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Background The northern pintail has the largest breeding range of any waterfowl species with nesting locations extending into Siberia and Scandinavian Peninsula. In North America, pintails nest from the eastern Canadian maritime provinces, west across the northern tier of the United States and throughout Canada and into Alaska. Highest concentrations of nesting pintails occur in Saskatchewan and Alberta. With its expansive breeding range, pintails have historically been considered one of the most numerous duck species as recorded on breeding grounds surveys; however, numbers of pintails have declined over the last 40 years and currently are below their long-term average and below goals established by the North American Waterfowl Management Plan. Mid-winter aerial survey estimates of pintails in North Carolina suggest that wintering numbers have declined over the long-term, but have stabilized over the last 20 years
In North Carolina and throughout the country, pintails are a highly prized species by hunters, but the long-term population decline has necessitated much more restrictive hunting seasons compared to most other duck species. The most likely culprit for long-term decline is poor breeding success as a result of long-term changes in habitat and more recent changes in farming practices. This fact was dramatically highlighted when pintail populations failed to rebound when the prairie region recently enjoyed a relatively wet cycle. Many other duck species during the same time period showed very favorable increases and several reached record levels. Much of the problem likely occurs in Prairie Canada (the heart of Pintail country), where nearly 75% of the grasslands have been converted to croplands since the early 1900’s and where large-scale, government conservation programs (like CRP) do not exist. One
of the poorly understood aspects of pintail ecology is the relationship
of pintail breeding areas and their affiliation to wintering areas
in North Carolina and other areas of the Atlantic Flyway. Pintails
wintering in the Atlantic Flyway are generally considered to be mix
of birds that nest in both eastern Canada and the prairie pothole
region of the United States and Canada. How this mix varies from
north to
south in the flyway in not well recognized. Although pintails are
widely dispersed and occur in far fewer numbers in eastern Canada,
nesting
habitat in this region is likely much more stable and does not undergo
the sometimes dramatic changes that occur in the prairies. Complicating
the matter is that breeding grounds surveys targeting pintails in
eastern Canada are lacking and population trends from this vast area
are unknown.
Having a better understanding how pintails wintering in the Atlantic
Flyway relate to the overall continental population of pintails will
help guide managers in North Carolina and the Atlantic Flyway in
making better informed pintail harvest and habitat management decisions. |
