Youth hunts are scheduled for many states across the US this weekend, offering parents and friends a special opportunity to share their love of waterfowling with the next generation of hunters. Waterfowler.com encourages all our readers to take a young person out for this special season, in states offering the opportunity.
The light goose conservation season is kicking off. For hunters who are still hoping to put in a few more hunts, this special season offers the opportunity to extend their season well into spring. Hunting snow geese on their return migration is an experience every waterfowler should have. Large decoy spreads and even larger flights of geese, make for a spectacle rarely rivaled in the life of the duck and goose hunter.
Waterfowler.com’s Trade-a-Hunt program is a great way to get together with other WFC members for everything from snow goose hunting to fly fishing. Through Trade-a-Hunt, members from across the nation and around the world have been getting together to hunt and fish with their forum friends. Be sure to check out what’s available by clicking on the Trade-A-Hunt tab under the Member Areas menu and don’t forget to post a trade yourself. From spring turkeys to late winter goose hunts, everyone has something to offer.
And now, on to the Migration Report.
With the regular season closed reports from across the country have been sparse. The continuation of abnormally warm weather and lack of snow cover across much of the US has the waterfowl migration scattered widely in all four flyways.
The good news is that the distribution of birds seems fairly even and should provide good gunning in the states that offer special, post season youth hunts. Many areas of the southern Mississippi Flyway received ample rain in the last two weeks of the regular season, putting huntable water in areas that had been dry all season. Newly flooded timber in many southern states should be prime for the youth hunts this weekend.
Snow goose concentrations remain good all across the southern portions of the Mississippi and Central Flyways, though there have been a few reports of light goose concentrations as far north as Nebraska.
A slight move back to colder weather for much of the US, over the next week, should keep the light geese from bolting too far back north, at least for the time being.
While it may seem winter will never return, it would be a fools bet to say we will not see another strong cold front across the Plaines and upper Mid-West before spring rolls around. But you never know? For the time being, light goose concentrations from Texas to Mississippi and northward into Arkansas and Oklahoma are holding and should provide ample hunting opportunity as the conservation order kicks off.
In the coming weeks Waterfowler.com will shift gears and begin our more detailed tracking of light geese. Stay tuned, this years spring snow goose hunting is about to get serious.
