About the
Black Duck Joint Venture
History
Once the most abundant fresh-water duck in eastern North America, black
duck populations have dropped steadily since the 1950s, reaching all-time
lows in the 1980s. Many factors have been implicated
in the Black Duck's decline. The North
American Waterfowl Management Plan created the Black Duck Joint Venture
(BDJV) in 1989 to help reverse the species' decline.
 The
mission of the BDJV is to promote and to coordinate the gathering of scientific
information among Flyway Council, universities and wildlife agencies in
Canada and the U.S., that is vital to ensuring sustained populations of
Black Ducks and other waterfowl that share their breeding range. The program
strategy is to determine population trends, assess harvest and distribution
changes, and determine important factors influencing population status
and dynamics - the data that are necessary to guide black duck protection
and management projects in related joint ventures
under the NAWMP. This strategy focuses efforts in four areas: Surveys,
Banding, Research and Evaluation.
The BDJV is made up
of members from the Canadian
Wildlife Service, the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service, and State and Provincial agencies.
Important
Factors in black duck declines
Habitat loss, competition with mallards, hunting, changes in nesting and
brood-rearing success and many other problems have contributed to the
decline of the black duck. The relative importance of these factors is
only just beginning to be understood. Fortunately, black duck populations
have stabilized in recent years, and even increased in some areas, as
more knowledge is gained through joint venture activities. However, overall
numbers of black ducks are still only at about half the level of the 1950s.
With the continued efforts of the BDJV to obtain more comprehensive information
and forge new partnerships among State, Provincial, and Federal agencies
and the private sector in the U.S. and Canada, the management and restoration
of the black ducks in North America can be achieved.
BDJV
Programs Areas
Surveys
Surveys are designed to provide statistically-reliable population trends
of black duck and mallard breeding populations within much of their historic
breeding range in eastern North America - Labrador, New Brunswick, Newfoundland,
Nova Scotia, Ontario, Prince Edward Island, and Quebec in Canada; and
Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin in the United States. Surveys
also provide valuable information on other breeding waterfowl within the
survey areas. Black duck breeding populations are monitored through annual
surveys on the species' main breeding grounds.
This information is
used to guide and evaluate waterfowl management in the Atlantic and Mississippi
Flyways. It enables managers to plan and evaluate hunting programs, develop
habitat protection and land management strategies, and play a prominent
role in evaluating the progress of overall objectives of the North
American Waterfowl Management Plan.
The survey program
employs three techniques:
1) The helicopter
survey has a rotational sampling regime that consists of 302 plots in
total, with an annual sample of 151 twenty-five square kilometer plots,
distributed across Bird Conservation Regions (BCRs) 8, 12 and 14. The
survey is performed in the Atlantic provinces, Quebec and Ontario.
2) Fixed-wing aircraft
surveys over portions of Michigan, Minnesota, Ontario, New York, Quebec,
Vermont, and Wisconsin using linear transects with ground-truthing by
helicopter to calculate population estimates.
3) A ground survey
on Prince Edward Island to estimate black duck breeding populations (a
continuation of an existing survey).
Banding
The banding program is an important element in determining the appropriate
management and conservation strategies for the black duck. The BDJV Technical
Committee assesses the annual harvest and survival rate data for use in
the annual regulatory review process. It is also useful in ongoing efforts
to consider new approaches to black duck harvest management - Adaptive
Harvest Management.
 Banding
provides essential information on subpopulations of breeding black ducks
and eastern mallards. It allows managers to assess annual survival, monitor
hunting pressure, and identify breeding ground origins of specific stocks
as they migrate through the Atlantic and Mississippi Flyways.
The Atlantic Flyway
Eastern Cooperative Banding Agreement coordinates banding programs under
the Black Duck Joint Venture throughout eastern North America. Priority
species include the black duck, mallard, green-winged teal, blue-winged
teal, wood duck and other dabbling ducks.
Research
While survey and banding programs are providing a better description of
what's happening to black ducks and eastern mallards, the goal of research
is to understand why. The research program addresses key factors responsible
for the black duck's decline, including:
- factors influencing
recruitment rates (nesting and brood-rearing success) throughout the
black duck's range.
- critical factors
in habitat use and selection by breeding black ducks, with emphasis
on population density and reproductive success.
- habitat management
methods for important black duck breeding, migration and wintering habitats.
- patterns of mortality
for populations of black ducks, including the effects of hunting, predation,
and disease.
- black duck and
mallard interactions across breeding, migration and wintering habitats,
with emphasis on hybridization and competition.
Communication
and Evaluation
The BDJV evaluation
program is an important element in helping
research programs helps to determine their impact on the black
duck population, and to guide future efforts.
The objectives of
the BDJV evaluation plan are:
- tracking progress
toward objectives in the overall strategic plan.
- monitoring the
black duck population in relation to North American Waterfowl Management
Plan goals.
- testing the validity
of assumptions made in designing survey and banding strategies.
- synthesizing research
findings to determine data gaps and facilitating construction of models
to test competing hypothesis.
- providing feedback
on effectiveness of strategies to help revise and refine the techniques
that will help meet the BDJV objectives.
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