Speaker
Dr. Jay Hunter
PhD in Marine Science
The Bluebonnet Nature Swamp Preserve, Baton Rouge, LA - Oct 20, 2011
Introductory Note
NWNL was fortunate to be invited on its first night of its first Lower Mississippi River Basin Expedition to hear Dr Jay Hunter speak to the Baton Rouge Audubon Society.
Jay Hunter is a Louisiana native with an undergraduate degree in Zoology and a Masters Degree at LSU. He then became an officer in the Baton Rouge, LA Air Force. After a brief tour with the Air Force, he returned to complete his PhD in Marine Sciences. From there, he studied crawfish – more specifically
the interactions that occur between crawfish and birds. He spent decades studying that synergy.
NWNL was fortunate to be invited to his talk to the Baton Rouge Audubon Society on the first night of our first Mississippi River Basin expedition. His talk was a great reminder of the amazing roles and interplay of the indigenous species that play critical roles in our varied environments. Dr Hunter also introduced NWNL to the possibility of successful win-win solutions to today’s environmental challenges.
Outline
BACKGROUND on WORKING WETLANDS
AN INTEREST in WETLAND HABITATS
RICE AND CRAWFISH
CRAWFISH PONDS
CROP DAMAGE BY CRAWFISH
BIRDS, CRAWFISH & FIN FISH
THE PRICE of CRAWFISH
NEEDS of WATER BIRDS
BIRDS v, CRAWFISH
CRAWFISH and CARP
NATURAL RESOURCES CONSERVATION SERVICE
All images © Alison M Jones. All rights reserved.
Key Quote “Working wetlands provide shallow-water habitat or moist-soil habitat -or, in other words, “muck.” But there’s always some water someplace in a working wetland system and that becomes especially important!” — Dr. Jay Hunter
BACKGROUND on WORKING WETLANDS
I got into birds and crawfish ponds because when I graduated there was no degree in fishery at LSU. But they had a doctorate in Marine Sciences, associated with fisheries. So, I graduated and needed to get research money. To do that, you must find both a problem and somebody interested in that problem who will say there needs to be something done.
I focused on the problem that there were around 50,000 acres of crawfish ponds at that period, many of them run in conjunction with rice. Farmers were very unhappy because there were many white birds in their ponds, most with a crawfish in their bill when they raised their heads. So, naturally that meant that there was some damage being done. Thus, I was advised that if I studied birds and crawfish ponds, surely there would be money.
After 27 years and $150,000 over 30 years, there was a project on developing birding trails for the Atchafalaya Basin; and eventually I became a birder. I could identify what was eating the crawfish. In the Air Force, I was 30 miles east of Attu Island in Alaska’s Aleutian chain of islands – where there were many birders. There I saw a sea gull and a red-legged kittiwake. I then worked with Clint Jeske, a bird person at the Louisiana Wetlands Educational Center, and Mike who taught biology in New Iberia for about 35 years, with a Degree in Ornithology from University of Southwestern Louisiana.
AN INTEREST in WETLAND HABITATS
Why is wetland habitat important? We have a significant loss of interior wetlands due to agriculture (soybeans and rice) and crawfish. Well, now this habitat is a working wetland that compensates for the loss of the coastal wetlands.
Natural wetlands are typically wet from late fall into early summer; and tend to be dry during the summer. However, year around, working wetlands provide shallow-water habitat or moist-soil habitat — in other words, “muck.” But there’s always some water someplace in a working wetland system and that becomes especially important.
In July we start getting shore birds here in what’s called “fall migration” from the northern nesting areas. The first ones that come through are the adults that have finished breeding and left their young. The next batch is the young, moving south for the winter. Then we get quite a few ducks moving in – like pintails and teal.
A “working wetland” used to be called “agriculture wetlands.” But the farming community didn’t like the term “agricultural wetland” because of problems associated with taking wetlands out of wetland structures. They were worried about the legal ramifications; but then they finally decided that working wetlands made sense.
A working wetland an impounded area used to raise some kind of crop. The principal crop most people associate with working wetlands is rice. But you can also keep the system flooded year-round as a fish farm. There, rice is grown in the warm months – typically planted from March into early June. It’s harvested from July into October.
Here, we have crawfish are typically found in our natural wetlands. Natural wetlands are dry in the summer and wet in the cool months. Crawfish in the ground produce their young in the warm months. When the rains and the floods come, the areas become full of water and the crawfish come out. The little crawfish start growing and become harvestable in the spring.
RICE and CRAWFISH
Farmers have long noticed that if they flood their rice fields to shoot ducks and geese, and then drain them to plant their rice, crawfish are there. Most crawfish in Louisiana have traditionally come from natural swamps–like Honey Island Swamp east of New Orleans. Well back in the 60’s, there were a couple years when crops of crawfish from the Atchafalaya Basin failed. By then, the Honey Island Swamp was no longer producing crawfish. A few people intentionally reflooded their rice fields to harvest the crawfish crop and sell it. That’s basically when the modern crawfish farming industry began.
At that same time, people discovered much of the interior wetlands that had been drained to produce soybeans were no longer productive. They couldn’t make good money off the soybeans and there were flooding problems. Soybeans don’t like water, so their prices went down. Pests became a problem, so they weren’t getting as many soybeans as when they originally cleared the land. Many farmers, especially in eastern Louisiana and Mississippi, started raising catfish in impoundments. You don’t find shorebirds there! These fields must be dried out occasionally out. Then you get lots of shorebirds in there like double-crested cormorants? Well, there weren’t very many double-crested cormorants around when the catfish farms were being developed. So, nobody even thought that there’d be a problem from birds if you had a catfish farm. Well, double-crested cormorants rebounded and became an issue.
Well, fin fish and catfish are certainly not as complicated. Catfish grow in the big pond for several years. Then, after you harvest the big catfish, you put more little catfish in and keep the system going. But, when you drain the little pond once a year, it becomes a waterbird heaven. Larger ponds must be drained every 6 or 7 years. They become a water bird heaven when draining. Cormorants don’t much care because they can dive and swim around; but if you need to walk with your feet on the bottom, you need the water to be low. You don’t want it to be 5 feet deep; so, that’s why it’s good to drain these ponds.
CRAWFISH PONDS
A crawfish pond is between 10-14″ deep. Thus, almost any wading bird can feed in a crawfish pond. Shorebirds like much shallower water; but it takes a while to fill the pond with water. Then – talk about a bonanza! When you drain the field, there’s a huge area of shallow water and moist soil. If you follow the local bird list-serv, you know that recently, a Red-neck Phalarope – quite rare in this state – showed up in one of these fields west of Lafayette.
By the mid 1980’s, crawfish were found in around 100,000 wetland acres. The number stagnated at that level; and there was a consequence causing many economic problems. The crawfish population is not subsidized in any way, shape or form. It’s a cash crop; and so it’s between you, the Creator and the IRS as to how much you report you make.
Now, the modern crawfish farming industry keeps keep reasonably good books and look over their shoulder for the taxman. One thing we noticed in our studies was that in the 1950’s and 1960’s, the crawfish acreage started growing and then reached a plateau. We also saw wading birds–egrets, herons, Ibis, spoonbills – doing that In 1950, their numbers started going up, and around 1970 they started plateau-ing.
Liked a growth curve, there’s an almost-vertical point where a line going straight up means that the numbers are greatly increasing, geometrically. Eventually, there is a point where everything levels off and the habitat no longer supports the birds. But in 1970-80, crawfish acreage leveled off. But the curve of the wading birds kept going straight up.
Louisiana is one of the few areas with a direct connection between cropland and the increase in wading birds. Birds like the little blue herons are in trouble throughout their natural range; but in Louisiana, they’re very healthy and their numbers are increasing. I remember when we had to go to Cameron to hunt to find a Roseate Spoonbill. But now, you can go 100 miles inland and find hundreds of Roseate Spoonbills in working wetlands systems. You can find them in post-breeding dispersion all the way into places like Ohio! John James Audubon would have been astounded.
We’ve documented over 100 species of water birds in working wetlands. Fifty species have regularly been counted and are abundant during part of the year. Now 37 of these species have been identified by various birding authorities as a “species of concern.”
What’s nice about going out to these working wetland areas is that there are many other species around, especially during migration. Many other areas are adjacent to these working wetlands. We’ve documented about 180 species associated with these working wetlands.
CROP DAMAGE BY CRAWFISH
Just because the birds eat the crawfish, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re causing a problem. You must have control to determine whether there’s a problem; so they set crawfish traps out in the ponds, and somebody boats from one to the next, lifting and checking the traps. The crawfish go into the traps through entrances in the bottom and the monitors dump them out through the tops of the traps. If the trap falls over, the crawfish can go out the top; and if the bird lands on the trap and turns it over, you lose any crawfish that were in the trap – plus the costs of the bait and your labor.
The birds eat what the crawfish eat – and crawfish are omnivores. Their intestine is something like a cow. It’s long and convoluted with multiple stomachs. Thus, a crawfish can eat straw and turn it into something useful, because it has a micro-generated system inside its gut. Crawfish are simple – they have a straight gut, basically a one-chamber stomach. Thus, it must be an omnivore. We just never realized that.
Birds also eat creepy crawlers, worms, insects, seeds, creepy crawlers and prey like that. They also eat the seeds, so they’re competitors to crawfish.
BIRDS, CRAWFISH & FIN FISH
How do we put more people on a unit of land? We go vertically, right? If we have three stories, we can have three sets of people living. But crawfish don’t grow very well in high densities. One crawfish per square foot yields a good crop. But you can increase the number per square foot if there’s a vertical substrate in the water column for them to crawl around on.
But if you have Brother Goose, he comes in and tears up that vertical substrate. That reduces the amount of area affected, thus impacting the crawfish. What about direct damage to the crawfish? I once saw a flock of about 1,000 white ibis over by Jennings, working in a crawfish pond. Each one came up with a crawfish in its mouth. We’ve done some bioenergetics studies and figured that they probably had to eat about half a pound of crawfish a day to meet their daily intake requirements.
Anecdotally, that flock of ibis was causing problems for that farmer. But we have no data that we can take into a court of law and prove that the cormorants damaged the catfish? Nope. But Mississippi can prove it, because they’ve got millions of dollars to study the problem and prove it.
Birds like double-crested cormorants and pelicans just basically wear out fin fish if they’re not somehow excluded from the system. They can eat large fish; and they can damage the fish by moving parasites into the system that then infect the fish.
There’s no question that our working wetlands, especially these crawfish/rice systems, are an extremely important habitat. They are such important habitats that last year – when BP accidently spilled all that oil in the Gulf – there was concern that there could be loss of early migrating birds along the coast if they got into the oil. So, folks redirected funds for habitat production through the Natural Resources Conservation Service/NRCS to help farmers refill rice fields and crawfish ponds. Otherwise, folks would not have filled their ponds during the August, September and October period.
THE PRICE of CRAWFISH
Now something that’s happened in rice production, regardless of whether we work in hectares or acres. From 2004 to 2006, there was a basic decline of almost half of the rice acreage. Why? Because of the high cost of diesel.
What about the crawfish crops? If you like to eat crawfish; and you go into a restaurant you really ought to ask – whether you’re eating Chinese crawfish, or not. It costs $3 per pound – no matter what the crawfish costs – to make a pound of crawfish meat, to peel the crawfish and so forth. It takes 6-1/2 pounds of live crawfish to make 1 pound of crawfish meat. Okay, that’s $3 to produce a pound of crawfish meat, without ever paying for the crawfish. The Chinese crawfish meat cost $3 a pound in the stores. It’s a bit more expensive now but it was difficult to compete.
So, problems were also caused by the fish-eating birds and – guess what? The Chinese grow catfish too–a lot cheaper than we can. They taste pretty much like our catfish. So, if you’re running a restaurant, will you pay $3 for catfish – or pay $1.50 for catfish, especially if your customers don’t care. Catfish is a global issue!
One reason we’re able to get funding for flooding fields with the BP Oil Spill money is that the system provides $750 to $1,000 per hectare. [One hectare is 2-1/2 acres]. Conservationists interacted with the agricultural community to sustain this habitat with BP support. With the crawfish culture, whether you use rice in the field or not, it is important for water-bird conservation efforts!
NEEDS of WATER BIRDS
My take-home message is that we have water birds throughout this region. What do they need? They need water, moist soil – and many of them need shallow water. What’s happening with these crawfish/rice projects and catfish systems is that we’re providing this habitat. Well, not a single farmer ever went out to grow crawfish, catfish or rice, who wanted to provide habitat but wound up providing habitat.
One of the things that’s great about our upcoming Yellow Rails and Rice Festival is that it’s in rice fields and working wetlands. It’s a partnership between academicians, conservationists and farmers. People from the US, Canada and even Europe are coming to the Yellow Rails and Rice Festival.
Why would they want to come? Well, if you are a birder, you’re quite enthusiastic about the festival, since the yellow rail is very difficult to find. They are very, very sneaky, crafty little creatures. You almost must run over them to see them. But if you have access to a rice compound, you can watch them fly out.
The culture of the area also offers gumbo and jambalaya, boudin and even “cracklin’s.” Now, many guests don’t know about the whooping cranes. Two whooping cranes released from White Lake were killed about a week ago in a working wetland. Why were they there?
They were released at White Lake, a large natural wetland area, now dry because of drought. Birds started moving around. They were released in the area where where our last main resident population of whooping cranes existed. That population did the same thing that the ones that were released did. They didn’t stay in one place – rather, they just worked the entire area. Back then, unfortunately, they probably were eaten. But in this recent case, two juveniles were seen and they have been contacted. Apparently the Endangered Species Act applies to the killing because it was an intentional killing. It’s disappointing but maybe it might be beneficial.
In wildlife management, we typically expect that in one year 70% of the young of most populations will die, with 30% surviving a year. Now, apparently 50% of whooping birds are gone. Two were shot, one was killed by a predator, one had to be euthanized and we’re unsure what happened with one. Another 10 will be released next month and hopefully that’ll be a positive reinforcement. I guarantee that everybody with a rifle or shotgun between here and the Texas border now knows not to shoot whooping cranes.
I am looking at is why we couldn’t get significant funding to figure out what the birds were doing in the ponds, especially since they are wading birds and there was no real problem from the standpoint of the birds. The bird numbers were increasing.
So, there was no urgency within the conservation community about birds being in trouble. If there were, there’d have been a hue and cry demanding, “Oh, we have to study the problem.” The problem was that the farmers were unhappy with birds in the ponds. They didn’t know if the damage was serious.
Is the crawfish industry now healthy and thriving? Yes. Are the birds doing anything really bad? Well, people would have gone out of business if birds were creating great damage.
BIRDS v CRAWFISH
AUDIENCE Do the farmers ever try to chase the birds away?
JAY HUNTER A farmer-friend has a multi-engine commercial license and a little ultra-light plane. As he flew it over his field, there were about 1,000 ibis there. Ibis, with their crooked beaks, are called “bec-croche” by Cajuns [French for “bent beak”]. He flew low over them; and suddenly there were many ibis all around him. Back on the ground, he crossed himself and never went after them again.
The problem with harassing almost any animal is that they learn. A crawfish farmer knows it’s illegal to shoot the birds; but it’s not illegal to frighten the birds. With cormorants and pelicans, strictly controlled permits must be issued for killing those birds. If a bird’s not hurt, the birds ignore the problem. I’ve seen a Great Egret literally rescued on the barrel of a propane canon. When timers they use “click,” they release gas into a chamber that builds up. At a certain concentration, it explodes. That time is about15 seconds or such. But birds just seem to count down, jump up and run off. They then land back on. When they hear in those canons, birds know that there’s a reason why those cannons are sounding. They fly over, don’t see anybody getting hurt, and know that’s a good place to go. It’s a wonderful attractant.
I always thought that farmers should intensify their farming, concentrating on 20 or 30 acres, say, instead of several hundred acres. If you’re concentrating on small acreages, you can probably better control and protect your crop. But remember – night herons are called “night” herons for a reason. They forge at night; and those “throwbacks” have the big beaks. When they have crawfish in their beak, you can hear it from here to the front of the building.
Birds may cause some localized, measurable damage. but as far as destroying or impeding the industry, the birds don’t seem to do that. Rice farmers may get subsidies, but their fields provide food to the citizens and the birds. In my mind, that justifies paying the rice farmer.
As roseate spoonbills increase dramatically in numbers and expand inland, we also see changes in the behavior of wood storks. There are two populations of Wood Storks that in Louisiana. They mainly nest in Mexico’s Campeche region in the winter. When they finish nesting, they migrate up into the lower Mississippi Valley. Historically, they followed the floods. The Mississippi River floods and other floods would fill the river basins and shallow areas adjacent to the river.
When the water goes down, the area starts drying up in June, July or August – and then, here come the storks! And they can feed quite well at night. Stork and ibis are “tactic feeders.” They and spoonbills don’t look for their food. They just walk around with their bills open and whack it. So, they don’t have to see. But if you raise carp or goldfish in your backyard pond, green herons, great blue herons and black, brown-eyed herons are fish specialists and may grab your $200 Koi. But…, don’t necessarily blame it on the bird – it may well be the raccoon.
CRAWFISH and CARP
You might if the cheap cost of crawfish and fish from China is due to the price of technology or just the labor? I think it is labor – especially for crawfish meat. But I’m told China keeps prices down artificially, in addition to their labor issues. The original catfish came out of Vietnam, but people in said you can’t call those catfish because they’re not of that genus. So, they started using their Vietnamese name – which didn’t make any difference to restaurateurs. So, the Chinese imported our American catfish and now they’re shipping them back to us!
The crawfish from China are the same crawfish we have. In the early 1900s, Japan wanted to raise bullfrogs, so they brought them in. Then they wondered what bullfrogs like to eat? They like crawfish, so, they brought crawfish from Louisiana to Japan. The Japanese didn’t like to eat crawfish; but now they eat all kinds of shellfish. But there’s shellfish parasite called “paragonimus,” a worm usually called a lung fluke. Eating raw crawfish, can put one in serious jeopardy. Everyone in that part of the world knows about “paragonimus” wiping out and knocking off dogs and cats. There’s never been “paragonimus,” that I know of, in any human in North America caused by eating crawfish, because here it’s always cooked.
Somehow, that crawfish got from Japan into China where Oriental people apparently have a pension for the color red. Crawfish are very easily raised. You can grow them in a little bowl – and even a small female will produce 100 eggs. But what do you do with 100 baby crawfish? Well, you throw them in a ditch. Next thing you know, crawfish are all over the place, and the Chinese didn’t eat crawfish back then.
But crawfish make holes in levees. Well, if you’ve got a rice field that’s no bigger than an average auditorium with a little levee, the crawfish will make holes through it – and you’re probably not going to be very happy about that – especially if you don’t eat them.
Thus, the original name for crawfish in China was something like “horrible devil” – a vile word. The Chinese finally realized that they had to either exterminate the crawfish or use it — so, they used it.
Some of you may have heard of carp – of which there are many different kinds. In China the most important source of animal protein in China is carp. Very few people in this country except those in lower socio-economic levels eat carp; but carp’s perfectly wonderful to eat. Eastern Europeans serve a carp for Christmas. So, if you think crawfish prices are a little pricey, remember you’re helping the birds.
NATURAL RESOURCES CONSERVATION SERVICE
Well, there used to be an organization within the U.S Department of Agriculture called the Soil Conservation Service. It has morphed into something broader called the Natural Resources Conservation Service/NRCA. They administer assistance programs for setting aside land to restore it to it’s former function. Their rules change every time that there’s a new farm bill. So, if you’re a landowner, you really need to interact with the local natural Resources Conservation Service to find out specifically what you can and cannot do.
Some solutions are permanent easements – which means you technically own the land. But there’s not a lot you can do to that land once you’ve been paid for a permanent easement. In other solutions, there might be 15- or 25-year types of easements where for 15 years you can’t do anything, but then you could start harvesting if you planted it. With a 30 year easement you can’t do anything until after 30 years; but you can lease for hunting and fishing, and that helps generate income to the landowner.
Much of the bottomland hardwood that was cleared, should not have cleared in the first place. Welcome to the government! The government gave them money for cutting down the trees and burning them. And now, fortunately the government seems to be trying to reverse some of that damage! It’s certainly nice to end my talk on a positive note!
Posted by NWNL on October 20, 2026.
Transcription edited and condensed for clarity by Alison M. Jones.
All images © Alison M. Jones, unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved.