For the lower forty-eight it looks as though “it\’s all over but the shoutin\'”. Although temperatures moderated last week, even dropping back below normal in some areas of the northern plains, the largest part of the snow goose migration has moved beyond the U.S. border. Canadian hunters in the lower regions of Manitoba and Saskatchewan report large flights of birds returning to the area and being slowed in their northward exodus by the recent weather.
Below the border only scattered pockets seem to remain, mostly in east central North Dakota. Though the season runs a few more weeks here in the states it looks as though it is all but wrapped up down here. That is, unless the weather decides to make another radical shift, and the way it has behaved this year you just never know.
No doubt the weather and migration of 2001-2002 will go down as one of the strangest in memory. Let\’s hope the questions and thought it provokes can lead us to a better understanding of what our part is in managing the resource that we as waterfowlers hold most dear.
