Kansas Goose Hunt - Long and Pic Heavy

We just got back from our trip to Kansas and our Canada goose hunt with Tornado Alley Waterfowl. We had an absolute blast! We had 3 from NELA, including LSUCouyon, 2 from NWMS, including myself and one from the Dallas area. The NELA crew and NWMS crew met in Conway, Ar for breakfast and headed on out. We made it to the lodge and met with Brandon about the hunt. The warm weather had the geese out of their normal patterns but Brandon and Jose had found a promising field for the next morning.
We were up at 3:30 am to meet Brandon and Jose for the hunt. They work very hard at concealment, and brush the layouts with the grasses that are near the fence row you hunt. After the hunt, all cover is removed because you just don’t know what the cover will be for the next hunt. It is rough work, but definitely pays off. The birds had no clue what was going on when the flaps fly back. We pulled grass, brushed blinds and set the spread right through shooting time.
The first bird was a single and things did not go as planned. Several in the group, excluding me, shot and missed, the bird flew away unscathed. The next single was hit but fell over a small berm 5 or 600 yards away. We had my buddy’s dog, and for her first Canada goose she got a long distance blind retrieve. She got a little hung up on the berm but pushed through and made a fabulous blind retrieve. Then things heated up. Big groups of mallards swarmed in and the Canadas were right in with them. Brandon warned, “Don’t shoot the ducks!” I was pretty proud because we actually did hold off on the ducks even as they landed in the decoys and walked around. Later, Brandon said the “big” (25-35 birds) groups of ducks were really tiny groups of ducks compared to earlier in the season.
We ended up with 31 greater and lesser Canada geese and 5 speckle bellies and had a blast doing it.
Sunday we were on a good field, tracks, feathers, and shite everywhere, but it was even warmer and the wind had shifted completely around and threw the birds out of whatever pattern they had left. We ended up scratching and headed home at about noon, after calling it a little early.
Brandon and Jose worked their tails off for us and made it a great trip. They are very meticulous in their setup and scouting because they want you to kill birds as bad as you do. Both are very knowledgeable and very willing to share that knowledge. The extremely warm weather, the high was 70 degrees, and the south wind had the geese all mixed up on Sunday. I highly recommend TAW if you are looking for a Ks waterfowl trip. We are already booking for next season so we can pile up the mallards next to the piles of geese.
The best part of the trip is how new friends become old friends in just a couple of days. Good friends are hard to find, so when you find them hang on.
The Spread

The Layouts

The Results