Syracuse.com - DEC promises additional cormorant hazing on Oneida Lake this fall

[HuntingNY-News]

"The DEC recommends adding one additional hazing day each week during September to boost the program's effectiveness."

The following article appeared in the most recent newsletter of the Oneida Lake Association:

"David Lemon, DEC Fisheries’ Manager- Region 7, informed the OLA Board in

February that some changes should be in the offing.

"Among these are the following:

"The DEC recommends adding one additional hazing day each week during September to boost the program’s effectiveness.

"Statistics show that migratory cormorant numbers have been increasing during this month, making additional harassment prudent.

"Manager Lemon and his colleagues also recommend extending their hazing calendar into October, if bird counts spike during that month. Larger numbers of migrant birds have been observed in October in recent years.

"Previously, the DEC’s harassment program avoided dates in this month, in deference to the lake’s waterfowl hunters, but the presence of significant cormorant flocks creates an

urgency that must be addressed.

"If diet studies show that 90% or more of cormorant consumption is gizzard

shad, the DEC proposes eliminating hazing altogether during late September and

October. Massive shad hatches buffered Oneida Lake’s game fish populations

during the past two autumns. Shad effectively provided cormorants sustenance

so that the birds did not destroy walleyes and yellow perch.

"Lake area residents may hear more “banging” during this year’s hazing program

because federal regulations over the type of pyrotechnics used during the past three years have eased. The DEC proposes that harassment volunteers be allowed to purchase, store, and use these “pyros,” and their launchers, during this year’s program.

"During that golden time when the United States Fish and Wildlife Services protected Oneida Lake, personnel from that agency found that the “fireworks effect” was extremely effective in making cormorants leave the lake.

"In addition to hazing, DEC technicians will remove cormorant nests on Oneida Lake’s islands. In the era prior to harassment, cormorants produced hundreds of young on the isles, compounding their devastation of the lake’s walleyes and perch. Up to 360 nesting

pairs of cormorants used the lake’s islands by 2000; this no longer occurs because of

Wildlife Services’ and DEC efforts.

"Never forget the magnitude of cormorants’ impact on Oneida Lake in the recent past. In 1995, Cornell Field Station biologists began tabulating the number of fish killed by cormorants annually. In 1996 alone, the birds consumed around 4,113,000 Oneida Lake fish, including nearly 190,000 walleyes and slightly over 2,000,000 yellow perch. About 82,000 of the walleyes were age one or older fish that, in cormorants’ absence, would likely have reached adulthood, enriching the lake’s fishery and, consequently, the lake

area’s economy," the newsletter concluded.

View the full article on The Syracuse Outdoors Blog