Waterfowl Reports

[Stringerless!]

Feeling a little optimistic about 2nd opener. Fishing on Green after work saw about 75 geese on water and the first raft of coots I have seen this year. About 200. Saw more geese in the air. Not much for ducks. Single here or a trio there. 1 hammerhandle,5 bass ( biggest 16) and a crappie. Water temp 60.

[websdown]

Also saw my first coot on Centerville and on the South end of White Bear Lake. Its a start they are the first to kinda start besides the teal & woodies.

[onthefly]

Bald eagle had big rafts of coot as well - one with maybe a couple hundred

[booger]

On the way to Stillwater this morning I saw about 8 flocks of geese, mostly small 4-5s but one bigger 8-12 flock also. Most I've seen so far, it is usually about 2-3 flocks.

Should be good hunting this weekend.

[Feathers Rainin]

I have never heard of people getting excited to see coots. Do you use the coot on a plank recipe?

[Stringerless!]

raw

[CANOPY SAM]

I think coots inhabit most of our lakes all year round (well not winter, but you know what I mean). They just start to bunch up real good just before exiting the state.

They sure are goofy little birds.

Don't get too wound up just yet boys. This storm is likely only going to move a few birds around, and perhaps make a few local birds move a little further thru the state. It's only early October. The weather next week is already predicted to be very nice, high 60's even lower 70's with plenty of sunshine.

These colder temps will get em' thinkin' though!

[Stringerless!]

Calendar birds.

[BoxMN]

Calendar birds.

+1

[CANOPY SAM]

What do you mean by Calendar birds? I don't understand.

Sunrise found me sitting along the riverbank not far from our country home. Had fairly steady action, but I was very frugal with my shots and only took two Mallards, and a plump Canadian Goose. Four shots. Clean missed on a fat drake mallard.

Could have bagged many limits of Blue Winged Teal and Wood Ducks, but just enjoyed watching them fly instead. It was really fun watching those groups of Teal bombing in and out of the river bottom. Going with the 30-40 mph wind this morning they were like little missiles.

I'm still not convinced we've got much of any migration into the NW region of Minnesota yet. Way too many teal and woodies still around, and even the two mallards I bagged were on the small side = all local birds.

Gotta love those low heavy clouds, and howling wind though. Just touch the call and the birds come barreling in on a string!

[fishuhalik]

Sam, I'm guessing we're gonna start seeing the first "mini wave" pretty soon. I'm in MN on days off right now, but a buddy of mine just posted on fb that it was 18 in Williston this morning. Definitely not the big push yet, that's still at least 3 weeks out, but we should see a few fresh birds pretty soon.

[walleyewess]

Had a fun morning. Hunted central Minnesota. Got 1 woodie 1 mallard and 2 drake pintails. Seen lots of birds. Some where near to 100+ but mostly teal and they did not give us and good shots. Called it an early morning because my buddies gun decided to no longer work.

[Stringerless!]

Calendar birds are ducks that migrate close to the same dates each year. They are not pushed by weather as much as the length of daylight. Ringnecks are considered a "calendar duck". Coots are also calendar bird. Now do you see why a guy could get excited about seeing a raft of coots ? There were new birds around this morning. Ended up with 2 teal,a woodie and a spoonie hen. Saw a lot of mallards, More this morning than during the whole first week. Not one flock would look at us though. One of those mornings that just leaves you scratching your head wondering WTH ?? Is there an eagle sitting in the tree behind us ?

[CANOPY SAM]

Thanks Stringer. If I could wager a guess, you were maybe seeing mallards that were moving further south, but had perhaps been previously pushed around a bit to the north? I also had a few groups this weekend that just burned on by like they had another agenda.

Yea Fish, it'll start here pretty soon. I put 60 miles on the truck this afternoon just on a little jaunt and did see more geese then I've seen in a while. Still not much for ducks to speak of, and the numbers up in Agassiz refuge are extremely low for this time of year.

The weather forecast this week looks more like mid-Sept then mid-Oct, so that's not gonna help much. But there again, it's not OUR weather that's gonna get em' moving. It's the weather in Northern Saskatchewan, and Manitoba that we need to turn cold and nasty. They'll come. Sooner or later they always do.

[strait-meat]

hunted Saturday out in FF and we got a 5 man limit of ducks. the local people seemed to have just concentrated more and no really new birds to the area. but they sure decoyed well---fun hunt.

[Feathers Rainin]

Calendar birds are ducks that migrate close to the same dates each year. They are not pushed by weather as much as the length of daylight. Ringnecks are considered a "calendar duck". Coots are also calendar bird. Now do you see why a guy could get excited about seeing a raft of coots ?

Nope not unless you are hunting coots. Plenty of times coots are packed in all the area water and no ducks.

We found a fair number of ducks for this time of year but not as many as we hoped after hearing good reports. Mainly bills and ringers. Very few coots.

[BoxMN]

Was in WC mn last weekend, and saw a very low number of ducks overall. Though this is still traditionally early, from our experience. Not many divers around yet, but the coots are starting to pile into Christina and Pelican, but not huge numbers yet. About 20th of October is when we used to want to be there, but hard with kids and all nowadays to make that regular, plus we are in NoDak then

We did end up shooting about 10 ducks, but that was for half a dozen guns in two spots, and very few ducks that came in left... heh, so yeah, not many ducks. Mostly woodies and BWT with one ringbill. We only saw a handful of flocks of divers. But still early for them out there. Good luck all next weekend.

[CodyDawg]

Did a goose hunt in the morning in WC MN and it was a great hunt. 24 geese by 830 am. Could have shot many, many more. Duck hunted in the afternoon and got 7. Still seeing way, WAY more hens than drakes. I stopped at a local in town pond and counted 22 hens and 1 drake sitting on the shore. At our pond, we saw probably 40 mallards and 1 confirmed drake (could have been a few more, but not many). We passed on the mallards for this reason and shot some teal and woodies. Never have i seen anything like this. No, they are not eclipse drakes mistaken for hens, we all talked about that.

[CANOPY SAM]

Those are some very lucky drakes!

[Sergio M]

Hunted Sunday in Freeport lots of teal around. 4 guys hunting in our group ended up with 13 green wing teal, 2 blue wing, 1 drake mallard and 2 pintails. Not a bad morning of hunting.

[walleye18]

Was in ND for the non resident opener....ended up with 89 ducks, 37 geese. 6 guys, had a blast. 2.5 days of hunting.

Dad had a stroke and had to get back home.

Lots of mallards and teal. Surprised at the low number of gaddys we got. Typically, we see tons of them. Not this year though.

Shot 3 snows too.....never have I ever seen snows in the dakotas this early.

[walleyeking19]

walleye18, what part of the state were you in? I'm heading up there tomorrow to hunt for a few days.

[walleye18]

Gackle/Lehr area.....no brainer! Scout and ask permission.

You will be in the birds "thick"!!

[TylerS]

Sorry to hear about your dad! Hope he's OK.

[walleye18]

Stroke took the toll on Dad...has rehab for the next 15-20 days, all depending upon how he progresses.

Everyday he is improving.

[walleyeking19]

Gackle/Lehr area.....no brainer! Scout and ask permission.

You will be in the birds "thick"!!

We'll be north of Devils Lake a little, so north of where you were. Hopefully the birds are there too! Hope your dad keeps improving! I'll say a prayer for him!

[walleye18]

Appreciate the prayers.

Your gonna have a great time. Scout, Scout and Scout some more. The birds are there.

Let us know how you do when you get back.

[fishuhalik]

For those of you wondering about numbers in Canada, a buddy just got back from 7 hours north of the border. Best shoot he's had in 25 years of going up there. 7 man limits of both ducks and geese, all 5 days done in less than 1 1/2hrs. Said it was the first time in his life he's got a multispecies triple (mallards & honkers in the same volley) and he got 5 of em! Said it was the best hunt of his life, and this is coming from a guy that was born & raised in NoDak. Should be a good migration!!

[fishuhalik]

And walleye, more prayers sent

That's the 2nd report of early snows I've heard. A friend of a friend was north of Rugby and killed 2, confirmed with pictures. only 2 they saw and they passed right over. Weird...

[CANOPY SAM]

Dad had a stroke and had to get back home.

Wow! No offense, but I have some mixed feelings about your report walleye. Glad to hear you had a good hunt, but your Dad's condition really overshadows everything about your report. Please tell me you brought him straight to a doctor rather then bringing him "home" first?

That's a really sad/scary deal man. My thoughts and most sincere prayers will be with your Dad in the coming days.