Quote:
Originally Posted by feesher
From what I understand, Larry's data supports the new dates but his hunter opinion survey is what he proposed.
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That is not completely true.
1) The harvest data I presented is for the old West Zone in 2001-2010 when season dates were consistently the second Saturday in November, closed for 12 days, then re-opened and ran until a week before the end of the framework. The opening date during that time was never earlier than November 8, we never had a 4-week first split, and we never closed as early as the 17th, so it is not possible for those data to support the new dates.
In fact, the weekly harvest I presented may well be exactly the same if we opened on November 1 or December 1. Consequently, they don't support moving the season earlier or later.
2) The hunter-opinion data I presented favored the latest possible dates proposed in the 2013 survey, which because the calendar was so early was November 16 running until January 26. You can see that we gave Coastal Zone hunters strategic choices of the traditional dates, more November hunting, more December hunting, and more January hunting. Hunter opinion has always favored the latest possible hunting dates when given specific choices.
3) I presented a summary of the November aerial survey counts since 1969 which show a strong downward trend over the last 20 years. In fact 11 of the 15 lowest November surveys on record have been flown in the last 15 years during a time of record high breeding populations. The other 4 lowest were flown in the mid-80's when we had record low breeding populations. These data suggest fewer ducks are coming to Louisiana by the first week in November.
So taken together, harvest data which shows we do kill good numbers of ducks early in the season; hunter opinion data showing hunters favor later seasons, and aerial survey data showing there might be some risk in setting seasons earlier ........ I recommended the traditional second Saturday in November opener and the typical season structure.
Look again at the weekly harvest data, and see that NW Louisiana, what is now in the West Zone, had an even earlier harvest signature than the SW or SE coastal areas. But for some reason, the Commission chose to set my recommended dates LATER in that zone but EARLIER in the Coastal Zone. If the harvest data were so important, then why?