well to living in suburban situations because of a lack of predators and good access to food,” he said. “Deer have adapted to living with people.”
A convert to bowhunting this year is Shorewood, one of several Lake Minnetonka communities where deer are rapidly multiplying. Last year the city used sharpshooters and police officers to remove deer on a private golf course.
Ramsey County, which typically has 1,200 to 1,500 deer within its borders, coordinates bowhunts during deerhunting season in open spaces in New Brighton, Shoreview, White Bear Township, Vadnais Heights, Maplewood and St. Paul.
The county conducts a survey each year to determine if the deer population is large enough to justify a hunt, using a figure of about 25 deer per mile of habitat as the threshold. The county then works with bowhunters from Metro Bowhunters and stages hunts in the 11 parks within its area.
Notices are placed around the park and in some cases the park is closed during a hunt.
In North Oaks, a herd of nearly 1,000 deer has been whittled down to the current level of 150 over the past 16 years, Mayor Thomas Watson said. But the community considered and rejected bowhunting. “Residents were very uncomfortable with the idea of bow-and-arrow hunters going through your property,” Watson said.
In 2002, Burnsville decided to control its herds through bowhunting and special rifle hunts.
Mille Lacs sees drop in walleye numbers
DNR News
While the walleye population in Lake Mille Lacs remains healthy, it may be smaller than expected, according to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR).
This fact was discovered during recent routine test netting to monitor the size and abundance of walleye. The DNR reports near-shore test nets caught only half as many walleye as the long-term average from 1983-2006. Nets placed in deeper water also caught fewer walleye than previous years.
“Lake Mille Lacs continues to have a large number of walleye in a wide range of sizes,” said DNR Fisheries Chief Ron Payer. “That’s good. And we expected some decline in walleye numbers based on a number of factors, including a weak 2004-year class of walleye. But the magnitude of this year’s decline was unanticipated.”
Payer said near-shore net catches this autumn averaged 7.2 walleye per net. This compares to an average of 15.4 from 1983-2006. Last year’s catch rate was 20.4 walleye per net. The DNR did not catch as many medium - and large-sized walleye as expected. He attributed the decline, in part, to higher than normal mortality due to unusually warm water temperatures, especially in June. Higher water temperatures stress fish and hooking mortality increases as water temperature increases.
Payer said anglers should know Mille Lacs continues to hold good numbers of spawning-sized fish. Still, the new data means the DNR will need to revisit regulations to ensure the lake’s walleye harvest stays within the safe harvest level and the state’s allocation. No walleye harvest overage will be allowed in 2008 due to the lower than anticipated number of walleye in recent population assessments.
Lake Mille Lacs is managed differently than any other lake in Minnesota. Its safe harvest level is set following meetings between the DNR and Chippewa Indian bands that signed the 1837 Treaty. Fisheries biologists have estimated that 549,000 lbs. of walleye can be safely harvested from Mille Lacs from Dec. 1, 2006, through Nov. 30, 2007. The eight bands set their harvest at 100,000 lbs., leaving 449,000 lbs. for non-band anglers.
The state may take up to 22 percent more than the allocation of 449,000 lbs. Currently, state-licensed anglers have harvested about 470,000 pounds, which is more than the allocation but within the 547,800-pound cap.
Current regulations on Mille Lacs allow anglers only to keep walleye between 14 and 16 inches, and not more than one walleye longer than 28 inches. The limit is four. This regulation is more restrictive than the regulation that was in effect during the early part of the fishing season because the estimated walleye harvest exceeded 365,000 pounds by July 1, a threshold that triggered a need for a regulation change to stay within the harvest cap. That regulation is scheduled to expire on Nov. 30 and a 20- to 28-inch protected slot would go into effect on Dec. 1.
Payer said DNR Fisheries managers recently met with the Lake Mille Lacs Advisory Group to discuss fishing options for this winter. No decisions were made at that meeting though participants attending the meeting favored retaining the 20- to 28-inch protected slot starting Dec. 1. This regulation would include a bag limit of four and only one walleye 28 inches or larger.
Pheasant hunters want more hard-to-get wildlife areas
The DNR has a new, targeted strategy for adding WMAs
By Chris Niskanen, St. Paul Pioneer Press
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) – When the pheasant season opened Saturday, one of the busiest places in Minnesota was the David B. Vesall Wildlife Management Area in Lac qui Parle County.
At 640 acres, the WMA is the largest new acquisition for the Department of Natural Resources in western Minnesota. Named after a former DNR wildlife director from Stillwater, the wildlife area’s parking lots will be packed with hunters hours before the 9 a.m. opener.
“I wouldn't be surprised if there are 30 to 40 people setting up at every corner before the season opens,” said Brad Olson, a DNR wildlife manager in Appleton.
WMAs are critical public hunting areas in Minnesota’s pheasant range, Olson and other wildlife experts say, yet these protected grasslands and wetlands account for only about 1 percent of the total landscape in the pheasant range. Not all of the 361,000 acres of WMAs in the pheasant range are considered suitable habitat.
Yet, DNR officials acknowledge there is a “huge” demand for WMAs in the pheasant range. Olson said he would encounter hunters from the Twin Cities, Duluth, Grand Rapids and all places in between at WMAs in western Minnesota.
But is state funding for WMA purchases keeping up with demand?
Even in the best of times, the answer is no.
In 2002, a WMA task force recommended adding 178,000 acres of WMAs in the pheasant range in the next decade, or 17,800 acres annually. The number was based not only on hunter needs but also on the need to protect critical habitat in rapidly developing areas.
Last year, the DNR added 5,700 acres of WMAs (including the Vesall WMA) in the pheasant range, the second highest annual increase in a decade, but less than a third of the report’s annual goal.
This year, the DNR will do better, adding as much as 8,000 acres in the pheasant range, but it will be far less than recommended by the task force. Most experts agree the report’s goal is a pipe dream unless new state funding sources are found.
“I think there is a huge demand, but I don’t think we can ever buy enough land in the agricultural area of the state to meet that demand,” said Dennis Simon, DNR wildlife chief. “It’s not going to happen.”
Still, the past two years are considered boom years for WMA acquisition.
In 2005 and 2006, the Legislature responded to the WMA task force report by ponying up $24 million in borrowed money through the state’s bonding process to buy wildlife lands. But the DNR’s ability to optimize those dollars has been cut short by skyrocketing land prices.
Kim Hennings, who oversees the DNR’s acquisition program, said land prices have increased four to fivefold in the past decade. In 1997, the agency was paying about $500 per acre; today, the price for prime land has jumped to nearly $3,000 per acre. Less valuable land sells for about $1,800.
“About $2,600 has been the average on options we’ve done lately,” Hennings said.
Despite the decline in home prices seen in Minnesota and around the country, there has been no trickle-down effect. That troubled housing market hasn’t made a dent in the price of recreational and agricultural land that Hennings is trying to acquire.
Simon said the DNR is trying to buy the best lands with its dwindling buying power.
“I think we’re on the right track, but there’s nothing we can do to affect the market pressures on land prices. In some cases, we just have to bite the bullet,” he said.
Still, the quickening pace of recent acquisitions had conservation leaders cheering. The numbers of WMA acres added annually to the pheasant range averaged 2,000 to 3,000 in the past decade. It spiked in 2000 to 6,400 and dropped to 975 in 2002.
“We’re happy to be getting the additional bonding money in the past two years, but it’s not close to what was recommended in the (2002) report,” said Matt Holland, a senior field coordinator for Pheasants Forever. Holland was one of the report’s authors.
In the past, hunters’ license fees paid for many WMAs. Today, Holland said, it is appropriate that WMA funding come from the state’s general fund (including bonding appropriations) because WMAs have a positive impact on all Minnesotans’ lives.
“(WMAs) provide protected wetlands and habitat for all types of wildlife,” he said, adding that rural communities benefit economically from hunters’ visits.
Simon said the DNR doesn’t know how many people visit WMAs, but the agency is preparing a study on the issue. He said the DNR and the University of Minnesota also are looking at how state-owned WMAs affect local tax bases under a program in which the state pays local governments (called payment in lieu of tax) to offset the loss of tax revenues.
The DNR has a new, targeted strategy for adding WMAs, too. Instead of buying small parcels and scattering them throughout the countryside, the DNR wants to add parcels to existing chunks of public land, thus creating “habitat complexes.”
The blocks might include a mix of federal and locally owned wildlife habitat. Biologists have found that large blocks of habitat serve wildlife better than smaller parcels do.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is partnering with the DNR to make its acquisitions more strategic. That agency owns 298,000 acres of Waterfowl Production Areas throughout the pheasant range, areas that also serve as important public hunting areas. The lands are bought exclusively with funds derived from the sale of federal ducks stamps; the Fish and Wildlife Service has added 15,500 acres of WPAs in the pheasant range in the past decade.
Creating large complexes of grasslands and wetlands has become the strategy of both agencies.
“On small parcels, there’s no place for birds to find a refuge,” Simon said. “An 80-acre unit can get pounded hard (by visitors). We’re trying to make these units large complexes.”
Conversation leaders agree on one thing – that a larger pool of state money is needed to buy WMAs. They also agree that the best chance to get that money is through dedicating a portion of the sales tax to natural resources.
Legislative leaders have promised to make that their first order of business when the Legislature begins Feb. 12. House and Senate leaders say they will push for a vote on a 2008 ballot question asking voters to approve a three-eighths of 1 percent sales tax increase, which would generate about $292 million annually and about $7 billion over the 25-year life of the legislation.
The money appears to be the only hope for funding an accelerated WMA program, conservation leaders say.
Brad Olson, the wildlife manager, knows hunters are closely following the progress of the WMA program – and dedicated funding at the Legislature.
“We get calls inquiring about new acquisitions before the ink is dry on the deed,” he said. “They follow these additions closely. And they’re waiting for the next one.”
13 men face total of $14,000 in fines and restitution
Bevy of out-of-state anglers face heavy fines and restitution
See photo in this week's issue of Outdoors Weekly on newsstands now!
DNR News
Anglers from Colorado to Illinois to Indiana to Florida face a bevy of fines and restitution for taking recent overlimits of fish in Minnesota.
A September 20, 2007 call to the Turn In Poacher (TIP) hotline found Peter Vandernoord, 90, Dyer, Indiana; Clarence D. Landhuis, 79, Orlando, Florida; and Herbert V. Weele, 78 and John Templeman, 76, both of Lansing, Illinois in possession of 240 perch over the legal limit. The legal limit for perch in Minnesota is 20 per day and 40 in possession.
Conservation Officer Tim Collette of Longville and a Cass County Boat and Water deputy visited the resort cabin that the men were staying in at Woman Lake near Hackensack, Minn., where they discovered 23 packages of frozen fish. An additional 14 bags of frozen fish was found in the resort office freezer.
The four men were each cited for 60 perch over the legal limit, a gross overlimit of fish. Fine and restitution total nearly $2,000 for each man. If convicted they could lose their fishing licenses for three years. No trial date has been set.
In other incidents on Woman Lake, George Brinker of Roanoke, Indiana and Marc Lothamer of Fort Wayne, Indiana, received a citation for fines and restitution totaling $1600 for being 56 sunfish over the legal limit and three perch over the legal limit. The possession limit for sunfish in Minnesota is 20. Meanwhile, Loren Hackman and Mark Worman, both of Elkhart, Indiana and Richard Elliot of Goshen, Indiana, face fines and restitution totaling $1200 for being 32 perch over the legal limit.
Lastly, Conservation Officer Larry Francis of Remer found Francis J. Britton, 73, Estero, Florida, Ron A. Hanson, 68, and Ernest H. Post, 80, both of Schererville, Indiana with an overlimit of perch. They face fines and restitution totaling nearly $1,700.
In still another incident, a Colorado angler faces a gross overlimit of sunfish on Thirteen Lake near Cass Lake. On October 4, Conservation Officer Mark Mathy of Cass Lake observed James B. Jahnz, 57, of Boulder, Colorado, place a large number of fish in his boat while fishing. A check found Jahnz 106 sunfish over the limit. Fine and restitution amount to $1600.
“We love to have people come and fish Minnesota. But you’ve got to obey the rules and regulations,” said Chief Conservation Officer, Colonel Mike Hamm. “Thirteen could prove to be both an unlucky and costly number for these 13 anglers.”
Established in 1981, the TIP program allows Minnesotans to call a toll-free number from anywhere in the state to report natural resource violations. Calls regarding violations can be placed anonymously at 1-800-652-9093; cash rewards are given for tips.
© 2007 Outdoors Weekly Corporation