A sad farewell to Ruffed Grouse?

[Old Yellaw]

This year in area 39 & 41 just north of Sudbury was an exceptional year three of us harvested 82 birds mix Ruffed ,Spruce but we saw a total of 152 birds.

[Fenelon]

Canada started using neonics in the mid 90's, which coincides with the downward cascade of numerous animal populations. This group of chemicals is as nasty as pcbs and DDT from years gone by. Residuals of up to 30 years
Potent endocrine disruptor that affects neuronal development, trashes the immune system, etc. Now it's in our wetlands, soils, and our water. Our aquatic inverts are now getting affected. They are now being linked to the rana virus that's threatening all of our amphibians. There's neonics in everything we eat and we do not know what effects this is having on us. Canada was slated to ban the use of two major neonics in 2018. They caved to industry pressure and were still using them today.........time bomb!

[Fenelon]

Pretty nasty stuff. Neonics are commonly used in
Dog and cat flea meds eg. ADVANTAGE II, K9 PRAVENTA, ETC. When your pet urinates outside they contaminate the property with neonics. Enough to wipe out all the bees within a hectare of your house. Eg. Bees lap up the morning dew off contaminated grass blades and it's enough to kill them. Best part is the 2-3 year soil residual

[mastercaster]

Numbers are high in the Kirkland Lake area, Although the birds are bigger this year. I am willing to bet, that is because of the dry spring, and that it was wet in the second half of the summer. I think they had a great first hatch, and then nothing after that.

MC

[fishhawk]

Canada started using neonics in the mid 90's, which coincides with the downward cascade of numerous animal populations. This group of chemicals is as nasty as pcbs and DDT from years gone by. Residuals of up to 30 years
Potent endocrine disruptor that affects neuronal development, trashes the immune system, etc. Now it's in our wetlands, soils, and our water. Our aquatic inverts are now getting affected. They are now being linked to the rana virus that's threatening all of our amphibians. There's neonics in everything we eat and we do not know what effects this is having on us. Canada was slated to ban the use of two major neonics in 2018. They caved to industry pressure and were still using them today.........time bomb!

Very interesting, I wonder if there is a connection of this Agra chemical and the crash of the European hare population in Ontario. I always suspected that there might be a chemical being applied to crops that was effecting the jacks populations. The Hare's spend live mostly in the agricultural fields or the cover adjacent to the crops, basically what ever is getting on the crops was getting on the Jacks. My theory was the chemical is harming the reproduction cycle of the hares or maybe outright killing the young. We had good success hunting the hares right up to the late 90's. Then something changed and they now have practically gone except for the odd pocket of remaining animals.

[Fenelon]

That pic of budding birds used to be the norm here in the south back in the 80s and 90s. Used to be an easy way to get some dinners. Birds would bud late afternoon with ironwood and black cherry being the trees of choice. Best budding days were when the barometer was crashing and a big snow storm was coming. It would be nothing to see 20 to 30 budding birds during my 35km drive home from Lindsay. Now there is nothing. I'm glad to hear that areas north of me still have birds. There seems to be a link between agricultural landscape (areas primarily supporting cash cropping) and population crash. This is another hint to me that these neonics are part of the problem.

[Fenelon]

https://news.usask.ca/articles/resea...wild-birds.php

Re: neonics affecting Passerine birds in canada

[Bo D]

Our camp is in wmu 60 and we had another year of abundant birds. Been that way for the past 5 years or so.

Even back home this past summer I saw more bees and monarch butterflies than I have in the past 6 or 7 years with more fruit on the trees and garden than the ever... Hard to put a handle on it with what you posted...

[MihajloSimsic]

I'd like to here from others regarding the population status of Ruffed Grouse based on what you're seeing in the area that you live and/or hunt. You don't see much comment being made by mnr regarding the total crash in areas of the province.I'm pretty sure WNV is the culprit. I live in WMU 75 and I mainly hunt the southern ends of 60. Numbers have been declining over the past 15 to 20 years but now it's dropped to almost total exterpation. There are so few birds now where I live I feel the species should be considered for SARA listing. Next to zero drumming males now in the spring. There is no longer a huntable population. There are so few birds I think I'd feel guilty harvesting the bird if I did find one. You can walk for hours, focussing on good habitat, with a good dog, and you'd be lucky to flush a single bird. I'm not even seeing budding birds when driving hundreds of kilometers around home. How are things in your area?

I've made plenty of hunting trips to WMUs 57, 55A, 40, 49, and 42, including this year. I see grouse every time I set foot in those woods. Even had some try to fight me lol unfortunately I NEVER see them when I actually hunt for them... They're surprisingly resilient in those areas considering it's chalk full of foxes, fishers, martens, Mink, and owls.

[FishHog]

Very interesting, I wonder if there is a connection of this Agra chemical and the crash of the European hare population in Ontario. I always suspected that there might be a chemical being applied to crops that was effecting the jacks populations. The Hare's spend live mostly in the agricultural fields or the cover adjacent to the crops, basically what ever is getting on the crops was getting on the Jacks. My theory was the chemical is harming the reproduction cycle of the hares or maybe outright killing the young. We had good success hunting the hares right up to the late 90's. Then something changed and they now have practically gone except for the odd pocket of remaining animals.

I think its a lot more to do with habitat loss. Used to be everyone had 100-200 acre farms and there was lots of fence lines/edges. Now they are all grouped together into 1000 acre lots and all get combined at once, and no edge territory that they need. When you add coyotes on top of no habitat, you lose populations very quickly.