DULUTH, Minn. — Minnesota duck hunters once had a love affair with scaup, often called bluebills, a duck that nests up by the Arctic Circle and made its way through the North Star state late each autumn, buzzing decoys on big lakes across the Northland.
But starting in the 1990s, the number of bluebills flying over Minnesota was getting noticeably smaller, and since then it's just kept going down.
Throughout the 1930s and '40s and even '50s, scaup were the most common, most numerous duck shot by Minnesota hunters, more than even mallards. Now, they are 12th on the bag list.
