Chatham Is Protecting Their Mussel Crop From Ducks With A Cannon

CHATHAM — There are so many mussels that, at low tide, Scatteree looks like a black sand beach, which means shellfishermen could be in the black next year – if eiders don’t beat them to the largesse.

“You really have to see it; it’s amazing,” David Likos, chairman of the shellfish advisory committee, told selectmen about the stretch of mussels from Scatteree to the Chatham Lighthouse last week.

The bountiful set of mussels lies across much of Chatham Harbor, as are rafts of eider that nosh on them, and the advisory committee and the shellfish constable hope to keep the hungry ducks away from three areas.

Selectmen gave them approval to do that and deterrents ranging from a “scare crow cannon” to ultrasonic bird repellers and holographic bird foil tape, will be used throughout the winter. The cannon will be placed east of Strong Island while the other, silent tactics will be used near Minister’s Point and Tern Island.

Holy crap Chatham is at war with ducks. Piping Plovers get a VIP section and meanwhile ducks are getting cannon blasts, ultrasonic bird repellers and holographic bird foil tape. What the hell is holographic bird foil tape?

I think the real question here is where was this technology when we were in elementary school? Chatham has a better air defense system than Syria, but we had to play soccer at recess in a goose shit mine field. The worst was when they would aerate the field the day before and you couldn’t tell what was a tube of dirt and what was goose shit. Just absolute mayhem .

P.S. This is a perfect example of a situation where our proposed beer for work program would come in handy. Offer a bounty of a beer per duck and we’d have booze bags strangling eiders with their bare hands.

P.P.S. I’m no expert but I think trash dumps could also benefit from “ultrasonic bird repellers”.