re: Cold weather- no duck…WTH???

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Look, I realize duck hunting isn’t what it used to be, but I’m optimistic that it will get better. I’ve personally seen improvements, albeit small, in the last couple of years where I hunt.

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It’s never getting better. Duck hunting has grown into such a massive money maker. Tens of thousands of acres of corn being left unharvested in Kansas and Missouri and Oklahoma for the sole purpose of keeping birds there all winter.

New birds are never making it into Texas and LA

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New birds are never making it into Texas and LA

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Likely true

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thousands of acres of corn

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Likely part of the reason but for sure not all of it.
Bottom line of it is that Louisiana habitat is nowhere near what it used to be. Salvinia, salt water invasion, rice replacement with sugarcane, crawfish ponds, all play a role. In 2020 the flooding in the Midwest decreased corn production by a massive amount yet the bird still did not get here even with massive decrease in corn .
Additionally, throughout the northern hemisphere, it has been shown that ducks are wintering farther north than their traditional winter grounds. This is not just a North America phenomenon.

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never getting better.

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Sadly, this is likely true.
It’s just that it’s a much more complicated situation than just some baws planting corn

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It was a whole different experience than what you see now. Flight birds during weather like this could be seen anywhere in south LA including middle of Baton Rouge.

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I hunted the 70s and 80s. Hell, my first hunt was in the late 60s. In the late 70s there were ducks and geese all over the place in SWLA. I drove by rice fields off the highway outside Rayne that were covered with mallards and pintails. Hunting west of Houston in the early 2000s, we still saw pintail and a few mallards but the era of the ringneck duck had begun by then. When I quit about 2010 it was ringnecks and teal. You guys killing any ringnecks?

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New birds are never making it into Texas

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That’s just not true. I’ve hunted from north of Dallas to the panhandle, there was plenty that pushed in with the front around Christmas. I will say I’m seeing a lot less birds than I did last year in the panhandle.

Thanks.

Duck hunting is a game where the rich get richer. You give up on duck hunting and the neighbor will buy it and add it to his property to help spread pressure and/or turn it into a roost/rest area.
You would be surprised how many birds will use a piece of property that isn’t hunted or driven through.
Hopefully I never run into such drastic problems yall have. It is hard to believe that NOBODY in Louisiana is killing ducks, but yall would know better than me.

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Duck hunting has grown into such a massive money maker.

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I hate to say it (because I love those guys and what they do/stand for) but Duck Dynasty had a huge impact on this.

After 2012 you could ride through any high school parking lot and there would be 40 trucks with duck stickers and dog boxes.

I had a kid in school at the time and saw it personally.

Thousands of people who had never Duck Hunted now found it cool.

At least no mergansers.

RIP-Duck, Quail, and Woodcock.
Ain't dere no more!