Cormorant control in the Les Cheneaux Islands seems to be working, according to Mike Hamburg of the Les Cheneaux Islands Association, before introducing his guest speaker at the Les Cheneaux Islands Association meeting Thursday, August 10.

"Last year I told you I thought the yellow perch numbers were improving. Well, all species of fish are being caught throughout the Les Cheneaux Islands. I even saw a gull this summer with an eightinch sunfish," Mr. Hamburg said. "Thanks to the efforts of the USDA Wildlife Services, fishing has improved everywhere."

Pete Butchko of the United States Department of Agriculture estimates that control efforts have helped reduce the number of nesting pairs of cormorants in the islands by 64 percent. He described the history of the cormorant control project and gave this year's progress report to Islands Association members.

"We're not near finished, yet," he said. "We've got a ways to go. We don't take all the credit for the nest numbers dropping, and we thank the DNR for how instrumental they've been in this project. Working together works, and we have a great partnership with the DNR."

He reminded Association members of the ephemeral status of the permit to kill cormorants, and cautioned the public against taking control into their own hands. The control permit was only issued to Wildlife Services and the agents they contract with. No one else has permission to kill cormorants, and he noted how an illegal release of some raccoons on a cormorant rookery is the kind of activity that may put the permit at risk. The depredation permit is up for review again in 2009, and there are many individuals and organizations that oppose lethal control.

"This cannot become the 'OK Corral' shoot-out," Mr. Butchko said. "It took us four years to get here."

He referred to the Les Cheneaux Islands control project as "our flagship project," and said it is being watched by policy makers and biologists around the country. If it works, it may be a model for continued control and new projects in the future.

"It's the project that's most important to us right now, and it's

to

agents

else cormorants, illegal cormorant

of

at

up

and

and

lethal

OK Butchko

get

Les project

said makers

the

a

and

most it's very important that we get this right," Mr. Butchko emphasized.

The United States Fish and Wildlife Service, which has authority over double-crested cormorants, relaxed strict protection of the bird in 2003, issuing a list of rules governing how the bird can be managed in the United States. Since that time, Wildlife Services received permission to use lethal control to knock down the large populations of cormorants that nest in the area and feed on local fish. Anglers have suspected for years that cormorants are a part of declining perch populations. Mr. Butchko cited Fisheries Research Biologist Dave Fielder of the Department of Natural Resources, who said, "It is compelling to conclude that cormorant depredation is at least part of the problem."

Mr. Butchko attributed the Department of Natural Resources with providing the research background that enabled Wildlife Services to obtain permission to kill double crested cormorants as a beneficial control effort.

"A lot of people think research is a synonym for 'let's do nothing,' but in this case, it really did something," he added.

Wildlife Services started to exercise its authority to employ lethal control methods in 2003, Mr. Butchko said, and he estimates cormorant nests in the Les Cheneaux Islands now number a little more than 2,000 nests, compared to 5,500 nests in 2003.

The control plan includes killing a certain percentage of adult birds and destroying eggs every year, since 2003. In its third year of control, agents are working toward shooting half of all the adult birds in the Les Cheneaux Islands, and destroying all eggs in nests by oiling them.

"We're at the halfway point in the project, and it looks like things are looking pretty good," Mr. Butchko said.

This year, agents added a harassment component to the project, and scared the birds off bays where yellow perch are known to spawn in the springtime. Islands Wildlife also contributed volunteers and fuel money to the harassment project.

In addition to Dave Fielder's ongoing fish population studies, other research is being conducted on the relationship between nesting cormorants and control efforts, and "what happens when you get into their islands," Mr. Butchko said.

He is encouraged by aerial surveys that show cormorant numbers are definitely declining in the Les Cheneaux Islands, and are not moving into the islands from other places.

"It seems to indicate we're not getting a backflow of cormorants," he noted. "When nesting birds are eliminated, it seems the number of foraging birds are also reduced."

He showed a graph that measured how sport fish catches are increasing as cormorant nest numbers decrease, and suggested a relationship between the numbers.

"Before we did this, we heard a lot of stories about people catching more fish, even from the (DNR) Creel Clerk," he said. "That anecdotal information correlates with the data."

Mr. Butchko commended the Islands Association for encouraging control efforts by sending letters to government officials.

Answering a question about whether the DNR plans to "do anything" with a $150,000 appropriation from the State of Michigan for cormorant control efforts, Mr. Butchko said he thinks that money is actually slated to go to Wildlife Services to expand its control efforts.

"I think there might have been some times to criticize the DNR, but this isn't one of them," Mr. Butchko said.