2021-2022 Waterfowl Reports

[brentbullets]

He’s been praying for snow and cold up north. LOL

 

[Huskermut]

Here's the video of my goose hunt for anyone interested. I've had a couple people ask about silos on ice. I just used a rubber mallet. It works well enough. Just have to be careful not to blow the stake out the side of the silo. Probably will try a drill going forward.

 

[NEducks]

If anyone is in the North Platte to Brady area ? Is the river still locked up tight with ice ? also channel 4 south of I-80? Thanks in advance, I’d scout myself but I’m several hours away at the moment.

 

[nebgoosehunter]

We had a great morning shooting honkers! Calm to lightly switching winds made it tough to center up birds. We moved the blind twice after our original set up. Didn't see as many geese as last weekend but we heard a ton of shooting all around today. We saw ONE duck is all and he came from the heavens vertical and back pedaled right over the dekes, it was beautiful! Should have had our limit pretty easy, but no biggie, still ended with 16 geese and the drake mallard. One of my buddies had his grandson along and I think he had a great time as well!

 

[nebgoosehunter]

I am thinking we are getting some reverse migrators but I'm not totally sure. I saw two very large groups of lessers going north last night after sundown, but a coworker who lives out of town 20 miles saw geese going south and saw a bunch of mallards going south over his place. This morning going to work is the most geese I've seen all winter on my drive. Big flocks flying in every direction like they didn't know what they wanted to do. Also saw a big flock of snows coming from the west. Hunting Saturday morning, we saw quite a few migrators coming out of the north, however they could have just been coming from another wintering area to the north a half hour so who knows if they were true migrators. We are supposed to have some snow showers Wednesday morning so I may take off part of the morning and try and chase some ducks on a spot I haven't been to in awhile.

 

[FriedPotatoes]

I am thinking we are getting some reverse migrators but I'm not totally sure. I saw two very large groups of lessers going north last night after sundown, but a coworker who lives out of town 20 miles saw geese going south and saw a bunch of mallards going south over his place. This morning going to work is the most geese I've seen all winter on my drive. Big flocks flying in every direction like they didn't know what they wanted to do. Also saw a big flock of snows coming from the west. Hunting Saturday morning, we saw quite a few migrators coming out of the north, however they could have just been coming from another wintering area to the north a half hour so who knows if they were true migrators. We are supposed to have some snow showers Wednesday morning so I may take off part of the morning and try and chase some ducks on a spot I haven't been to in awhile.

kinda asking the same questions down in OK. We got a good push of birds around the new year, they stayed for a bit and then poof were gone about a week ago. Not sure if they flew further south or back north. Thought this latest front yesterday and Saturday may push birds down to us but it didn’t, at least not where we were. I’m not sure if the bulk of the migration is south of us or went back north of us or has always been north of us. Only really had one main push of mallards this year.

 

[nebgoosehunter]

I'm so glad I took part of the morning off this morning to chase ducks in the snow. I wanted to go solo just to have some peace and because I don't believe I've hunted solo yet this season. Birds started flying right at shooting light. I decoyed a dozen wigeon a few minutes after LST but could not pick out a nice drake. They were probably 12 yards is all. I wasn't too concerned as I was seeing just as many wigeon as I was mallards and figured I'd have another chance. I had two mallards down and had another dozen ducks decoy in with two of them being wigeon. Once again the light was poor and I couldn't pick one out but I was able to pick a greenhead. Needed one mallard for my limit is all and of course 20 come in on the last flock. I had my greenhead limit by 7:50. I don't think I shot a bird over 20 yards today and some were 10 yards. I waited around until 9:45 but never did have any more wigs come by except for a pair with some mallards while brushing snow off the decoys, go figure. Also saw a pair of pintails with some high mallards but that group ignored me. This morning was good for the soul!

 

[nebgoosehunter]

We are supposed to get another small shot of snow tonight so I took off a couple hours tomorrow morning to hunt the same spot as last week, hoping the greenheads cooperate again! I'm also using my MLK Day holiday on Wednesday and hunting with a buddy on his pond. Hoping for a mixed bag hunt if all goes well. Ducks, big and little cans, and snows have all been using it mid day. Probably some specks mixed in I'd suspect. Supposed to have a strong wind gusting to 25-30 first thing in the morning. The wind may be our biggest ally for getting some snows without the ecaller.

 

[nebgoosehunter]

Hunted the exact same spot as last Wednesday but birds just weren't responsive. I drove through fog on the way there but as soon as I got there the cloud deck was clearing off and it was dead calm. Birds flew very high and I probably saw about the same amount of ducks as last time. I took two shots and brought home two greenheads, great morning!

 

[nebgoosehunter]

Well today did not quite pan out. There were maybe 40 dark geese and 400 snows roosted on the pond as we drove up. Half the snows didn't want to leave until five minutes before LST. Right at shooting light we had a pair of mallards cup up and buzz us but we weren't ready for them. A few minutes later we got a single greenhead and maybe 10 minutes later had a pair come in that I shot the drake. Only winged him and he swam into the cattails. Gave it a good look but the cattails were extremely dense. It wasn't a huge stand but they were so thick you could barely walk through them. About 20 minutes later we saw him come out onto the ice next to the cattails so I went back and searched for a long time to no avail. Had a group of lessers come over about 50 yards high but being down in the pit I mis-judged them and thought they were too high to try. My buddy knocked one down easy on one shot though. We waited about four hours with very little action besides a nice feed of about 2k darks and 2k snows right north of us a half mile. Finally at 1130 we heard a duck backpedaling and I stood up and took a greenhead. While getting the bird in the water the whole feed gets up of course and a good wad of darks flies right over while I am still 10 yards from the pit. My buddy tripled on geese. Talk about terrible timing haha. We sat for another half hour and called it quits at noon with four geese and three greenheads counting the one I searched forever for. It is supposed to be a nice weekend so I may try and take four of my kids out for a goose hunt one evening.