Doug Macrae, The Independent
June 7, 2006
Regardless
of whether or not you support the practice of shooting thousands of cormorants
at Presqu’ile each year, it’s increasingly difficult
to find anything positive to say about the way Ontario Parks and MNR has conducted this sorry affair.
The program has been scientifically and logistically flawed from the very
beginning, and it is now costing taxpayers a small fortune – probably upwards
of $250,000/year when all costs are added. Contrary to the official line, the
cormorant management efforts on Gull and High Bluff Island have caused
significant disturbance to the other colonial birds nesting in the same forest
blocks, even driving one nesting species – Red-tailed Hawk - from the Park
altogether.
High Bluff - once a quiet, seldom visited colonial bird sanctuary – is now a
hive of human activity that has left birds disturbed and the land with deep
physical scars. These include building a plywood cabin and several outhouses,
and driving ATV’s all over the island creating kilometers of overlapping
trails, many through biologically interesting areas.
Perhaps the most pitiful example of this program is the island’s ever growing
“compost facility”, where the thousands of shot cormorants end up. Last year,
the dump’s allowable limit for mercury – accumulated in cormorants from the
fish they eat - was actually exceeded, and Ontario Parks was forced to remove
the mercury tainted “compost” to the Brighton Landfill. Their solution for this
year? Why, build a bigger composter of course,
presumably to better dilute the mercury so they won’t have to remove it again!
Because so many people – especially fishers - viscerally hate cormorants, the
public has been willing to give Ontario Parks a pass when it comes to scrutiny.
But for those who have followed this project in detail over the years, it is a
shocking example of waste, ineptitude, deception, and bad planning. Good
questions have consistently been ignored, concerns and advice dismissed, and
inconvenient facts glossed over. All of this has hurt relations with potential
allies and has contributed to the economic losses in local tourism, as birders
continue to abandon Presqu’ile in favour
of friendlier, quieter places.
But there was something different with this year’s killing effort, and it will
very likely affect how this program unfolds in the future. The Achilles heel of
this program is the cruelty inherent with this particular management effort.
Thanks to the persistent efforts by some animal protection groups, observers
have now amassed a veritable videotape library of the cruelty, and the
associated inaction of Ontario Parks staff to reduce it. Now, the methods of
the cormorant cull will be seen by the general public for the first time and
the “free pass” which Ontario Parks has enjoyed to date, will be over.
I would hope that even people who hate cormorants would at least agree that
leaving wounded birds for many hours and even days to eventually succumb from a
gunshot wound is unacceptable. Similarly, chicks left baking in the sun because
their parent has been shot and can’t shade them should also be unacceptable.
It’s certainly wrong in waterfowl hunting where law and tradition dictate that
you must make all reasonable efforts to locate shot birds. And it is certainly
true of the deer cull at Presqu’ile, where Ontario
Parks has done an excellent job of ensuring that deer are killed quickly, and
that none are wounded and escape. So why isn’t this standard of conduct true
for cormorants?
Ontario Parks, by their own figures, admit to retrieving only about two of
three birds shot during a study last year. That means that fully one-third of
the shot birds are either left dead or wounded in the trees, or they fly to the
Lake and wait to die. We are not talking about a few birds, or a few dozen. We
are talking about hundreds upon hundreds of cormorants crawling and floating
around while they slowly die. Can you imagine the public outcry if a third of
the deer shot during the cull were left to run around the park hobbled and
bleeding without anyone making a serious attempt to end their suffering? There
would be outrage!
The Presqu’ile cormorant management strategy will
come up for public review and comment before next year’s efforts begin. When
this review process starts, there will be a wealth of damaging correspondence
and video to counter the official line given by Ontario Parks. Hopefully the
interested public will take the time to understand this issue better, and help
direct it to a more professional, scientifically based conclusion.