We ARE IN FOR A RUDE AWAKENING!!!! SHORTER DUCK SEAON!!

Carl, the spice medley "makes" a terrine: fresh thyme,stripped and chopped, alllspice fresh ground (lends the flavors of clove,cinnamon, nutmeg all-in-one), fresh ground black and white pepper. Weighting the terrine after baking achieves two things: 1.) It pushes all the spice infused fats and juices throughout the loaf, permeating it with flavor, while compressing the terrine as it cools. 2.)Much of the now-liquid phase fat is pushed to the outside surfaces of the terrine,congealing on the outer faces. With the aid of salt and nitrates in the bacon, this fat layer extends the "life" of the terrine, post production, to several weeks.

The recommended method for weighting is to lay something that weighs-in around 2-3lbs. that will fit inside the terrine mold's edges, and is inert

IF, you know anyone who raises rabbits( preferably New Zealand whites) , substitution of rabbit liver(milder less bitter bile-like background flavor than chicken livers) is an excellent option.

Thursa loved bread-and -butter pickles with her terrine slice. Preserves or chutney (Major Grey's Hot Mango is our favorite.) are good choices, too.

What Chris is describing is a pate', since the outer layer is pastry, according to my spouse (French Canadian).
 
Andrew, from what I recall, Wisconsin was turned down by the USFWS following their last attempt to add a Late Sea Duck Zone to their hunting zone grid after the Mississippi Zone was granted.

Since you did not request clarification, I am not going to get into r versus K-selected species comparisons as they relate to population biology.

I would estimate the number of commercial Sea Duck specialty guide operations at less than 10 along the west coast of Lake Michigan. The MDNR just closed-out a multi-year investigation that culminated in the conviction of a Sea Duck "guide" that operated on the Straits of Mackinaw, as well as Saginaw Bay.
 
RL, good info! I looked up a couple of recipes. I'm gonna give it a try.
 
Just because you do not fancy them and others do. Does not make them crap.
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I didn't say that they are crap, I said they taste/smell like crap - and they do to most people (maybe not you when brined and smoked). Point being most people do not eat them AND that is good for seaducks, in general, that most people don't like them. Were they easy to eat, they would be hunted harder.

If more folks craved a bowl of coot stew, the population would be in worse shape in my opinion.
 
Andrew, from what I recall, Wisconsin was turned down by the USFWS following their last attempt to add a Late Sea Duck Zone to their hunting zone grid after the Mississippi Zone was granted.

Since you did not request clarification, I am not going to get into r versus K-selected species comparisons as they relate to population biology.

I would estimate the number of commercial Sea Duck specialty guide operations at less than 10 along the west coast of Lake Michigan. The MDNR just closed-out a multi-year investigation that culminated in the conviction of a Sea Duck "guide" that operated on the Straits of Mackinaw, as well as Saginaw Bay.
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Is this case in Michigan closed? I wasnt aware it had ended yet, There are plenty of guides chasing sea ducks on Lake Michigan and its growing every year.
 
No, Wisconsin has petitioned the USFWS to add both a Mississippi Zone and a Late Sea Duck Zone to their existing two-zone season foremat. The Mississippi Zone was granted a couple of years ago. They (WDNR) have continued to request a Late Sea Duck Zone for their section of western Lake Michigan with NO success. From Brad's comments, I doubt if this will ever be granted, since it would further expand hunting pressure on this waterfowl population segment.
 
I am just seeing this thread. I was at the "final" proposal meeting on Maine's part in this reduction. Of all the participants, about 25-30 or so, nobody, in my recollection, spoke against the reduction in total bag from 7 to 5 sea ducks or the reduction in days from the old Oct 1 to Jan31 to the new proposal Nov 11 to Jan 16, 2017.
Maine's bag limit will still stay separated, so 6 puddle ducks and 5 sea ducks, plus geese and etc.
With the sea duck season starting during the peak of Maine's deer season, and some would say the rut, you could argue that the sea duck season will be from after the Monday after Thanksgiving to Jan. 14, that's 42 huntable days.
I can concur that pressure has certainly risen here in southern Maine and stand on whichever side of the fence you will, I do not believe that any one party is solely responsible for the fluctuation in Maine's sea duck population. I think the movement of their food source and Black Back Gulls are as much an issue as any debated topic. And the argument of it's not like yesteryear, you're right, I don't know of much that is, but the new changes should certainly relieve some pressure on Maine birds.
 
No, Wisconsin has petitioned the USFWS to add both a Mississippi Zone and a Late Sea Duck Zone to their existing two-zone season foremat. The Mississippi Zone was granted a couple of years ago. They (WDNR) have continued to request a Late Sea Duck Zone for their section of western Lake Michigan with NO success. From Brad's comments, I doubt if this will ever be granted, since it would further expand hunting pressure on this waterfowl population segment.
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I was pretty sure it was either Mississippi zone or the Michigan zone. Had they not asked for the River zone they would have gotten. The Lake zone. I could be wrong but I that is the way it portrayed to me when it was being g discussed originally.
 
Not sure if its been shared before, but some good info on sea ducks


http://seaduckjv.org/science-resources/atlantic-and-great-lakes-sea-duck-migration-study/
 
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No, Wisconsin has petitioned the USFWS to add both a Mississippi Zone and a Late Sea Duck Zone to their existing two-zone season foremat. The Mississippi Zone was granted a couple of years ago. They (WDNR) have continued to request a Late Sea Duck Zone for their section of western Lake Michigan with NO success. From Brad's comments, I doubt if this will ever be granted, since it would further expand hunting pressure on this waterfowl population segment.
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I was pretty sure it was either Mississippi zone or the Michigan zone. Had they not asked for the River zone they would have gotten. The Lake zone. I could be wrong but I that is the way it portrayed to me when it was being g discussed originally.


Phil, pretty poorly worded by me. Yes, the original proposal submission was an either/or request for one additional Zone. Following approval of the Mississippi Zone(2014?), subsequent requests have been for addition of the Late Sea Duck Zone along the western Lake Michigan coast.
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RL

Wisconsin themselves turned down the opportunity to have a LM zone added and instead chose the Miss River zone 4 years ago but I have not heard about pursuits for an additional zone after that. I was at the forefront of the 'fight' for a Lake Michigan season about 4 years ago now when I was living in WI. In a round about way I was hoping it would bring attention the resource in a positive light, not just hoping to kill more sea ducks. My senior project was aerial off shore surveys and a small batch of harvest data from LM which showed very good success rates for those off shore hunting. I still think it would have been the right move for WI hunter opportunity and sea duck research but that ship has sailed for now.

I would appreciate your species comparison. I remember this portion of biology classes vaguely.

I think you are correct in the number of guides in WI, maybe even less.
Having hunted both east coast and LM I think conditions are far less tolerable on LM due to the lack of structure on LM. This plays into the role of those wanting to make the effort to pursue off-shore hunting.
 
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I think anyone that has hunted sea duck for any length of time has to agree that the populations are drastically less than they were ten years ago. This is not only true here in Connecticut but in the northern areas as well. Although the all reasons are not really known, the fact that there are less of them, they take several years to reach sexual maturity, and have received a fairly heavy amount of hunting pressure over the last several years it seems almost unsportsmanlike to not support shortened seasons and limits. Having talked to many people who harvest sea ducks and having a friend who guided for many years in Maine, like it or not, much of the sea duck harvest is NOT consumed by the hunter. This is too bad. Granted they are not quite as tasty as a teal or pintail but prepared right, they can be quite good, although this comment is directed at scoter and eider. I've not found any good way to cook an oldsquaw. As far as including them in the regular limit or not, this is largely a perception issue. If you're honest with yourself, if you're set up on an offshore ledge in Maine or anchored in Long Island Sound, the likelihood of shooting something other than a sea duck in extremely unlikely. Likewise, if you're set up for puddle ducks in a marsh, the opposite is true. Hunting broadbill might be an exception. Hopefully the new restrictions will help these birds, they're too neat to see disappear.
Now, not wishing to increase the harvest on the sea ducks, here's a recipe that we've used for years with scoter and eider with great success. Try it. Hopefully some more of the harvest will be eaten.Ingredients: 4-5 potatoes Bunch or two of carrots 1 turnip 3 Onions Celery (bunch sliced) Thyme Sweet basil Bay leaves Ground Marjoram 20 ounces of crushed tomatoes Remove damaged meat and fat from birds Cube the meat into bite sized pieces Flour and brown in OIL (not butter) Combine ingredients, adding water to desired consistency, simmer until done.
 
I have a friend who was involved in some aerial survey transect studies associated with offshore wind turbine "farm" locations. One of these was on the west coast of Lake Michigan and the other was in the Straits of Mackinaw (actually, lower St. Mary's River and coastal zone east of the Straits of Mackinaw). From what I recall from our conversations, long-tail numbers were significantly higher in spring (probably due to a truncated migration interval as birds moved through on their way to breeding/nesting sites). This was a multi-year sampling interval, spring and fall, but the actual sample numer (flights per season were down in the 4-5 range); a high number of flight transects, but not many flights.


Here is the WiDNR's official document outlining the formation of the Zones you mention:

dnr.wi.gov/about/nr/2011/December/12-11-2B3.pdf

I assume the aerial survey mentioned in this article was what you were involved in:

Pleast note Mr. Van Horn's statements...

http://www.jsonline.com/sports/outdoors/skys-the-limit-in-state-for-sea-duck-hunting-st3m80q-136713443.html

What Brad was driving at is that populations of sea ducks (long-tails in the current discussion) have a broad population biology "strategy" that places them farther along the coontinuum between the the two extemes of either r selection or K selection. K and r are derived from the Pearl-Verhulst (sp?) logistic growth equation; broadly accepted and utilized to describe logarithmic population growth. K is the upper-bound horixontal assymptote that has come to be designated broadly as a species' carrying capacity. K selected organisms generally exhibit: long life spans,low (er) fecundity, high levels/duration of parental care expended in rearing young, longer time interval to sexual maturity, slower growth. The intrinsic rate of natural increase coefficient "r" in this equation has come to be broadly referred to as the maximal rate of growth strategy employed by species that broadly exhibit a suite of life/reproductive behaviors ( low parental care/effort per progeny, high fecundity, short time interval between generations, multi-year breeding, etc.)

The proper use of these two terms is to state that Species A is more r or K selected that Species B, essentially placing each population relative to each other between these extreme endpoints of the continuum. When you hear someone state that species A is k-selective, you should always ask: relative to what other species? Essentially the terms are used to compare and differentiate "life strategies" at the population or species level.

Broadly, K selected species populations generally exist in more stable environments, with far lower amplitudes with respect to envrionmental variability temporally, which generally occur at latitudes closer the equator and/or altitudes closer to sea level for terrestrial organisms. In converse, r selected organisms generally occupy highly changeable environments exhibiting broad swings in environmental variability. Generally, these occur at higher latitudes and/or altitudes.

Essentially, this was the broad point that Steve Sutton previously conveyed when he discussed management of mallards versus eiders...a very well fleshed-out effort to differentiate the broad differences in their respective biology to argue the rationale of why their populations should be also managed differently.
 
Correct, that article is the survey I was involved in.
If I remember correctly we tried to fly once a week for a 2 month period in the spring and again in the fall.
Weather, waves and visibility played large factors and probably 50% of flights were rescheduled or cancelled. Meaning sometimes we flew twice in a week and other times 10 days apart.

Thank you for brush up on biology.
 
Well that just induced a flash-back to my Principle of Ecology 400-level class back at Auburn!
 
Well that just induced a flash-back to my Principle of Ecology 400-level class back at Auburn!

Carl, I am in the "camp" whose members hold that stenotopic/eurytopic are better descriptors for species' life strategy aspects- far fewer qualifiers attached to their use in a discussion!
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I have to admit, I (and most of my friend) was completely lost in that class.
It was all modeling & statistics, being taught by a new professor who didn't seem to understand that 75% of his student were undergrads and this was their first real ecology class.
25% of the class was grad students and that was the level he taught the class, graduate level.
Left most of us undergrads in the dust and he didn't bother looking back.
The grade split in the class for grad/undergrad was basically As/Cs & Ds.
Couple of years later, after a pile of undergrads had to retake the class, they started having an intro 250 level class then the upper level 400 level.
 
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