You can help! Pelican Petition

If you fish the Mississippi, or near it, you have undoubtedly noticed the increase in white pelican numbers. Nowhere is this more evident than lower Pool 13 where an estimated 4,000+ birds spend much of the year and have the only breeding colony on the Upper Mississippi River.

Adult pelicans consume 2.5 to 4 pounds of fish per day (Hall 1925; Anderson 1987). Although they are often said to feed mainly on small schooling fish of little value to humans, such as gizzard shad and rough fish, they are non-selective and will eat fish that are available to them at any given time.

White pelicans do not dive for fish, feeding only as deep as their necks can reach, so the potential impact to game fish populations on the Upper Mississippi River is theoretically high. This is because fish such as largemouth bass, northern pike, crappies, bluegills, pumpkinseeds, and yellow perch spend much of their time in shallow backwater areas where white pelicans often forage. These species are already faced with a reduction in quality overwintering habitat due to siltation of backwaters.

State DNRs on both sides of the river as well as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have been asked if they know the impact on game fish populations and how many pelicans is too many pelicans. They do not have the answer.

That is why our petition exists — to push for RIVER-SPECIFIC research to get answers that can serve as input to a management plan, if needed. State legislators have been engaged and will also be recipients of the formal proposal when it is presented.

If you share the concern, please visit Upper Mississippi River White Pelican Impact Assessment Petitionand sign the petition. It only takes a second. There is more information, photos, and videos on the site.

Thank you for your help.

Not sure what the states can do. They are under Federal Authority laws of the Migratory Bird Act! Dealing with the Feds will take decades!!

I wanna know what’s causing the increase.

White Pelican populations do move and shift without much warning or understanding.

Here is an interesting read…

https://gf.nd.gov/wildlife/id/shorebirds/white-pelican

Chase Lake National Wildlife Refuge hosts the largest colony of breeding white pelicans in North America with an estimated 1/3 to 1/2 of the entire population of pelicans nesting here. Since 2005, small colonies (less than 500 nests) have been documented at several other sites. A “responsibility” species. Moved from a level I to a level II because populations appear stable to increasing. Moderate Concern by Waterbird Conservation for the Americas.

The American White Pelican was moved from a Level I to a Level II Species of Conservation Priority due to stable population and increasing breeding range. White pelicans are establishing small but new breeding colonies in North Dakota. Efforts to identify additional breeding colonies are underway. Although new colonies are forming, the white pelican remains at-risk primarily due to the overall limited number of colonies in North America (less than 50). Several State Wildlife Grant Projects (T2-9-R, T-18-R, T-27-HM) have contributed to habitat enhancement of wetlands for white pelicans

I think you will have a tough time replicating white pelicans to “cormorant status”.

I have an interesting story about pelicans last spring. A small lake near Princton, MN has a couple of small backwater areas that I occasionally fish for panfish in the spring. Went there once last April and caught over 100 in 3 hours, all dinky palm sized that were released.

My Father went back there a week later and caught nothing. While he was in there, a landowner came down to talk to him. He told him that several days earlier, a flock of pelicans had come in there and cleaned out the panfish. There were dozens of them. They would corral schools of crappies and sunfish for hours, and then gulp then down. The landowner watched in amazement and considered firing off a couple rounds to scare them off, but didn’t. This area is only a couple feet deep so I’m sure it was easy pickings.

There is a video on our site from last spring right after spawn time for bass showing a group of pelicans shoulder to shoulder gulping fry. Pretty scary. There is also a photo from an area golf course where a single adult pelican landed and regurgitated a pile of fish, including many game fish.

It’s going to be a challenge to get any action, and nobody is saying “kill them all off,” but the question of balance is one that should be answered considering the dramatic increase in numbers.

That’s how mother nature works. What’s scary about it? Populations go up and populations go down. Things have a way of evening themselves out in nature.

It’s going to be a challenge to get any action, and nobody is saying “kill them all off,”

I am!

Growing up in Hutchinson there are a few small super shallow lakes that would have tons of walleyes in them periodically but often faced issues with freeze out. When Spring rolled around the pelicans would come in and they would literally clean the lake out in a few days. They heard all the fish to shallow water and scoop away. Just imagine how many crappies a single Pelican can eat in a day when they eat 4 pounds of fish a day.

I don’t know what the answer is, but something needs to be done. They are really getting to be a problem on a fair # of lakes around here. They are eating machines. If people don’t think they are or will have a real negative effect on the fisheries they are wrong.

Pelicans–wolves of the water

lead head jigs give you any ideas??

Iowaboy1 wrote:

lead head jigs give you any ideas??

With a propellant behind them??

Hyperbole at best……almost sounds like an excuse for not catching fish. I’ve got a friend who blames the wolves for his not filling his deer tags. That hasn’t stopped me. I just move to an area not being immediately impacted by them. The same can be said for fishing. And if those shallow lakes, the ones subject to winter-kill, are allowed to have the panfish population explode, that guarantees a winter-kill in the near future. The farmers are btchn about the turkeys and waterfowl hurting their harvest. So should we wipe them out? Or live with what mother nature does so well on her own? She’s pretty darn good at maintaining an equilibrium, if allowed to.

This might be hiperbowl, but if you suspected a rat infestation in your house, would you do something about it? Or let mother-nature takes it’s course? Sure, nature would eventually even things out, but not until your house was destroyed.

Strawman argument. We don’t live on pool 13, and aren’t the birds just as entitled to eat fish as us?

duh queen wrote:

Strawman argument. We don’t live on pool 13, and aren’t the birds just as entitled to eat fish as us?

So if I understand you correctly. If its happening at Pool 13 or anyplace else we should let mother nature takes its natural course, But if its happening at you home then its a different situation right. Just want to be clear I understand that correctly.

When you figure out this problem figure out how to get the otters out of the lake at my dads lake that ate all the fish

Pelicans are a government protected species!

I took years to legally change how cormorants were protected and there are rules on how they are controlled.

Termites, wasps, and rodents (in and around your home) are typically not projected.

A protected group expands and takes advantage of its surroundings at the expense of others and its politically incorrect to do anything about it…..

Actually I have always been amazed and mesmerized by white pelicans. Years ago when I saw my first nobody from out of state believed me. I cant shake that. It would feel like waging war on Indigo Bunting or Scarlet Tanagers. I understand it though. It would suck to be their target.

I’d need to see some proof that their population has increased dramatically.
They’ve been doing what they do for an unknown amount of generations and we still have great fishing throughout the state.
Of all the things potentially hurting fish populations, I really doubt that pelicans will be the cause.

Look at my link posted above. Plenty to read on white Pelicans.

They have been getting more and more common on the Croix the past 3 or 4 years. Don’t go down wind from them when there are a bunch on the islands in front of Hudson. Stinky &%&(%(‘s. They don’t appear to be skipping any meals. Luckly they only hang out there for a few weeks.

You can view Idaho’s full American White Pelican Conservation Plan at the link below.

Notable quote: “Idaho Department of Fish and Game (IDFG) believes there is a need to develop an approach to manage impacts of pelicans on native trout and sport fisheries in Idaho that balance conservation and recreation interests for both birds and fish.”

Idaho Pelican Plan