On August 12, 2005, the Division of Migratory Bird Management of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service posted its “Report On Roboducks: Review Of Electronic-Motorized Decoys For Taking Migratory Game Birds” (“SWD Report”).¹ The SWD Report recites the relevant history, introduction of the devices during the 1998-99 season in California, growth in their use, the studies that establish their devastating effectiveness and the ethical questions that they have raised. It states that: “The purpose of this report is to summarize some of the results of these studies and to discuss potential management implications of widespread use of these devices.”

In the “Background” section, the SWD Report recites the history of regulations on methods of take that began with the Migratory Bird Treaty Act in 1918. Sink boxes were restricted to coastal areas in 1927 and then banned altogether in 1935. Using airplanes, boats or other devices to haze, concentrate or drive waterfowl also were proscribed in 1927. Regulations restricted use of live decoys in 1931 and then prohibited them altogether in 1935. The service adopted rules against baiting in 1931 and has expanded them many times since. The three-shell limitation on shotgun magazine capacity also went into effect in 1935. The 1941 regulations prohibited use of livestock as a means of concealment in waterfowl hunting. And the service banned electronic calling in 1957, promptly after invention of devices true enough in sound quality to be effective – and portable enough to take afield. The SWD Report states:

“The primary motivation for most of the regulatory changes during the 1930s was to safeguard the depleted populations of migratory game birds, mainly waterfowl, during the drought years. However, many of the prohibitions in the basic regulations were in some measure to insure that hunting privileges could be maintained. Excessive take meant shorter seasons, smaller bag limits, and more restrictions for everyone. But clearly, some methods of take (e.g. electronic calls, sink-boxes, baiting, trapping) were viewed as “too effective’ and not consistent with good sportsmanship or ethical standards. Thus, these restrictions were aimed at preventing unfair advantage or preserving fair chase values . . .” (Emphasis added).

Turning to the subject of electronic, motorized decoys, the SWD Report then summarizes the various studies that have demonstrated their effectiveness, the history of restrictions and the current controversy over their use. A reader could easily gain the impression that the anonymous authors were laying the foundation for a future federal ban.

Alas, after a promising build-up, the report concludes with the bland suggestion that an effort should be made (by whom and to what end being left largely to the imagination) to determine “public opinion” on the issue. In short, any regulation must bubble up from below, rather than come down from above – as though “management” is a matter of a consensus of the managed rather than an exercise in informed leadership – in which case one wonders why we pay for the regulatory establishment we have which is supposed to be the very fount of informed leadership on this subject². If public opinion controls, then maybe we should fire our biologists and replace them with people trained in opinion polling.

And in the process, we should not overlook the philosophical change that took place somewhere along the way in the dark of night. The bans on live decoys, baiting, electronic calling and other controls on methods of take did not depend upon scientific studies of impact on population or surveys of public opinion. They were banned by managers in the exercise of management prerogative based on managerial judgment. Successful enterprises of all types – businesses, institutions, even governments – function in precisely the same fashion. It is always possible to imagine another study that could be done, to consult with more experts, to await further analysis in almost any situation. Show me a person, an entity or agency paralyzed by those endless possibilities and I will show you a failure, a celebration of dysfunction. The dysfunction in this case has produced an outright refusal to address a festering problem that should have been addressed long ago in the fashion that states such as Arkansas have chosen, that same decisive action that greeted electronic calls almost on the instant that they showed up in the marsh in the late ‘50s.

Sportsmanship, hunting ethics and fair chase: As hunters we tend to think of these as matters important only to us, as “internal affairs” of interest only to hunters, with hunters being the only parties with a podium at the debating forum. Would that it were so.

In this era of muck-raking media and the power of the internet, what we think and do resonates in the public domain and can attract wide public attention – when we offend the general public’s sense of sportsmanship, hunting ethics and fair chase. That is never a good thing. If you doubt me, ask yourself this question: When was the last time you saw a piece extolling the virtues and values of hunting in the mainstream media?

The media seek stories that will outrage and scandalize. When “Sixty Minutes,” for example, does a feature on hunting (as it has done on more than one occasion within recent memory), it invariably shines a spotlight on a practice that most people in the viewing audience consider downright odious. The producers selected those pieces for precisely that reason. When you muster the cold respect that unpleasant facts demand and review those tapes objectively, they all derive their punch from the appearance of unfairness, of cruelty, of men reveling in the killing of animals in circumstances that show no socially redeeming countervailing values, with the animals having no fair chance at all to escape or retain even a shred of native dignity.

To me the matter comes down to this, pure and simple: Until we elevate sportsmanship and fair chase to the top of our masthead, teach and advocate it relentlessly, and make all of our actions conform to that creed, we seriously risk loss of our heritage at the hands of an electorate that we could not defeat once aroused. The risk increases as populations grow and we become an ever smaller minority. Given the nature of those who lead the anti-hunting crowd, you can be sure that there will be no “fair chase and sportsmanship” in that electoral fight, when it comes – an exercise in which we will be prey, not predator, and electoral roadkill when the authorities count the votes.

Why go out of our way to arouse that public by defense of practices that are in conflict with our traditions and celebrate the notion that THE KILL is what we are all about? Why should it take a threat of bad publicity and the growing strength of the antis to get us to do what we ought to have done on our own motion – because it is right – and not out of fear of the consequences if we don’t?

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The October/November 2005 issue of California Waterfowl includes the usual “President’s Report” (p.10) by Dr. Robert McLandress, entitled “The Enemy is Us.”³ In his discussion of SWDs, among other subjects, he takes the position that the partial ban on SWDs, (from the beginning of our season to November 30, with no ban on wind-driven models) has returned kill “to traditional patterns”⁴ and that in any case, the devices have lost their effectiveness. He concludes: “As a result, there is no biological justification left to restrict the devices any further in California. Unfortunately, the controversy on ethics and fair chase principles has continued to consume the hunting community.” (Emphasis added). Dr. McLandress obviously believes (and he has so stated to me in private conversation), that the very debate on issues of ethics and fair chase is, well, unfortunate, divisive, beside the point, detracts from more important effort where unity must prevail, etc.

According to its website the Association’s “mission is to conserve California’s waterfowl, wetlands and waterfowling heritage.” How can one purport to speak on behalf of such an organization and lament a debate over the meaning of “waterfowling heritage” in this context? That’s what the “unfortunate” debate is really all about, isn’t it?⁵

A serious hypocrisy lies at the core of the relentless effort to stifle debate on the ethical and sportsmanship aspects of the SWD question. Sooner or later, the issue comes back to the argument that hunter kill doesn’t matter and issues of ethics, etc., should be left purely to personal choice. If hunting ethics and fair chase have no place in the debate, then how do you exclude them from “waterfowling heritage?” Have they never played a part – or does the CWA mission statement really mean “heritage, but without regard to sportsmanship?” If hunter kill has no effect on populations, then why not advocate for abolition of all restrictions, such as those on electronic calling, use of live decoys, baiting, sinkboxes, restricting repeating shotguns to three shells, etc? Isn’t sportsmanship part of the foundation of those restrictions (as the SWD Report states) – and how do you distinguish them from SWDs – or then from now? In short, why not drop the codpiece and stand exposed in your true beliefs – for all the world to see and evaluate?

Why not admit that the habitat creation and other programs that we trumpet with great pride (and use to raise vast sums from willing donors) are offered purely in aid of a killer agenda in which sportsmanship and fair chase play no part, except as propaganda, a public relations trick that we trot out when convenient to obscure the hard edges of the truth? A key component of the hypocrisy, of course, is the tacit, grudging notion that we need the propaganda (in the abstract of course, but not in practice) mainlined into the veins of the membership, because the truth might embarrass us. Worse, it might stir a disapproving, non-hunting public to take the action we all fear and could not prevent, leaving our sport as nothing but a cherished memory buried in the shambles of disgrace and electoral defeat.

But I find some amusement in the process – the lame advocacy to which Dr. McLandress resorts to support his argument and what it reveals about his position. He states, SWDs have lost their effectiveness, that the birds have acclimated to them. No longer effective, they should no longer be an issue and we should move on, drop the divisive debate and concentrate on happier subjects The most difficult aspect of confronting this argument is to decide where to begin, when so many fallacies and inconsistencies beckon.

First, Dr. Mclandress’ article appeared in the October/November issue of California Waterfowl and was presumably written well before publication, i.e., long before use of SWDs became legal for the 2005-06 waterfowl season in California!⁶ So he’s relying on anecdotal evidence from the end of last season.⁷ All of the scientific studies of SWD use agree that their effectiveness drops off as the season wears on – from a factor of 6 or higher to perhaps 2 to 3.⁸ So to the dedicated users, the devices become less effective as the season progresses – but they still produce twice the kill that users would have achieved without them – and without any bearing on how effective they will be when they first come into use this season on innocent birds that have not been “acclimated.” That’s the science, Dr. McLandress. Where’s your study to support the “no longer effective argument”? Persistence and repetition do not create truth out of error. Obstinance in error is not a virtue of leadership.

And that is not the end of the matter. If SWDs are no longer effective, why do hunters keep buying and using them? In a world of uncertainty and strong opinion, how do you distinguish signal from noise, plot from happenstance? We all know and apply a few common sense rules. When faced with a flat conflict between what people say and what they do, choose the latter – for therein lies the truth. Lawyers, judges and juries deal in anecdotal evidence all the time and assign probative weight to actions over words, for obvious reasons. Successful business people and leaders in all walks of life do the same.

By all appearances and the experience of our early season, we in California had a great hatch of local birds this year. So unlike recent years, we have a large proportion of juveniles in this year’s flight, the birds most easily called and brought to the decoy spread. This is the year we could have given up the infernal SWDs without so much as the appearance of hardship, even for the “skill-challenged” hunters. This is also the year when the gullible juveniles have started to die in huge numbers over the flashing devices, now that they are legal for the last sixty days of our season.

And in the face of all this, our Association president basically advocates their use by demeaning the very argument itself as having no relevance. According to him, it is destructive, out-of date, misguided, yesterday’s argument that only serves to divide rather than unite us in the glow of a happy hour before the next morning’s hunt. Needless to say, that opinion won’t make the argument go away – nor should it, particularly as SWDs are but a symptom of a much more deep seated and threatening malady.

I do not dispute that Dr. McLandress and many like-minded folk would prefer to airbrush the entire SWD debate from history. As it is but the tip of a larger and far more ugly iceberg, that will not happen.

One final note: Those who share my views should not perceive this as a California or CWA problem – or simply a spasm of bureaucratic timidity on the part of the Service. Despite his distaste for the very argument and resort to expediently inconsistent positions, Dr. McLandress and the CWA Board have never hesitated to engage on the subject. In contrast, Ducks Unlimited treats the issue with stony silence, as though it didn’t exist, while prominently featuring SWDs in those few tapes and publications it produces that deal with hunting. Delta is no better.

And just as life is ambiguous, unheroic and inconsistent, CWA’s programs for creation and enhancement of wood duck and mallard habitat have contributed significantly to the fact that we are enjoying a banner season while much of the rest of the country apparently is not. In short, it is the issue – not the organization.

That issue, however, represents the key to survival of our sport. Until our organizations pick up that banner and embrace it wholeheartedly, our ability to produce mallards and wood ducks in this state will eventually have no meaning except to birdwatchers and the vegetarian segment of the enviro crowd. If we really care about our heritage, the time to act decisively in the name of sportsmanship, fair chase and ethical hunting practices is long overdue. Advocacy of a decisive and comprehensive ban on the use of SWDs should be number one on that agenda, coupled with a proclamation that “waterfowling heritage” harbors no place for devices of modern technology that enhance the killing leverage of the hunter in derogation of traditional skill.

1 The authors of the SWD Report are not identified.

2 When the Service (or any other federal agency for that matter) proposes a regulation not prompted by an emergency, they post it in the Federal Register and solicit public input during a prescribed comment period. The SWD Report appears to by contemplating some sort of public poll taking even prior to drafting a proposed regulation.

3 Readers of these pieces will recognize that as an observation I have made more than once (with attribution), derived from the wonderful comic strip “Pogo” that appeared in many newspapers from coast to coast. The full statement of Pogo’s Rule is: “We have met the enemy and it is us.”

4 In the recent past, Dr. McLandress steadfastly refused to accept the idea that SWDs had any effect on transitional patterns. Now we are told that we are returning to them – as in SWDs did change traditional patters but no longer do.

5 CWA’s homepage contains the following quote from the writings of John Muir: “When one tugs at a single string in nature one finds it attached to the rest of the world.” One does not have to strain to imagine how Muir would have reacted to SWDs. And the mission statement used to mention “fair chase,” something no longer featured at least on the website.

6 Use of electronic spinning wing decoys is not legal in California prior to December 1.

7 Unless he is the one relying on it, Dr. McLandress heaps scorn on anecdotal evidence, insisting on “science” as the answer to all or our questions.

8 Hunters using SWDs kill at rates six times or more greater than hunters who do not use them, trailing off to lower rates at the end of the season. Even at the end, however, SWDs significantly increase the kill by users over what they would take without them.