Research Article Exploring Fall Migratory Patterns of American Black Ducks Using Eight Decades of Band-Recovery Data PHILIP LAVRETSKY, 1 Wright State University, 3640 Colonel Glenn Hwy, Dayton, OH 45435, USA JOSHUA H. MILLER, Department of Geology, University of Cincinnati, 500 Geology/Physics Building, Cincinnati, OH 45221, USA; Wright State University, 3640 Colonel Glenn Hwy, Dayton, OH 45435, USA; Florida Museum of Natural History, Dickinson Hall, Gainesville, FL 32611, USA; and University of Alaska Museum, 907 Yukon Dr., Fairbanks, AK 99775, USA VOLKER BAHN, Wright State University, 3640 Colonel Glenn Hwy, Dayton, OH 45435, USA JEFFREY L. PETERS, Wright State University, 3640 Colonel Glenn Hwy, Dayton, OH 45435, USA ABSTRACT As regions of habitat used by migratory waterfowl are subjected to rising anthropogenic pressures, establishing patterns of landscape use during migratory cycles is becoming increasingly important for managing and maintaining populations. Although data collection strategies such as global positioning system (GPS) telemetry promise high-resolution insight on geographic use of contemporary populations, decades of available band recovery records on many species can provide a low-cost, multi-generational alternative for defining broad, historically informed patterns of landscape use. We used nearly a century of band-recovery data to reconstruct patterns of fall migratory landscape use for American black ducks in the Mississippi and Atlantic flyways. We partitioned band recovery positions by month from September to February and spatially analyzed positions using kernel density estimates (KDEs) to delineate geographic regions used by American black ducks and track changes in landscape use during migration. Additionally, we considered the appropriateness of current management strategies, which treat American black ducks as a single population, by testing for differences in month-specific landscape use between ducks banded in the Mississippi and Atlantic flyways, and between international management units (ducks banded in Canada or the U.S.). We found that geographic distributions during peak migration faithfully recovered regions previously hypothesized as migratory corridors. Furthermore, regardless of banding origin, we found highly similar distributions and strong flyway fidelity in Atlantic flyway American black ducks. Conversely, American black ducks banded in the Mississippi flyway displayed differences in landscape use between Canadian and U.S. populations, with Canadian ducks significantly more likely to winter in areas within the Atlantic flyway (i.e., migrate between flyways). Flyway- and population-specific patterns of black duck landscape use indicate populations behave more independently than currently treated by management models (including the Adaptive Harvest Management plan), and that population maintenance may be advanced by managing stocks separately. Ó 2014 The Wildlife Society. KEY WORDS Anas rubripes, Atlantic flyway, banding records, Mississippi flyway. Migratory species use many geographic regions and habitats throughout their annual cycles (Fryxell and Sinclair 1988, Beier and Noss 1998, Thirgood et al. 2004). For ducks, research has primarily focused on breeding, molting, and wintering areas (Serie et al. 1983, Bowman and Brown 1992, Yarris et al. 1994, Robertson and Cooke 1999, Nicolai et al. 2005), with little attention to delineating regions of important mid-migratory habitat (Newton 2006). However, the quality of mid-migratory habitat is critical to successful migration cycles (Raveling 1979, Krapu 1981, Ankney et al. 1991, Madsen 1995, Anteau et al. 2004). Management and conservation of waterfowl populations require high- quality data on their key migratory habitats and overall geographic requirements (Nichols et al. 1995a, Krementz et al. 2011). Although telemetry methods offer fine- resolution data for studying landscape use by duck populations (see Kendall and Nichols 2004), expense and technological complications limit sample sizes of individuals and temporal coverage. In contrast, banding records, which typically include decades of data on thousands of individuals, provide considerable temporal and spatial coverage. For example, using band recovery data, Calenge et al. (2010) were able to successfully delineate the timing and geography of fall and spring migratory corridors of Eurasian green- winged teal (Anas crecca) across southern France. American black ducks (Anas rubripes) have been a species of management concern in eastern North America since Received: 5 December 2012; Accepted: 14 May 2014 1 E-mail: lavretsky.2@wright.edu The Journal of Wildlife Management; DOI: 10.1002/jwmg.752 Lavretsky et al.  American Black Duck Migratory Patterns 1