It's official, the waterfowl season here in Missouri is hurtling toward a premature end. The lack of habitat along with a bitterly cold December after a mild, if not balmy, November has resulted in a short and less than stellar duck season for most of us on the west side of Missouri.
The bootheel is holding the majority of birds right now, but overall duck numbers have dropped dramatically over the last two weeks with about 250,000 ducks leaving the state for warmer evirons. Duck numbers, at the time of the survey, were also about 100,000 less than the same time last year; which would have preceded the large influx of ducks we enjoyed during Christmas week last year when a major cold front pushed through around the 21st.
Grand Pass CA suffered the greatest loss of birds, going from 173,000 ducks to around 50,000. I think they are basically froze solid up there so that is not surprising.
Schell-Osage & Four Rivers are still holding some ducks with 9,000 & 36,000 respectively. One anomaly that I saw was Montrose holding 18,000 ducks & 4200 Canadians, not bad numbers for them.
There is more than a month left in the southern zone season in Missouri, but I just can't see it being anything but forgettable. Oh well, it's like I said in an earlier post, they can't all be winners. Coming off such an incredible '04-'05 season makes this one a little harder to swallow, but for me it all equals out. I have witnessed incredibly large groups of mallards this year, granted most of them have been cruising southward at about 10,000 feet high, but at least I was there to see them. Hopefully, the same groups will come through next year and hopefully the habitat will be in better shape. Also, I have gone out duck hunting around 8 times this year and I have yet to be skunked (I'm knocking on wood as I type) which is a noteworthy achievement in any year. I have even limited out once... on teal.
It certainly looks like the Southern end of the flyway is going to have an incredible duck season and with that in mind I will no longer tolerate the tedious commentaries I have had to endure over the last few years while traveling in Dixie. I have listened to residents from Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana rant on about how Ducks Unlimited and the state of Missouri are ruining duck hunting for them by planting too many refuges and wetland areas (I'm not kidding). I have always bit my tongue, for the most part, but after this craptastic season I will nip such drivel in the bud from now on. The narrow-mindedness of people never ceases to amaze me.
That's all I got for now. Good luck to anyone hunting north of the Arkansas border... you'll need it.
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