The Duck Hunters Organization begins annual field work at 50 sites in advance of nesting season
BISMARCK, NORTH DAKOTA — As the prairie pothole region’s breeding grounds thaw, Delta Waterfowl’s Predator Management trappers have begun work to increase duck production and boost the hatch in the PPR, an area known as “The Duck Factory” because of its importance to continental duck populations.
Delta is operating a program-record 50 sites during the 2025 breeding season, strategically placed in five key PPR jurisdictions for breeding ducks: Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, North Dakota, and South Dakota.
“Our goal of starting in mid-March is to set the table for ducks when they return to start nesting,” said Mike Buxton, waterfowl programs director for Delta Waterfowl. “Our program seasonally restores the predator/prey balance ahead of and during the nesting season to give nesting hens the best opportunity to hatch a successful nest.”
Delta’s trappers will find variable conditions across the PPR as they begin their work. Buxton said the Dakotas are relatively snow-free, while the Canadian prairie has received more snowfall this winter. Manitoba wetlands are in the best shape of the three Canadian provinces.
“A lot of areas in Saskatchewan and Alberta received decent amounts of snow this winter, but wetlands there started in such a deficit from the long-term drought. It’ll help, but it’s likely not enough to pull them into excellent breeding conditions,” Buxton said.
The goal of Delta’s Predator Management Program is to boost nest success—the percentage of nesting hens that hatch eggs. Nest success is the driver of continental duck populations. Biologists agree that nest success of 15 percent to 20 percent is necessary just to maintain the existing waterfowl population. In many key areas of the prairie, nest success is abysmal, often less than 10 percent.
“We’re working in areas with 60 to 80 or even 100 nesting pairs of ducks per square mile, because that’s where we see the most return on our trapping investment,” Buxton said. “We take areas that should be producing a lot of ducks based on pair numbers and we maximize the production. We’re applying Predator Management in areas where duck production is not reaching its potential.”
Raccoons and skunks, duck nest predators that were uncommon or absent across much of the prairie prior to the 1950s, have become overly abundant in many areas because of changes in land use and agriculture. The effects have been devastating for ducks. Studies have shown that up to 90 percent of the failed nests are destroyed by predators.
“The altered landscape has created an imbalance between waterfowl and predators,” said Joel Brice, Delta’s chief conservation officer. “We focus Predator Management on areas where the predator/prey balance is misaligned. The result is that more ducks will hatch, and more ducks will fly south.”
Delta continues to build up the organization’s highly effective Predator Management Program to deliver on the Million Duck Campaign, a transformational $250 million fundraising initiative with a goal to add 1 million ducks to every fall flight.
“Delta Waterfowl continues to increase its impact for ducks and duck hunters,” Brice said. “Expanding Predator Management and Delta’s Duck Production programs will put more ducks into the fall flight every year.”
Delta Waterfowl is The Duck Hunters Organization, a leading conservation group working to produce ducks and secure the future of waterfowl hunting in North America. Visit deltawaterfowl.org.
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