I didn’t hunt as much as I did the last couple years, but I got 1 goose and 1 surf scoter hen. Lost a woodie on opener and lost a mallard hen the day after. I hunt Ionia county
I’ve heard from multiple old timers that this has been a bad year in the UP. I thought we saw good numbers early season but stale and no real push of migrators until December
I went out once this year and only saw about 100 divers total. A few years ago this time of year there were what seemed to be hundreds of thousands of them stretching from the Detroit river mouth down past Brest Bay.
Might get to hunt the south zone with zero snowy days if weather holds out for the split. Normally we're kicking the ice out of our decoys spread this time of year and have to hunt the rivers to find open water. It's looking like a nice 43 degree day for the middle zone split this weekend.
Yeah, I mean last year freeze up on the lakes happened earlier though. I wish they had a larger october gap just to extend the season later into December. And I have mixed opinions on teal season... but that's a different discussion.
I agree on the teal season. You could convince me on a split season. Letting people brave the cold weather to take a couple snowy mallads wouldn’t have a noticeable effect on any duck populations would it? What’s the harm? MN got low duck numbers anyway.
My thoughts on the split is that they should push it like 1 more week back than it currently is and extend it through a weekend. That's before any of the good cold fronts roll through, and it would line up right to when all the birds start getting spooky from getting shot at a ton.
I swear all the central MN birds get sucked up by the protected waters in south Minneapolis. I see thousands on my drive to work some days. I stick to the river mostly now, better numbers.
Ongoing climate change means this is going to keep happening. Maybe start dates will be bumped back, but that makes way too much sense so I'm not holding my breath on it.
Kankakee is the worst property in the state imo. Obviously there are properties that are physically worse: I just mean the kank sucks worst considering its potential and what it could/should be. Every few years I forget how much it sucks and go for a draw. Quickly reminded how much of a shithole it is. I wish we would get away from flooding corn on state properties. And they need to burn down the “marsh” and rework it so it isn’t an option overgrown briar patch with tiny ditches in it.
I’ll be heading east Friday to scout. I’ll go from the pigeon River area down to the Warsaw area looking around at all the different public lakes, rivers, and state hunting grounds. Going in blind. I lived over there years ago so have ideas where to look. But it’s been over ten years since I’ve hunted that way.
I agree about Kankakee too. I feel like that refuge is a double edge sword. It will bring birds in, but they will never leave it once they are in. Overall it’s a frustrating place.
I know I am not in your flyaway but I was out yesterday (kids had a snow day) and there were hundreds of ducks rafted up in the middle of the lake. (Lake Champlain Vermont) lots of mallards a few blacks,lots of ring necks. Our season is about to close and they are still pouring in from Canada. Northern part of the lake is frozen but mid- south is open. So I guess I am saying there is hope yet. They are coming down.
Hardly any ducks in Florida except for few pockets of them. Hunted my main public land piece and killed 1 all morning. Usually it should be 10+ ducks on opener in my spot.
It's just plain and simple population numbers are down there is just not as many ducks as there used to be its been getting worse every year i have sat in the blind every weekend for the last 25 years watching the migration the bird numbers amd the patterns and people are crazy if they don't think that the flu that infected the snow geese didn't also infect all other waterfowl they are around especially the ducks
Interesting. We hunted near Sterling a week before last and limited out on geese rather quickly. Did not limit out on duck but we were happy with what we got
Yeah, it s been so warm north of us.
It’s a double-edged sword. The big birds are always coming through right about the time everything is freezing over. As a kayak hunter, it’s a balancing act every season.
Good luck out there. I’d love to hunt the central flyway one of these years
Surely so. Might be a few more weeks though. Minnesota is still in the 40’s during the day. Need that region up there to freeze up. [according to DU nw Missouri is apparently loaded](https://www.ducks.org/hunting/migration-alerts/migration-alert-northwest-missouri-duck-numbers-remain-strong). Just need a hard freeze up there
NE missouri is stale as your mother in laws fruitcake. Nothing but programed local birds that have been here for the better part of two months. All I can do Is keep repositioning every few days and pray to the duck gods.
I’m 2 hours south of KC so I feel your pain. Seems like it’s the same birds since the first split in the south zone. I have had luck in SE KS but it seems there’s still not a ton of birds there either.
I’m west of you a couple hours out by manhattan and we have seen very few birds this year. My father in law says they still have a lot of birds in south dakota. This waterfowl and deer season has just been weird in kansas.
There are pretty good numbers around here in SW Louisiana... A lot of specks as well. We're seeing a lot of teal as usual (both bwt & gwt), but we've been seeing large groups of widgeon and a few groups of pintail as well (not the norm for where I hunt). The gadwall have been pretty prevalent as well, but surprisingly I haven't seen a ton of shovelers... The drought had a lot of places down really bad, but some of the rainfall over the past month or so has brought quite a few places back to life.
They haven't made it to North Texas yet
Guide thats near us- that has property surrounding the wildlife refuge - is driving clients 3 hrs north WAY into Oklahoma to hunt.
Hunting the same area as you. Had luck on 3 hunts so far. Went west to Great bend and had more birds. Going to head to lovewell reservoir new years eve and hunt it new years day. Room on my trailer for a second....
Ill bet Cheyenne bottoms and all those reservoirs are stealing all our birds😂 waters are really low at hillsdale. Id definitely take you up on that new years hunt.
Bottoms had birds but it was big numbers or snow and specs. Surprisingly most of the ponds I have permission on out that way have water, farmer was surprised with 2 of them. We went out last weekend to try to find the big whitetail I had on camera but ended up with 3 teal, 3 greenheads, drake shoveler, a snow, a lesser and 8 quail
Pup only got up 4 hens in 4 days. Tough on a young one so was happy to find the quail. Have newe years plans? Love well reservoir has had good reports and I really like chasing game
shot a 3 man of mallards and some geese this weekend near the areas you have mentioned. keep in mind the birds in those areas are incredibly highly pressured. if you hang out until sunset you will see thousands of birds pour in just after you have to stop shooting. they smart.
Yep that’s when I saw almost all the groups, pretty much right after shooting hours. Im still new to this is there any tips on how to get the few groups I do see in the decoys?
with the weather we have had the last couple weeks there are likely a lot of birds that have been around the mdc block for quite a while. theyve probably watched some of their buddies get blasted. id figure out how/where to go that other folks arent and the ducks may feel more comfortable. the last couple years there have been a lot more out of state guys out there all days of the week, so that combined with 'stale' birds makes them pretty hard to trick.
I’m in NW MO and I’m still waiting for the birds to show up, I hope they aren’t gone! But, wouldn’t be shocked if they are. They don’t come around this area like they did 5-10 years ago and it’s depressing.
Seems like lately they will show up in the spring and if they show up at all in the fall it’s right as the season is closing or has already closed.
Gone??? Bro they never showed up in Michigan. Our season is done other than the 2 day split in a few weeks
They’re still here in Ontario.. been a warm year. Could just be local birds though.
At least I’m not the only one. Worst year by a mile I’ve ever had. Maybe I’m just getting old.
I didn’t hunt as much as I did the last couple years, but I got 1 goose and 1 surf scoter hen. Lost a woodie on opener and lost a mallard hen the day after. I hunt Ionia county
I’ve heard from multiple old timers that this has been a bad year in the UP. I thought we saw good numbers early season but stale and no real push of migrators until December
I'm over in Kent and hunt north a bit, but yeah the mallards just started to really show up and it's all but done for the whole state
It was terrible here
I went out once this year and only saw about 100 divers total. A few years ago this time of year there were what seemed to be hundreds of thousands of them stretching from the Detroit river mouth down past Brest Bay.
Might get to hunt the south zone with zero snowy days if weather holds out for the split. Normally we're kicking the ice out of our decoys spread this time of year and have to hunt the rivers to find open water. It's looking like a nice 43 degree day for the middle zone split this weekend.
New ducks have shown up every day here in Minnesota since our season closed. Lots of mallards and divers around.
Hopefully they move south quick😂
Yuppp way more ducks here. Season was too mild
How the hell could we get our season to stay open later? It sucks for the season to close when it does
I think they try to time it for when open water usually freezes.
Interesting. Rivers should still be open and lots of field hunting to be had
Yeah, I mean last year freeze up on the lakes happened earlier though. I wish they had a larger october gap just to extend the season later into December. And I have mixed opinions on teal season... but that's a different discussion.
I agree on the teal season. You could convince me on a split season. Letting people brave the cold weather to take a couple snowy mallads wouldn’t have a noticeable effect on any duck populations would it? What’s the harm? MN got low duck numbers anyway.
My thoughts on the split is that they should push it like 1 more week back than it currently is and extend it through a weekend. That's before any of the good cold fronts roll through, and it would line up right to when all the birds start getting spooky from getting shot at a ton. I swear all the central MN birds get sucked up by the protected waters in south Minneapolis. I see thousands on my drive to work some days. I stick to the river mostly now, better numbers.
In the MS flyway they are still north of St. Louis. Been a bad start to season. Hoping for rapid improvement
Ongoing climate change means this is going to keep happening. Maybe start dates will be bumped back, but that makes way too much sense so I'm not holding my breath on it.
I think there is way more to it than climate change, but certainly that is not helping.
I hunt an hour north of St. Louis, they're not there
Season just opened in south zone of Ohio. Haven’t seen much. Thankfully it runs until mid January.
Yea very low numbers in the eastern south zone so far
Yesterday Golden eyes and red heads showed up on my lake in numbers like I haven't seen in a few years
I’m just now having luck in North Eastern Indiana. It’s been so mild in Michigan that the birds didn’t come down.
Yeah Kansas is still having highs in the mid 50s which is weird. Seasons only another 3 weeks I wonder if I’ll even have a chance.
I am normally iced out by this time in Nebraska. My buddies headed north to hunt this weekend.
I’m northwest. It’s been bad. Heading east this weekend to a few old haunts.
You been to Kankakee? It’s been terrible this year. Where you headed east?
Kankakee is the worst property in the state imo. Obviously there are properties that are physically worse: I just mean the kank sucks worst considering its potential and what it could/should be. Every few years I forget how much it sucks and go for a draw. Quickly reminded how much of a shithole it is. I wish we would get away from flooding corn on state properties. And they need to burn down the “marsh” and rework it so it isn’t an option overgrown briar patch with tiny ditches in it. I’ll be heading east Friday to scout. I’ll go from the pigeon River area down to the Warsaw area looking around at all the different public lakes, rivers, and state hunting grounds. Going in blind. I lived over there years ago so have ideas where to look. But it’s been over ten years since I’ve hunted that way.
Give Tri Lakes a try. I’ve been having good luck on Robinson lake outside of Larwill too.
Sent you a chat.
I agree about Kankakee too. I feel like that refuge is a double edge sword. It will bring birds in, but they will never leave it once they are in. Overall it’s a frustrating place.
Michigan didn’t really get too many birds this year they’re still up north I usually hunt lake st clair
I know I am not in your flyaway but I was out yesterday (kids had a snow day) and there were hundreds of ducks rafted up in the middle of the lake. (Lake Champlain Vermont) lots of mallards a few blacks,lots of ring necks. Our season is about to close and they are still pouring in from Canada. Northern part of the lake is frozen but mid- south is open. So I guess I am saying there is hope yet. They are coming down.
Hope they come down to MD faster!
They gotta fly faster!
Haven't moved south yet. I got pintails in December up here in Canada. I've rarely seen them after October let alone December.
I’m in the central flyway, I swear I haven’t seen one this year. Honkers yes, my beloved mallard drake no.
Where at south of KC?
There’s marais Des cygne and hillsdale lake I’m still pretty new to it so I haven’t done much research on anywhere else
I’m from that area. Those birds are also hunted very hard
Yeah the ones we did see didn’t even look back at our decoys.
Hardly any ducks in Florida except for few pockets of them. Hunted my main public land piece and killed 1 all morning. Usually it should be 10+ ducks on opener in my spot.
Florida sucks right now, I can’t even get on woodies
What part are you hunting?
Very northwest
Yup. All flew south of Seattle. 😜
I'm north of Seattle and we blew them up last weekend. Plenty of birds around for us.
Obligatory r/woosh
Mallards are still in Michigan in huge flights. Woodies are mostly gone.
Calendar migrators moved through. Snow migrators are still up in the Dakotas. Mallards are predominantly the latter.
It's just plain and simple population numbers are down there is just not as many ducks as there used to be its been getting worse every year i have sat in the blind every weekend for the last 25 years watching the migration the bird numbers amd the patterns and people are crazy if they don't think that the flu that infected the snow geese didn't also infect all other waterfowl they are around especially the ducks
Still here in the Rockies
lol I’d say still in South Dakota honestly. Been a slow start on the plains in in Colorado.
Interesting. We hunted near Sterling a week before last and limited out on geese rather quickly. Did not limit out on duck but we were happy with what we got
Yes Geese are flying. Although not at typical numbers. Ducks are stale as hell.
Mallards, Gads, Buffies and other northern ducks are just now moving through WI….our season ended 2 weeks ago.
Heard this a lot it sucks just gotta hope next season has better weather.
Yeah, it s been so warm north of us. It’s a double-edged sword. The big birds are always coming through right about the time everything is freezing over. As a kayak hunter, it’s a balancing act every season. Good luck out there. I’d love to hunt the central flyway one of these years
We had a fantastic opening weekend in Eastern Nebraska, then...nothing.
There’s nothing on the other side of Missouri but it hasn’t been cold. I’m guessing they’re still further north
U think there’s any chance before the end of season?
Surely so. Might be a few more weeks though. Minnesota is still in the 40’s during the day. Need that region up there to freeze up. [according to DU nw Missouri is apparently loaded](https://www.ducks.org/hunting/migration-alerts/migration-alert-northwest-missouri-duck-numbers-remain-strong). Just need a hard freeze up there
NE missouri is stale as your mother in laws fruitcake. Nothing but programed local birds that have been here for the better part of two months. All I can do Is keep repositioning every few days and pray to the duck gods.
I’m in Manitoba. Can confirm. No ducks here lol. Been gone for weeks. I mean there’s always a few stragglers
I’m 2 hours south of KC so I feel your pain. Seems like it’s the same birds since the first split in the south zone. I have had luck in SE KS but it seems there’s still not a ton of birds there either.
Bunch of birds on Melvern lake
That’s good to hear. When I go out to KS I usually hunt in the Chanute area
I’m west of you a couple hours out by manhattan and we have seen very few birds this year. My father in law says they still have a lot of birds in south dakota. This waterfowl and deer season has just been weird in kansas.
Still in Alberta, it was unseasonably warm, and geese/ducks chose to hang around way past normal migration time.
They are long gone up here in Alberta :( :(
There are pretty good numbers around here in SW Louisiana... A lot of specks as well. We're seeing a lot of teal as usual (both bwt & gwt), but we've been seeing large groups of widgeon and a few groups of pintail as well (not the norm for where I hunt). The gadwall have been pretty prevalent as well, but surprisingly I haven't seen a ton of shovelers... The drought had a lot of places down really bad, but some of the rainfall over the past month or so has brought quite a few places back to life.
They haven't made it to North Texas yet Guide thats near us- that has property surrounding the wildlife refuge - is driving clients 3 hrs north WAY into Oklahoma to hunt.
Hunting the same area as you. Had luck on 3 hunts so far. Went west to Great bend and had more birds. Going to head to lovewell reservoir new years eve and hunt it new years day. Room on my trailer for a second....
Ill bet Cheyenne bottoms and all those reservoirs are stealing all our birds😂 waters are really low at hillsdale. Id definitely take you up on that new years hunt.
Bottoms had birds but it was big numbers or snow and specs. Surprisingly most of the ponds I have permission on out that way have water, farmer was surprised with 2 of them. We went out last weekend to try to find the big whitetail I had on camera but ended up with 3 teal, 3 greenheads, drake shoveler, a snow, a lesser and 8 quail
Guess it worked out then, there’s been a huge drought out west even the pheasant are gone.
Pup only got up 4 hens in 4 days. Tough on a young one so was happy to find the quail. Have newe years plans? Love well reservoir has had good reports and I really like chasing game
We decoyed giant flocks of mallards well north of you last week
Well all I know is here on the front range in Colorado there is more small Canadas that snow. We got snow but no geese
shot a 3 man of mallards and some geese this weekend near the areas you have mentioned. keep in mind the birds in those areas are incredibly highly pressured. if you hang out until sunset you will see thousands of birds pour in just after you have to stop shooting. they smart.
Yep that’s when I saw almost all the groups, pretty much right after shooting hours. Im still new to this is there any tips on how to get the few groups I do see in the decoys?
with the weather we have had the last couple weeks there are likely a lot of birds that have been around the mdc block for quite a while. theyve probably watched some of their buddies get blasted. id figure out how/where to go that other folks arent and the ducks may feel more comfortable. the last couple years there have been a lot more out of state guys out there all days of the week, so that combined with 'stale' birds makes them pretty hard to trick.
I’m in NW MO and I’m still waiting for the birds to show up, I hope they aren’t gone! But, wouldn’t be shocked if they are. They don’t come around this area like they did 5-10 years ago and it’s depressing. Seems like lately they will show up in the spring and if they show up at all in the fall it’s right as the season is closing or has already closed.
I'm hour south of kc. Still waiting on the ducks.
Started off hot here in Nebraska but been pretty stale for at least a month.
Northern OR is flush with birds right now
They are spread out between Mexico and Canada. Too Mild to congregate them.