SAVANNA, Ill. — To hunters, the future appears bleak: They are the sitting ducks.
More than 50 area hunters turned up for a U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service public meeting last week, with the majority protesting a revised conservation plan for the Upper Mississippi River that has not changed in one respect — permanent duck-hunting blinds will be eliminated.
“This program is clearly going after the duck hunters,” Jim Bailey of Savanna told the panel of U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service personnel.
Refuge Manager Don Hultman does not contest the quality of hunting — or even safety — that permanent blinds can afford. The issue, he said, was construction of property on public land.
Ed Britton, Savanna district manager for the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, added that blinds have sparked confrontations.
“A lot of completely new people are coming to the river, and all the best places are taken,” Britton said. Blinds have been burned, and assaults have been documented.
Permanent blinds were banned on the rest of the Upper Mississippi — in Pools 4 through 11 — in 2000. The camouflaged wood structures propped atop water were allowed to remain in Pools 12, 13 and 14 — from Dubuque to LeClaire, Iowa — where 250 permanent blinds were counted during aerial surveys. The eight other pools had played host to a total of about 50 blinds, Britton said.
Local rules gave the blind-builder rights to hunt from the shed-like structure if he or she arrived 30 minutes before hunting started.
“Those blinds have been in the family for 30 or 40 years,” Britton said. “They’ve been assured of that hunting spot for 30 or 40 years.”
The tradition is such a major issue locally that when permanent blinds were eliminated elsewhere, Britton said, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service waited to impose the regulation so that it could be researched and allow for public input on the comprehensive conservation plan that began four years ago for the 261-mile-long refuge.
Under the plan, called Alternative E, canoe trails would be created and areas will be closed for waterfowl. The permanent blinds will be phased out of the Mississippi River’s Pool 12 this year, Pool 14 in 2007 and Pool 13 in 2008.
But local hunters are bent on the issue of permanent blinds, and as one after another protested the plan Tuesday, Hultman told the audience, “When it comes to permanent blinds, the writing is on the wall.”
To which duck hunter Bailey replied, “If you’ve already got your mind made up and it’s locked in stone, be good enough to tell me and stop wasting my time.”
Hultman noted that he had a point, but said hunters voicing opinions at the meetings helped him understand the local perspective.
Bill Kemmerling of Thomson suggested the permanent blinds remain with registration fees required and penalties if “bad apples” caused problems.
Tom Kamper of Thomson said he’s hunted from his own permanent blind for 30 years. The few hunting-related calls the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service fields now will be nothing compared to the “wildlife wildfest” that would ensue with duck hunting from boats, he predicted.
One of the few supporters to the plan to eliminate permanent blinds said the structures should be removed. “Some of those blinds look like a junkyard,” Joyce Bautsch of Savanna said.
Hultman suggested that if duck hunting is on the decline, local duck hunters still might be able to hunt from the same spots they’ve claimed for decades.
When Kamper asked how the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service planned to take care of the hunters, or simply let them fistfight over the territory, Hultman said people tend to sort it out themselves.
Public comments of the comprehensive conservation plan will be accepted through March 6. Comments can be sent to Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge, Attention: CCP Comment, 51 East 4th St., Room 101, Winona, MN 55987, or via the Web site www.fws.gov/midwest/planning/uppermiss/.
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Originally Posted by Glenn
and I could invite you to hunt.
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