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Waterfowl Reports


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When walking back to the truck a flock of woodies, flock of mallards, and a flock of 4 pintails landed exactly where my decoys were.

They actually let you start walking before they arrived? For me they always wait until I have my gun unloaded and am starting out to pick up the decoys. grin

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We were up by Fergus Falls. There were mostly Woodies flying, a few Mallards and no Teal. We took a drive about 5:30 saturday and only saw 10 teal total on all the ponds we looked at(15 - 20).

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The last year the opener was at noon two buddies and I were done by 1 oclock. Great opening day.

Opener hasnt been at noon for a few years now and You said you got 9 birds on Sunday and missed 2 or 3 birds The way I see it you did great and if you would not of missed those birds you would of had a limit.

I think the earlier opener was the best thing thats happened for waterfowling regs for quite some time,. We saw a bunch of teal and woodies they were not gone yet and the ringnecks arnt quite down yet either .

As the saying goes "you can Please some of the people some of the time BUT you can't please all of the people all of the time"

This holds true for everything.. just my 2c

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Best opener in years. My dad and I shot 7 green and blue wing teal and one hen woody on Sat. 3 blue wing teal and one hen woody on Sun. Had a great time. I shot more ducks in first half hour on Sat than I did all of last year. Two year old lab continues to show promise.

Crappy part now is that we have to wait a week to hunt again.

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Overall opener weekend was not quit as good as last year numbers wise for us, but we managed a few of teal, woodies, and ring bills each day (8 total each sat and Sun, 2 Monday, 3 guys). Definitely saw ducks moving around Saturday and Sunday, just could not get them to commit Sat morning and could have made better shots as well.

There were definitely a lot more people out on Saturday this year vs last year. Reports from the area we were in were that everyone saw a lot more hunters, even on back woods pot holes.

Oddly, a slew we used to hunt near Marshall that always had people on it only had one group this year, which was my buddies dad/uncle. They limited out by 9 each day on Teal and Woodies.

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If you are that clairvoyant I'd go buy lottery tickets instead of writing letters.

Its not being clairvoyant...Its called commen sense. If ducks get shot at opening day at 9am and later...it doesent effect their morning flight the next day as much as if it opens a half hour before sunrise. Very straightfoward. I have never had birds on the sunday of opener start flying half an hour before shooting time and almost be completly done flying by shooting time. Thats due to hunting pressure sat morning. When it opens at 9 what happens?? At 8am you get a massive flight of birds...why? because everyone is seting out decoys. At 9 you get a massive flight of birds why? because they start geting shot at... hunters create their own flight...but the key here is that the ducks were not harrased in the early morning when they were doing their normal routine. Its like that first evning you can hunt ducks of the season, the hunting is awsome...but what happens after that?? Most of the birds fly after shooting time.

This might not hold as true in the wooded area of the state where there is more water and less hunters, but holds true in the prairie portion with less water and more hunters. Usually its good on opening day and better sunday...which I believe makes the hunting better for the weekend as a whole. Other hunters I talked to in my area noticed the same thing...sunday morning was a major dropoff from sat with birds flying before shooting time.

Elwood- It has been years since opening day was at noon, I was talking about the last year opener was held at noon, not 2010. I agree not everyone is going to be happy. I dont mind the earlier date for opener, what I dont like is the earlier shooting time on opening day. I had a great opener, no complaints about it. I talk to allot of hunters and no one has an opinion on the earlier shooting time, or dislikes it...I think thats because allot of guys havent thought of the effects the earlier shooting time has on the flight sunday. Everything has a cause and effect. Opener at half hour before sunrise= better hunting on opening day. Opener at 9am= better hunt sunday.

Enough of my rant....Heres an actual report. Went out tues morning. Shot 2 ducks and a goose hunting solo. 1 mallard and 1 wigeon. Very warm out there with no wind. Passed on 2 good shots because the flocks were very large (50 +) and I dident want to educate that many birds.

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Well it is what is i guess... you got to change it up sometimes lol. But went out the past two days wednsday pretty slow had a group of three guys only shot ten birds lost two nice ringbill drakes was kind of a bummer didnt see to many cept we got out 10 min past shooting time and seen around a 100 divers coming outta the rice. And today a lot better this storm we had pushed in quite a bit of ducks seen around 400 only had about 60 to 70 though decoy but shot a limit for four only recovered 17 lost 6 birds due to the wind or birds diving. Most ringbills and wigeons even some teal still around. didnt expect it to be storming though this morn and having to battle 5 ft rollers on the way out to the spot.

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two shooters sat morning got 6 woodies and one mallard, sunday three shooters and nine woodies. waiting for the mallards to get to us

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Two hunters, 12 birds saturday with 5 drake mallards, 2 gadwalls, 3 bwt, and 2 gwt. Fast shooting but we were picking 1 or 2 birds per group so out hunt would last longer.

Sunday. Same two hunters, same pond. 6 mallards (one hen), 1 gadwall, and 5 bwt. Took more of the shots that were given to us and weren't so picky due to us wanted to get back to camp, pack up, and head some before lunch.

Great hunts both days with my Friends Lab making all 24 retrieves, including two blind retrieves each day on birds dropped behind in the TALL cattails. Couldn't have asked for a better performance out of the old girl.

This was a very good WMA we hunted and was not the only one in the area that was FULL of birds. Over 200 miles logged on the truck last friday paid off big time!

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I had a great morning with my daughters one of which is shooting. 12 ducks and she got her first goose. We had a mixed bag with mallards,bwt,gwt, wood ducks, red head and ringnecks. I picked the shots carefully this morning and went 5 for 5 and then picked up the last one on the second shot. What a great morning.

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I've been hunting about a 40 mile radius from Grand Forks and haven't had a problem of finding ducks or geese...especially hunkers. Manage to limit out on geese yesterday by just sitting in a ditch and waiting for them to pass by. There was lots and on the move and flying low. Not alot of hunters what so ever. Saw only three groups decoying maybe three other groups hunting ducks. Duck hunting is really good as well. Biggest problem for me trying to identify all the different ducks(first year duck hunting) you can or can't shot so I pass on alot of them. Good luck to anybody going out

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I had a great morning with my daughters one of which is shooting. 12 ducks and she got her first goose. We had a mixed bag with mallards,bwt,gwt, wood ducks, red head and ringnecks. I picked the shots carefully this morning and went 5 for 5 and then picked up the last one on the second shot. What a great morning.

Is it where I think your hunting

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was out this morning around hugo. saw a bunch of geese was able to get 2. a few ducks nothing to talk about but we ended up with 3 mergansers. its weird ive never realy seen mergansers this early in the season around here before.

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Well The season has been slow for my group. A total of seven woodducks for the first two weekends for three guys. Tons of birds around but they are not using our area this year. Too little water is the issue. Flooded three times this spring and we end up with two dry ponds. Mallards are very weary already and I just got a new black lab and wanted to put birds under it like previous years with my retired black lab. I guess that we will have to put some ringnecks up in her face or even buy some chuckars to make sure she has some birds in her face. Good luck out there and hopefully this little spot that I found tonight has the ducks I saw on it tomorrow morning. Then my dog will have plenty of birds in her face and I will have to retract my statement!!!!!! grin

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Went out to a family pothole in west central MN on Saturday, I should have rounded up a few guns, but didn't scout friday night so I had no clue what to expect. the small openings in the cattails were loaded with woodies, mallards, and bw teal. Had a lot of birds moving back and forth from hole to hole all morning, with the occasional duck checking out the big opening and my decoy spread. I wasn't too choosy, taking the first 2 bw teal, and first 3 mallards that came in, and got the heck out of there hoping to get another hunt in on sunday. Allergies kicked in on saturday night and I didn't get out yesterday though. It was good to see that many ducks in there though, I venture to guess many of them were hatched out right there in the crp surrounding the sloughs.

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You Know CSD I had a simalar deal going on with those allergies also sunday that was a battle in its own.

This morning I got 1 GWT and thats it lots of birds just nothing close enough I set up and about 20 min later about 20-30 mallards land a few yards from my decoys and WOW was that loud no better way to learn duck talk than from the ducks themselves well that went on for about and hour and abotu 15 min before shooting they get up and fly away. thats hunting

OH yea I almost forgot to put the plug in the boat noticed a bit of water when I climbed in and well you guys know the story... blush Thanks Hntbux for the offer of your spare plug

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Seeing good numbers around me, but I did see more birds over the 9/24-25 weekend than the 10/1 - 2 weekend.

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We had a pretty good mixed bag on Saturday. 1 goose, 3 woodie, 1 redhead, 2 pintails, 1 ringbill and a few BWT. Lot's of birds flying all morning including a big flock of Snows that wanted nothing to do with us. Beautiful weekend but I'm ready for some colder weather to move in.

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Hunted south of the metro on public land. Hiked back a ways to get away from the expected crowds to a back woods pond I found/scouted a while back. Hunted both days, Saturday and Sunday.

Had one group around a bend to the right 150 yards away one day, another group 200 yards around a bend to the left on Sunday. Both days tons of Woody action and limited out both days on Woodies. Got two Mallards on Saturday. Other than the two Mallards, all we saw were Woodies. But plenty of them.

Saturday, the other group and our group did not screw each other up and all were pretty good about Sky Bustin'. Yesterday, I bet the two guys who set up to the left of us went through 120 + shells. Even had pellets come splashing by us pretty good once, and to do that they had to be shooting almost right at us through some woods and brush. They knew we were there.

Funny thing is was that we could really see birds coming in and out of the general area, and we often didn't see anything coming or going from where they shot. We figured they must have been gunning at anything that was flying in their general area.

It was annoying, but comes with the territory. The BEST part was when we got two woodies down that were flying so fast their trajectory carried them 80-100 yards away to a spot in their line of sight. First one fell on the other side of a point, and the dog goes on a blind retrieve, works the area and brings back a nice drake. The other bird was wounded, unfortunatley, but the dog goes back out across the pond, into the woods we guessed about 60-75 yards, you hear some commotion and soon pops back out with the other Woody.

Smiled long on that one! It's my dog's first year duck hunting and it looks like I have a winner.

Safe hunting everyone.

Broc

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Lots of dumb geese in Mankato area. Me and my neighbor got our limit by 9:30 and 4 ducks to boot. Woodies and teal. I have never had geese lock so fast on the dekes. Needed one more to limit and had 7 come in. Wish those came sooner. My 9 month lab old got all the ducks and her first goose today and its only the 2nd hunt of her life. Very happy with her.

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Killed two woodducks this morning on public. Should of had my limit of woodies and teal but most swung around from a corner that I could not see from where I was standing and they were moving at full speed. Shooting was horrible also!!! Have a landowner that has property right up to a public waterfowl lake and we have padded the path down and this morning when we checked their was around two hundred greenheads out there with a bunch of Woodies and teal and a few redheads but if they don't fly by us there is not enough water for us to move to different spots and the mud is incredible.

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Steve Cordts, what was the quote in the star and trib, record numbers of ducks in the state ah ah well ah really ? Compared to when ? I heard little to zero shooting and we saw maybe a dozen ducks. In 1983 through the mid 90's maybe, we'd see hundreds and hundreds of ducks so record numbers I'm very confused by hearing that. We see about 90 geese per duck in our area(s). I live in 3 counties in a way and no one I'm talking to are seeing any, maybe this warm weather messed em up but read the sunday sports/outdoors and clarify what record numbers meant ?

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Steve Cordts, what was the quote in the star and trib, record numbers of ducks in the state ah ah well ah really ? Compared to when ? I heard little to zero shooting and we saw maybe a dozen ducks. In 1983 through the mid 90's maybe, we'd see hundreds and hundreds of ducks so record numbers I'm very confused by hearing that. We see about 90 geese per duck in our area(s). I live in 3 counties in a way and no one I'm talking to are seeing any, maybe this warm weather messed em up but read the sunday sports/outdoors and clarify what record numbers meant ?

http://news.dnr.state.mn.us/2011/07/29/d...lent/#more-6129

http://blogs.twincities.com/outdoors/files/2011/09/Sept.-29-2011-MN-WF-Mig-Report.pdf

The weather has played a big part in where the ducks are or aren't right now. The state had big numbers of blue wing teal and woodies up until before the opener. How many NW winds have we had to blow the early calendar birds out? Then we get strings of 80 degree days where nothing seems to move around much. I was in west central MN this past weekend hunting and heard plenty of shooting, and had piles of birds roosting in the property I was hunting. Sometimes, regardless of numbers, its still all about the location during the early part of the season. There was honestly more ducks on that property in MN than my favorite spots in SD are holding right now.

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Interesting I also was in west central MN, more central than west though and heard barely any shooting but like you said location, maybe the best waters are holding the majority of the ducks and maybe that's what has changed over the last 15 years. We had 0 hit our 14 wood duck houses again this year and our classic blue wing teal pond had 3 in it most of the summer. Those woody boxes used to be at capacity every year, we maintain and clean them, but talking to bow hunters they aren't seeing them or hearing them whistle by like the good old days. What is the deal, all these farms I can choose from and there's nothing there hardly ever, years back it was absolutely just nuts. I'm asking every waterfowler I come in contact with and they just give ya the what ducks at least there's geese around, most would quit buying stamps if there were no geese around like the 70's to mid 80's. Going to float a 10 mile stretch of river this wkd where we made hay for many years, will report back.

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Was out this morning at got a limit of geese in a T shirt laugh. Luckly the only flock that came in. They must have liked my calling cuz they came into my landing zone like i had a string around their neck.

I'm gunna try a new field tmrw I'll check back in when get in.

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  • Your Responses - Share & Have Fun :)

    • Kettle
      Walked today and yesterday, flushed 9, shot at two and got two. Hopefully next year I'll have a dog to hunt with. Still warm up here, skim of ice on ponds. Weather has been nice. Hopefully walk a bit more the next few weeks. Been pretty cautious walking for birds to not interfere with deer hunters. There sure are not the deer hunters there used to be 
    • LakeofthewoodsMN
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    • gimruis
      I hunt in the rifle zone so I don't have a need to use a shotgun to hunt deer, but I would be looking at this if there was ever a need to.   There could be state legislation introduced next summer that eliminates the shotgun zone completely.  It has bipartisan support.  Wisconsin removed theirs years ago and MN is usually later to follow.  They've tried to pass it more than once and it came up just short both times.  Probably just a matter of time.
    • Wanderer
      Oh, h e l l no! 
    • leech~~
      Screw that, here's whatch need!  😆   Power-Shok Rifled Slug 10 Gauge 766 Grain Grain Weight: 766 Shotshell Length: 3-1/2in / 89mm Muzzle Velocity: 1280
    • Wanderer
      20 ga has become a real popular deer round in the last 5 or so years.  The rifled barrels are zinging those sabot slugs with rifle like accuracy out to 100 yards easily.  Some go so far as dialing in for a 200 yard shot but really, by 150 they’re falling off pretty low.   I have a single shot Ultraslug in 20 ga that shoots really well at 100 yards.  Most everyone I know that has bought a slug gun lately has gotten the Savage 220 in 20ga.  Problem can be finding the shells you want.
    • leech~~
      My son always bugs me about getting a nice light over-under 20ga for grouse hunting.  I say Heck no, I'm getting a 3 1/2" 10ga so I can put as much lead in the air that I can!!     So, I'm keeping my 12ga.  
    • 11-87
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    • leech~~
      Wanderer is right on the money and covered it well.  I was wondering too if you had a slug barrel for one of your guns?  If so you could make that your slug gun with a scope, and the other your turkey gun with the Red dot.  As you can afford it. 
    • Wanderer
      Kinda depends on if you want magnification or quick target acquisition.   More magnification options and better accuracy with a scope.  You get what you pay for too so get comfortable with a budget for one.  Tasco and Bushnell work but I find they lose their zero easier, have low contrast and don’t gather light well in low light conditions.  That said, I’m still using one I haven’t replaced yet.  Vortex has been the hot brand for the past several years for bang for the buck.  Good products.  Nothing beats Swarovski though.  Huge dough for those.  Burris is another decent option.   There are some specific models for shotgun/slug hunting in the economy brands and bullet drop compensation (BDC) reticles.  Based on experience I’d recommend not falling for that marketing ploy.   Red dots are usually lower magnification and easier to get on target.  Reasonably accurate but don’t do well with definition, like searching the brush for your target.  I put a HAWKE red dot on a .22 for squirrels and it’s been good.  For turkey, that’s probably the route I’d go.     If your slug shots are normally not too far and too brushy, I’d think a red dot could work there too if you’re only buying 1 scope.  You’ll be better off dimming the reticle to the lowest setting you can easily use to not over shine the target and get a finer aim point.   If you don’t have a slug barrel, you might appreciate one of those.  I had a browning with a smoothbore slug barrel that shot Brenneke 2-3/4 inch well.  The 11-87 would well fitted with a cantelever rifled barrel. 
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