Madduck had its origins and has existed largely as a voice of protest, a fount of criticism, challenging the establishment in the manner of a minority party in the parliament of waterfowl ideas. I have often been accosted by readers who say: “So you hate SWDs and AHM, you disrespect waterfowl biologists and you consider the regulators gutless toadies to the lowest common denominator of killer opinion. Okay, got that. But what are you for?”

Fair enough. Time for an affirmative agenda, a recitation of concepts that should guide our sport, those who participate in it, those who profit from it and those who control the regulatory regime.

On waterfowl biology: Without doubt, science should control in those areas where we have it. The problem is not whether science should control but what the word actually means in this context. Our scientists fail candidly to distinguish in their pronouncements between what they know as provable fact and what they surmise. And what they surmise may be knowable but not yet known – or simply impossible ever to know, given the complexity of the subject and the host of variables.

In short, we suffer from a lack of candor – or perhaps less charitably, a pretension to verity to glorify the pretender, as in: “I’m a scientist and you’re not,” meaning “I know and you don’t, even if what I am telling you conflicts with your real world experience and that of everyone else who actually ventures into the marsh.” Compensatory kill theory provides the prime example of a theory that still holds sway in many circles even though it simply cannot be proved or disproved in any meaningful way. And because it cannot be disproved, its adherents embrace it as an article of faith and condemn those who disagree to a form of damnation, as in the style of most fundamentalists. We need to remind ourselves that fervent spiritual belief, no matter how heartfelt and sincere, is not science.

Thus, point one of the agenda: Rely on biology but demand that (a) it meet the standards of true science, and (b) that our scientists admit the limitations of what they actually know.

Finally, we can’t pass this subject without using the “A” word. No one denies that anecdotal evidence is inferior to scientific proof. But in the absence of scientific proof, anecdotal evidence is the best we have and deserves respect depending upon its probity, i.e., who is reporting and on what base of experience and observation? The tendency of scientists summarily to reject anecdotal evidence when they have nothing better discredits them while rendering them irrelevant. For the great majority of mankind, including waterfowlers, are powerfully influenced by the testimony of their senses, particularly in areas of intense and self-interested experience. When the weatherman predicts light showers and you are caught without an umbrella or raincoat in the mother of all torrential downpours, is the weatherman right because he made his prediction on the basis of the best science, satellite imagery and a state-of-the-art computer program?

Anyone who spends time in the marsh knows that the observable number of birds has dramatically declined over the last five to six years – and with the exception of the last half of the ‘90s, over the last 30 years. “Science” that purports to support a contrary thesis fails the test of relevancy, whatever its component verities might be.

On waterfowl management: Adaptive Harvest Management, the fed’s computer model that sets season lengths and bag limit each year (based in large part on mid-continent mallard populations and pothole counts), was put in place – and tuned to achieve kill targets – without regard to the population goals of the North American Waterfowl Management Plan. Indeed, AHM manages for “sustainable kill” (does anyone sense an oxymoron here?) rather than sustainable populations, whereas the NAWMP appears to mandate the opposite. And yet those in the service in charge of the NAWMP apparently do not communicate with the captains of AHM, and vice versa.

We need not tarry over this bureaucratic disconnect. A growing tide of opinion has come to rest on the conclusion that AHM has failed as a management tool. It has not produced sustainable kill – and has presided over a disturbing decline in the populations of most species over the last six seasons. In many of what used to be our prime waterfowling states, the quality of hunting has deteriorated dramatically. So it is reasonable, if perhaps optimistic to assume that AHM will pass into the dustbin of history and we will be seeking a new approach to waterfowl management.

We suggest that the NAWMP approach represents the correct one – manage for sustainable, high populations. Assume that hunter kill matters, particularly when populations are in decline (because the opposite defies proof) and set harvest targets by reference to the number of breeding ducks we want to see on the nesting grounds the following spring. Given the number of imponderables, we won’t hit the target often but it is a better and more worthy target than managing for kill, particularly in light of stewardship responsibilities.

The message is the key: If we manage for a lot ducks and succeed in our efforts, hunting will take care of itself. AHM failed due to flaws in the methodology. Scientists were unwilling to admit that they were acting on an unprovable surmise – as in see proposition one above – but it was doomed to fail by dint of the wrong goal.

Of course, AHM will not pass from the scene without heated debate: Do we dissect the corpse for the organs – saving some part of the formulae less flawed than the rest – or do we try to bring the whole edifice back to shuddering life by application of some sort of shock therapy, as in a parody of a Grade B monster flick? We advocate creative destruction. Junk it – and don’t look back. None of the organs are worth transplant. Start over with a fresh and critical eye.

To put the matter bluntly, thousands of birds in the sky trump five or six or seven on the strap every time. Priceless alive, merely a good meal dead. (And we all know what happens to a good meal within 24 hours). A significant devaluation, no matter how you look at it.

On Our Associations: One can attack this issue by critiquing what we have or by suggesting an alternative ideal to which we can aspire. Being seized by a more benevolent than normal mood, I choose the latter.

First, the notion that our associations should engage in major habitat acquisition and restoration work remains appropriate. Debates over how it is done, i.e, such matters as predator control, for example, can ultimately improve our management – so long as they are true contests of ideas rather than proxies for underlying tests of strength. Sometimes management issues become proxies for argument over who is right rather than what they may be right about. But our knowledge being incomplete, disagreement becomes inevitable. Properly addressed it can prove constructive, particularly in a field where provably right answers do not abound and where today’s wisdom becomes tomorrow’s quaint falsehood, the waterfowl management equivalent of using leeches to cure stomach disorders, once the fashion of medical science.

Second, our ideal association will stress sportsmanship, fair chase, ethical hunting practices and stewardship responsibilities. These will be more than just high-sounding phrases in the mission statement, disregarded where the rubber meets the road. The principles will inform all of the actions of our ideal association, its programs for young hunters, its legislative advocacy agenda, the whole works, every day, every hour, the message at all fund-raisers, dinners and field days.

People tell me that this idea has traction with old hunters but not with the young, that all new and younger hunters have an urgent need to kill their limits and only acquire conservation values with time and experience, only after becoming sated with killing. Thus, associations faced with the imperatives of budgets, payrolls and expenses that only a numerous membership can support must downplay the high-sounding stuff, particularly anything that a sensitive member might see as critical of his or her “ethics.”

The argument makes sense, until you test it against the examples provided by the sons and daughters of hunters who practice sportsmanship, ethical hunting practices and the ideals of fair chase. Somehow, these young people manage to evolve without passing through the killer phase – because of their upbringing. In short, the correct approach is a matter of education, of advocacy, from a source of authority – precisely the leadership role that an association should play in these matters. It is a sad commentary that none of them do, despite mission statements freely sprinkled with the appropriately sanctimonious verbiage. When questioned, the leaders will say that they can’t risk offending any members for fear of losing numbers, dues and advertising revenue. So we sell out for a few bucks – or the paranoid, unproven prospect of losing a few bucks.

A principle is only a principle if one puts something at risk to adhere to it. If there is no risk, then it is not principle but platitude, the lowest common denominator of the politician in the small “p” sense of that term. But there’s a lot more to gain from these principles than just the satisfaction of doing what is right.

If hunting rights are in fact under siege in this country due to the merger and malevolent dedication of powerful anti-hunting forces, then we must reduce our vulnerability by cleaning up our act, by avoiding conduct that the general public will find objectionable and improving our image as true stewards of the waterfowl resource. We cannot do that while carrying out an agenda that focuses on maximizing kill rather than sustaining and protecting populations.

Moreover, we could not win any electoral battle on our numbers alone. We will need at least the tacit support of mainline environmental groups. Just to pick an especially sore point, how will we explain support for continued spinning-wing decoy use when we go to the Sierra Club or National Audubon for help? How will we defend our right to kill waterfowl – as a birthright, a matter of tradition – when we invoke the advances of modern technology to nullify all of the skills that form the foundations of tradition, birthright and sportsmanship?

Finally, we need leaders who do not shy from the truth, who do not fear the consequences of giving the membership a dose of cold reality in lieu of the happy horsepucky and ceremonies of self-congratulation that so often emanate from those sources. Our populations are in decline, our experience suffers, we do not recruit enough young people, too many go into the marsh for the wrong reasons to celebrate the wrong values as plunderers rather than as sensitive participants. Our habitats undergo deleterious change that we don’t understand – as in the puzzling production decline in the Prairie Pothole region -- and suffer inexorable encroachment from development despite our best efforts, whether inspired or misguided.

Anyone with a frame of reference that extends thirty year or more has an acute and painful awareness of what we have lost and continue to lose year by year, a little bit here, a little bit there, two steps forward for three steps back, as we act out the boiled frog syndrome against a symphony of polyannaism from on high. We are in crisis – not least because those who have taken over our associations deny its existence.

So when you review all of the above – if you are still with me – in all three areas addressed, the issue comes down to facing the truth, mustering the cold respect that unpleasant facts demand and dealing with it, without obfuscation. After all, hard times provide the true test of leadership in human affairs and always have. That bit of gnarly truth applies as well to our little corner of human activity as it does to every other. We disregard it at extreme peril to our hopes for the future.