Waterfowl season has come and gone. Hopefully, you’ve got plenty of good memories to reflect upon during the long offseason. And more importantly, hopefully, you didn’t make any blunders, intentionally or otherwise, that put you on the wrong side of the law—as these guys did.
During the last five months, Split Reed has kept tabs on waterfowling’s biggest news, including poaching incidents, of which there were some truly eye-popping ones. These are the strangest waterfowl poaching incidents of the season.
1. “Black Ducks”
In early January, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Refuge Law Enforcement announced that it had cited two people for “unlawfully harvesting migratory non-game birds” in Virginia. In simpler terms, these fellows stoned two cormorants, believing them to be ducks. The goofiest part of the story is that when they were approached by law enforcement, they said they’d mistaken the birds for black ducks.
2. Night Hunting
We’ve all heard people shooting before legal shooting time, but have you ever heard of someone actually hunting at night? Well, that’s exactly what Georgia DNR Law Enforcement found on January 2nd in Worth County. Georgia wardens cited three individuals for hunting ducks after hours and exceeding legal bag limits after taking 21 wood ducks. While Georgia DNR did not disclose exactly how the hunters were able to kill ducks in the dark, one can only assume that they were water swatting them.
AI Hallucination
In October, we reported on the first—and certainly not last—incidents of duck hunters being cited for relying on incorrect regulatory information provided by AI. In this case, waterfowlers in Idaho hunted out of season because AI pulled dates from the draft but not the final regulations. Sometimes I still chuckle thinking about how good those guys probably thought the hunting was—and how confused they were that they were the only ones shooting—before wardens busted them.
Dumping Snow
Twice during the season, game wardens stirred emotions in the waterfowling world by posting photos of massive piles of wasted snow geese. The first incident took place early in the season in Saskatchewan when 142 dead birds were found dumped on private land. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the only time a similar incident was reported. In December, 207 snows were found dumped in two Mississippi dumpsters. Officials have been investigating both incidents.
Duck Club Bust
This incident was actually settled before the waterfowl season kicked off—but it’s too shocking not to include in the story. Last summer, a federal judge shut down an entire duck club in Illinois for two years for baiting birds by scattering corn around blinds. According to a U.S. DOJ press release, Hugh Burns, the club’s owner, was fined $11,000 and must also pay $50,000 in restitution to the Illinois Department of Natural Resources.