Usage of the waterfowl ring-recovery data for the calculation of the sustainable hunting bag size

This article is the third one in the publication set where we proof the methods of usage bird ring-recovery data for definition of the population parameters of separate species, demographic statuses of their populations and calculation of the rational harvest rates in the huntable bird species. For the enlarging of usage of the ring-recovery data for the rational (sustainable) use of the waterfowl resources, we propose new method of calculation of the hunting bag size. As huntable objects it is possible to use those species only which do not included into different level of Red Data Books and those ones where the species’ demographic status allows hunting. The proposed calculation way includes data on annual mortality rate of different waterfowl species and age cohorts, obtained from ring-recovery data together with the information on the total species’ numbers taken from surveys and expert assessments. In addition, ring-recovery data allow calculation waterfowl hunting bag size for separate regions of Russia for the birds that winter in Europe and breed in the northern parts of European Russia and Western Siberia. Proposed method directed to make the hunting bag calculation be more rational instead of normally used arbitrary and generally intuitive approach to this very important problem.