Water, water everywhere

But really, its not. F&G blocks on the whole are either dry, or getting that way. ABCD Flax Block (not a F&G block)is semi dry. The big "Duck Factories" of the 80's & 90's are almost anything but. Add in botulism and you'd have every reason to be quite pessimistic about your chances of getting a duck or 2. But the AW banding results from early this year, while not 'crunched' and 'documented' indicated that the traditional moulting/banding sites were anything but under-populated, in fact they were crawling with birds and the catch rate was as high or higher than ever before. While the data is extraordinarily skewed to the actual locations of the banding sites, the scientific facts are that duck numbers in the region are hardly dwindling, if anything the birds have simply moved to where the habitat meets their needs.

In terms of environmental factors I feel genuinely sorry for the blokes who slog their guts out defending, improving and enhancing wetlands and then have no water, but the facts are that dry seasons do happen, and when they do its going to be a hard road ahead for them. The investment in wetland management, and in fact all types of waterfowl hunting is a big one and I simply don't know of any really succesful guys who just turn up on the day and shoot hoards of birds - well maybe with the exception of maize field shooting, but even then adequate camo and good dekes make a difference and they both take time and effort to maintain. The mudflat guys prep their boats and given that they stay in or on the water 2 months of the year (the Firth of Thames floating maimai ones)they need to be maintained and prepped well in advance. The pond guys need to be spraying, chopping, dragging and generally maintaining on an ongoing basis and that takes a chunk of time and commitment. The point is I suppose, that with all of that outlay it ought to be reasonable to expect a return by way of a harvest. Some guys may be happy to sit in the maimai on a dry pond and have a beer or 2 to pass the day, but the average joe license holder is probably going to reconsider his or her investment in a license if they get hammered by the conditions year after year. And this is shaping up as one of the tough seasons. I drove to Hamilton and back twice in the past 5 days, and can say I have never seen the river so low. The Mangatawhiri River which borders the Dean and Cocks blocks is so low that only the deep channel is carrying water. There were good numbers of birds in some spots on the Waikato, but even she's really low with sandbars exposed that are normally 4-5 feet under water. So will we see a fall in license sales next year? F&G is desperately under-funded and calling on regions to tap into their reserve funds to put into the central pool (ehem) so any weather related impact on license revenue is going to hurt.

Putting life into perspective though - now something like 70% of the national dairy herd is living in drought regions. Production impact is being forecast at anywhere between 2-5% of total output and some farmers are in desperate cash flow strapped situations. We need to spare a thought for those families affected and wish for them that the rains come soon.

And when they do, so hopefully will the ducks come to the F&G swamp blocks, and i really do hope that this happens before Queens Birthday when they are closed up to hunter access.