The 2020 avian botulism outbreak in the Klamath Basin was a demoralizing horror show for everyone involved, from those who fought to curb its spread by picking up rotting bird corpses, to those who have been fighting to get more water for Lower Klamath.
However, the outbreak did provide some really interesting data about where the victims came from, and where they were headed.
How so? Because 127 of the dead had been banded at some point earlier in their lives - mostly in California - and because 834 ducks that were successfully treated at the "Duck Hospital" at Lower Klamath were banded before their release. Of those later harvested by hunters, the vast majority ended up in California.
Click
here for a sneak preview of our look at this data in the Spring issue of
California Waterfowl magazine.