Where are they?

[MickThompson]

It's not just the acres and acres of standing and flooded corn. No till farming practices have taken over every where, and it leaves a ton more waste grain laying in every field north of us. Ducks and geese have a ton of places to feed, and as the seasons to our north close, they have no hunting pressure. They can sit and have all the food they want, and plenty of water to rest in, and they can do whatever ducky things they want until and unless it freezes/snows over and stays that way. There is more hunting pressure on the ducks than ever before, thanks in large part to the Duck Dynasty era. Everyone wants the pile pics for FB and IG, and thinks their influencer videos on Tik Tok or whatever video platform is gonna make them a ton of money.

You'd be shocked how little is actually left between modern combines and earlier harvesting

 

[wcw280]

Yea these new combines when setup right are like vacuums.

 

[scn]

First thing is they have to stop allowing the flooding of standing corn, period. 2nd thing have to cut back and out alot of the food grown and dumped on refugees. It's one thing giving them areas to rest it's another having these completely undisturbed refugees loaded with food to hold thousands of birds there all winter. They will stay there ice or not with it like that. It can freeze over and they can still feed in these flooded standing cornfields, they are flooded right up to the ears of corn. They just walk on the ice and eat right off the ears of corn. We have to get them spreaded back out some and moving around again some. Restoring somewhat of a migration that isn't just solely based on blistering ,ridiculously, unbearable winter weather conditions. It wasn't like that for years, weather played it's role but they were other factors such as food, pressure, and disturbances that also played key roles in distributing and moving migration of birds, also contributing in spreading out the birds some over much larger areas. Rather than the much more condensed and compacted migration we have now with huge concentrations of birds in small areas. If things don't change this sport is eventually going to go away.

None of those changes will ever happen.

 

[MidTennFisher]

A dry field close to my house here in W. TN.
Mostly snows/blues but what shocked me the most was the amount of ducks mixed in with them. Groups of 50, 100+ ducks working the field. I work with the property owners brother and when I talked to him he stated his brother got tired of people calling and knocking on his door for permission to hunt he just constantly drove through the fields to run them off.

Why won't he let anyone hunt it?

 

[Bgoodman30]

It's not just the acres and acres of standing and flooded corn. No till farming practices have taken over every where, and it leaves a ton more waste grain laying in every field north of us. Ducks and geese have a ton of places to feed, and as the seasons to our north close, they have no hunting pressure. They can sit and have all the food they want, and plenty of water to rest in, and they can do whatever ducky things they want until and unless it freezes/snows over and stays that way. There is more hunting pressure on the ducks than ever before, thanks in large part to the Duck Dynasty era. Everyone wants the pile pics for FB and IG, and thinks their influencer videos on Tik Tok or whatever video platform is gonna make them a ton of money.

Duck Dynasty is about to start back up on A&E. I guess duck hunting is finished as we know it..

 

[JagwalCrush]

Other than the point that birds might be overpopulated and not reproducing as well in certain areas I think you made more of a point as to how to increase harvest results for the majority or spread them around rather than how to help overall populations.

I think it's time for a hard look in the mirror with what it takes for a pleasurable hunt nationwide. We need to be conservation minded and not number minded. Habitat is lost more and more every year. How many predators does it take to equal one 6 man limit of adult birds?

^^^^^^^^ this.

 

[MickThompson]

If the ducks are overpopulated, why isn't that stress pushing them further south or spreading them into lower quality habitat away from core migration corridors?

 

[Bone_Chaser]

It's not just the acres and acres of standing and flooded corn. No till farming practices have taken over every where, and it leaves a ton more waste grain laying in every field north of us. Ducks and geese have a ton of places to feed, and as the seasons to our north close, they have no hunting pressure. They can sit and have all the food they want, and plenty of water to rest in, and they can do whatever ducky things they want until and unless it freezes/snows over and stays that way. There is more hunting pressure on the ducks than ever before, thanks in large part to the Duck Dynasty era. Everyone wants the pile pics for FB and IG, and thinks their influencer videos on Tik Tok or whatever video platform is gonna make them a ton of money.

There are actually significantly less waterfowl hunters now that 50 years ago, just more ding dongs on decent public land from my observation.

I do think intensively managed properties killing hundreds or thousands of ducks per season are a huge reason overall hunting isn't as good.

I think bag limits need adjusted a couple of seasons. I wouldn't be shocked if the same mysterious reason for decline in turkey, grouse and several other birds might be at play. Same deal as turkey though. Harvest numbers are staying the same while populations continually decrease.

 

[Smashdn]

When the prairies are wet again and if we ever get expanded CRP and grass up there, all this won't be talked about.

 

[deerhunter10]

When the prairies are wet again and if we ever get expanded CRP and grass up there, all this won't be talked about.

That will probably never happen again. The government will have to incentives that.