Longtime pilot-biologist keeps an eye on North American waterfowl

BY BRAD DOKKEN

Knight Ridder Newspapers


NEAR LARONGE, Saskatchewan - (KRT) - For Fred Roetker, flying from southern Louisiana to the Canadian wilderness in May comes as naturally as the migration instinct that tells ducks its time to head north each spring.

Roetker, 53, is one of 12 pilot-biologists flying the Lower 48 for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Each spring, he flies a Cessna 206 equipped with amphibious floats more than 1,400 miles from his home near Lafayette, La., to Canada, where he counts ducks in northern Saskatchewan and northern Manitoba on the boreal forest portion of the annual North American waterfowl population survey.

A cooperative effort between the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Canadian Wildlife Service, the survey this year marks its 50th
anniversary.

Managers across North America's four waterfowl flyways use the survey results to determine waterfowl regulations each fall. The survey also
samples duck numbers and habitat conditions in the prairie pothole region and parts of the northern United States.

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Wilderness veteran

Put Roetker in a bush plane in the Canadian wilderness, and the Illinois native is right at home. He found his calling as a college student while banding ducks in Canada in the 1970s and has logged more than 10,000 hours in the air.

Roetker has flown the northern Saskatchewan and Manitoba legs of the survey since 1994. That means staying in primitive cabins on remote
lakes, arranging his flights so a gas pump is always within reach - the plane's 139-gallon tank will keep him in the air about six hours - and watching the weather for changes that could mean the difference between safety and something else.

Roetker shared some of his insights into the wilderness survey during a recent flight from Saskatoon, Sask., to an outpost cabin on Swan
Lake, located in the bush country about 50 miles southwest of LaRonge. During the 162-mile flight, the country changed from an ag-dominated prairie landscape dotted with potholes, to seemingly
endless miles of pine trees and lakes, streams and smaller wetlands.

``It's a challenge to fly duck surveys in the bush,'' Roetker said. ``To organize fuel and other bush logistics.'' But with those challenges, he says, come rewards.

``It's mostly pristine country as you get to the northern part of the area,'' Roetker said. ``I feel it's a privilege to fly this country. When you stay a couple of nights in the bush, it brings home the point of just how remote this country is. It's a reality check on how small any of us really are.''

Roetker says the importance of the boreal forest to producing ducks can't be overlooked, either, even though the prairie gets most of the credit.

``The prairies are an awesome duck-producing factory when they're wet,'' he said. ``But when they're not, this is the savior of waterfowl. I maintain the core population here is important to our hunting, especially down south. It's a dependable portion of the pie year in and year out.''

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Rustic cabin

The cabin near LaRonge is one of Roetker's first stops on the wilderness survey, and it's available thanks to some local residents who've shared it with the pilot crews for about 20 years. Complete with antlers on the walls and boards filled with nails set sharp-side up outside each window to keep the bears at bay, the trapper's outpost is home for a few days each spring, Roetker says.

``Northern hospitality is alive and well, and this cabin is a great example,'' he said. ``It really makes the logistics a lot easier for us.

``You've got to get grounded in your survey area. In a month's time, we try to get in touch with what makes this country tick and how it relates to waterfowl production.''

Joining Roetker as an observer on this year's boreal survey is Barret Fortier. A biologist at Mandalay National Wildlife Refuge in Louisiana, Fortier, 29, had spent the last two days stranded at the cabin after bad weather kept Roetker grounded in Saskatoon.

For a Louisiana boy who'd never been north of Big Sky, Mont., Fortier says the opportunity to spend a few weeks in northern Canada is an adventure, even if it occasionally means being grounded in the wilderness.

``It's been great,'' he said. ``I pulled a chair on the dock with my binoculars and just soaked it up. I'd come in here and fry some eggs and drink some coffee. That's about it.''

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Crucial habitat

By the time they wrap up the survey in the next couple of weeks, Roetker and Fortier will have logged about 5,500 miles, flying more than 300 segments about 150 feet off the ground and counting ducks on each side of the plane. The advent of Global Positioning System technology has made the job a lot easier, Roetker says, because it means less time staring at maps in a part of the world with few obvious landmarks.

``When I first started, it was just maps,'' Roetker said. ``I call it navigation after the fact. GPS makes it tremendously easier. You can
spend your time looking out the window at ducks.''

Where untrained eyes might just see specks with wings down below, Roetker and Fortier see goldeneyes, scaup, buffleheads, ringnecks and
mallards. In flight, they call out each species into a computerized voice recorder that tallies the results for later use.

Besides a good eye, it takes a special person to spend five weeks in a small airplane at low altitudes counting ducks, Roetker says.

``I guess it's a good thing we don't get tired of looking at ducks or we'd be in the wrong job,'' he said.