Arkansas biologists band more than 5,800 ducks during research trip to the Prairie Pothole Region

As waterfowl migration peaks in Arkansas, Cayce Guy is watching the skies over Steve N. Wilson Raft Creek Bottoms Wildlife Management Area with more excitement than usual.
Guy, the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission’s biologist at the WMA, recently returned from a three-week assignment in North Dakota, where he helped band hundreds of ducks as part of a long-running effort to track migration and guide hunting regulations in the Mississippi Flyway.

The work is part of a rotating cooperative program among flyway states. Crews capture ducks using rocket nets, identify each bird by species, sex and age, attach a lightweight metal band and release it on site. A smaller number are held briefly for avian influenza testing or fitted with GPS transmitters for research.

“Those preseason banding efforts allow us to estimate survival rates, understand where birds go, and manage harvest responsibly,” said Brett Leach, AGFC’s Waterfowl Program coordinator.

Guy said refuge staff prepared the sites ahead of time by mowing shoreline habitat and baiting ducks with barley. Once the banding teams arrived, they shifted bait onto dry ground to ensure captured birds stayed out of the water and safe inside the nets.

“We’re catching hundreds of birds in a shot,” Guy said. “It has to move very fast, from firing the nets to banding and releasing.”

In two months of work between crews in North Dakota and South Dakota, the effort banded 5,826 ducks, according to AGFC.

Guy said his biggest takeaway was seeing how much nesting habitat depends on both refuge lands and private conservation programs in the Prairie Pothole Region.

“You can see how much habitat has been lost to conversion, and how drought affects the birds,” he said. “It really shows how important Farm Bill programs are.”

Guy hopes he may one day harvest a banded duck he helped capture.

“That’s the dream for anyone who’s been up there banding,” he said.

Hunters who recover a bird band are asked to report it at reportband.gov.

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