Oneida Lake Volunteer Cormorant Harassment Effort Set Again for This Fall

Oneida Lake volunteer cormorant harassment effort set again for this fall

Published: Friday, August 12, 2011, 6:25 AM

By David Figura/The Post-Standard
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Volunteers are teaming up again this fall with the state Department of Environmental Conservation to harass cormorants on Oneida Lake.

A training session for volunteers has been set for Aug. 25 at the Cornell Biological Field Station at Shackelton Point in Bridgeport.

“You have to be at the training, otherwise you’re not going to be able to volunteer,” said David Lemon, the fisheries manager for the DEC’s Region 7, who is coordinating the effort against the fish-eating birds.

Last year, Lemon coordinated a contingent of about 60 volunteers who donated their time, boats and gas to be on the lake about four days a week during the month of September. He said he plans on relying on many of those same volunteers this time around.

Lemon noted this year’s harassment effort will have two major changes from last year. First, there will be a “go, no go” decision made the day prior to each outing. Last year, he explained, volunteers were sent out at times when there really weren’t that many birds on the lake.

“That was a waste of gas and money,” he said.

Also, while volunteers were out last year about four times a week, they weren’t hitting the entire lake each time. This year, he said, the volunteers will be out an average of two times a week, during which time they’ll give the lake full coverage.

Lemon said the volunteers will once again be allowed to use pyrotechnics paid for by the Oneida Lake Association to harass the birds, but will not be allowed to shoot and kill them.

“We (the DEC) will be shooting some for a dietary study,” he said.

On a positive note, Lemon noted the lake appears to have “a tremendous amount” of young gizzard shad this year, which cormorants like to eat. That should “buffer their predation,” he said, on the lake’s perch and walleye.

Meanwhile, legislation authored by U.S. Rep. Ann Marie Buerkle that includes money for cormorant harassment on Oneida Lake in the U.S. Department of Agriculture budget for 2012 has passed the House of Representatives, but still must get approval in the Senate. Federal lawmakers are on recess.

Federal funding for the lake’s cormorant harassment program was cut in 2009 after years of successfully bringing down the numbers of nesting and migrating birds.

For more information about this fall’s harassment effort, call 607-753-3095, ext. 213.