Migratory Birds of the Southwest Region Fish and Wildlife Service

Waterfowl Banding in North America

Two ducklings were caught in a duck trap. Photo credit: Jim Bredy, USFWS.

The US Fish and Wildlife Service’s Division of Migratory Bird Management, in conjunction with the USGS Bird Banding Laboratory, Canadian Wildlife Service and various states, coordinates the banding of migratory waterfowl. Biologists band more than 200,000 ducks and nearly 150,000 geese and swans in North America each year. The flways.us website has a wealth of information on waterfowl banding. Excerpts from this website are included in this article.

One of the first uses of banding and recovery location data was to help biologists determine waterfowl migration routes. By banding ducks and geese in the northern breeding areas and then marking the points where hunters and others recovered them, biologists identified the four major migratory pathways, or flyways, that cross North America.

Flyway Biologist, Jim Bredy, cradles an armload of recently banded mallards. Photo credit: Dan Collins, USFWS.

Band recovery data show biologists how the harvest is distributed throughout the flyway. Biologists also can estimate annual harvest rates and even annual survival rates for some waterfowl species from band recovery data. The annual variation in harvest and survival rates has helped biologists understand how breeding habitat conditions and harvest regulations affect survival. These harvest and survival rates are critical pieces of information that are used to help determine appropriate hunting regulations each year.

Many of the birds banded are recovered in Canada and the United States. However some of the birds banded are found as far south as Cuba, Mexico and South America.

Search banding records of various species of waterfowl (follow the directions)

Typical trapping set, used to live-trap ducks. Photo credit: Jim Bredy, USFWS.

Report a band or http://www.reportband.gov/ for more information.

Submitted by Jim Bredy, Flyway Biologist, USF&WS Division of Migratory Bird Management. Jim is currently based in Albuquerque, NM, but has worked with migratory birds all over Canada, the United States, and Mexico. He spent most of the month of August, 2009 on a duck banding assignment in Canada.

Waterfowl Survey Shows Good News

Canvasbacks, redheads, and Northern shovelers break traditional survey area records.Preliminary results from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Canadian Wildlife Service’s Waterfowl Breeding Population and Habitat Survey indicate a total duck population estimate of more than 41 million birds in the traditional survey area. This represents a 14 percent increase from 2006 and is 24 percent above the 1955-2006 average. [News Release] Interviews with the pilot/biologists and video of the conditions can be see at http://www.fws.gov/video/wmv/statusprelim2007a.wmv