geese

Dave

Depending on the time of year and state the bag limits change, some states have a more liberal limit than Ontario. With all the hunters south of the boarder and so few here in Ontario I find it hard to believe we would harvest more birds. I don't think Ontario would take 200K birds in a season.

Looking for some data.

Doug, we may have a large land mass but only a small portion puts hunters in a position to kill geese with success on a regular basis.

Found this link, Maryland alone has taken over 200K geese in a year.

Minnesota killed close to 300K just years ago!

http://www.flyways.us/regulations-an...harvest-trends

I found the number hard to believe as well Aaron. I assume they are getting their numbers from the survey they send out?

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Originally Posted by LondonDave

What are the bag limits down in the states? Are they mainly hunting the James Bay Migrators where there might be a two bird limit like some areas in Ontario or are they hunting local populations like many areas in Ontario with the 5 to 10 bird limits? Our generous bag limits in most areas could be what increases our numbers?

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I'm curious too on bag limits in some states. I remember watching a Grind Waterfowl episode and I think it was Washington you could only hunt geese on like Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday and the bag limit was like 3, don't quote me on that lol.

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Originally Posted by IH8ATTN

I'm curious too on bag limits in some states. I remember watching a Grind Waterfowl episode and I think it was Washington you could only hunt geese on like Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday and the bag limit was like 3, don't quote me on that lol.

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A few years ago I was talking to guy from either Washington or Oregon.. He was pretty sure there was no goose season their.. Yes he was a hunter..

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Originally Posted by topher

A few years ago I was talking to guy from either Washington or Oregon.. He was pretty sure there was no goose season their.. Yes he was a hunter..

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I happen to know for a fact that both have seasons and both states see a lot of birds

For Ontario I don't know if its 200K, but it may not be far off. We have two brief periods where we can kill 10 a day and the rest is 5 a day. No possession limits anymore.

I bet that each of the major guiding services kill 3000+ a year, add in the lesser known guides and its not hard to beleive that guiding services are contributing to 30K + to that number.

I see a fair number hit the dirt and I mostly hunt by myself or with one other person. If I had a little more time and hunting partners who actually cared about killing geese as a group we could get to 1000 birds a year.

Those are really high harvest numbers. My guess is the population size estimates they use might be understated?

I bet the harvest figure is accurate and maybe even a little conservative.

2008 havest was 185K in ON and 2009 was 180K

Last season's removal of the possession restriction probably encouraged some fellas to keep hunting longer than they normally would - exactly what the relaxed regulation was designed to encourage

I would guess the figure is bang on. Also don't discount the impact of a successful guiding/outfitting operation on harvest numbers over the course of a season, now multiply that out to the number of guiding operations.

- In regards to the US bag limits, I think if you were to average it out across their many mini seasons and across state lines, Ontario waterfowlers can take more geese per season than waterfowlers in the US.

- I think biologists use the November bird counts (# in province) because it is a blended number that captures portions of both migratory and resident populations.

- And don't forget how large the province is; from Point Pelee to James Bay is only a couple hundred kilometers shorter than Point Pelee to the Louisiana Delta. Not saying that geese migrate nearly that far but by the same token more than %50 of their migration happens within the province.

Here is a link to some historical goose harvest data from CWS(Canadian Wildlife Service). Pretty neat actually.

http://www.ec.gc.ca/rcom-mbhr/defaul...21396B-1#tab15

"Went to a Nature London event this week. MNR officer speaking.

800 000 Canada Geese in Ont. as of last Nov. 2013
200 000 harvested last Fall." quote
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Reviewed my notes for clarification.

Those figures are for the 3 Ontario groups:

Hudson's Bay migratory population.... through the Mississippi Valley

James Bay migratory population.... through the Tennessee Valley

Ontario temperate group... do not migrate .... south of the boreal forest