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Started By
Message
re: West Zone peeps.
Posted on 1/6/25 at 9:56 am to DuckSausage
Posted on 1/6/25 at 9:56 am to DuckSausage
Provided the coastal areas have feed I would agree.
0
Posted on 1/6/25 at 10:23 am to VernonPLSUfan
Just as a side note…. It was interesting to see the number of ducks and geese on the farm this morning. Much more than I have seen all season long. Obviously birds coming in with the cold front.(on a large amount of ac. In south Jeff Davis)
Posted on 1/6/25 at 1:16 pm to VernonPLSUfan
Since y'all all here now..... and all have the same problem. Yall make sure and hit up them DU and Delta W banquets and give them more of your money to go North with. Biggest hypocrisy in the hunting game. Yet someone will attempt to defend them under my comment here. I remember when delta W came about and all our buck monies was gonna stay right here along the coast.....now look at them. Just like DU more and more headed north and you can find everyone of them "chapter presidents" and such booking more and more trips north with your money in the name of "conservation studies" . DU throws around small projects down here just enough for y'all to defend them and the whole time slipping us all the wiener!! Go ahead bash away. There will even be a couple y'all try and say if it wasn't for them we wouldn't have any ducks anywhere.... Like some organization is gonna control mother nature. BUCHA BULL!
Posted on 1/6/25 at 7:47 pm to bluemoons
quote:Used to be here in the 70's and 80's and a little in the early 90's. Now it's the early migration in November where we are seeing migrating ducks. Open the first weekend of November like it used to be. Close for two weeks in mid-December, open up before Christmas and close in mid-Jan. Hell, open up first weekend in November and run the season straight 60 days and be over with first week in Jan.
the most productive month of the season for us.
Posted on 1/7/25 at 8:34 am to VernonPLSUfan
I agree that the major movement of ducks to the coast happens in November. People that complain about ducks not showing up until later in the season simply don't have ducks and are chasing ghosts.
Posted on 1/7/25 at 5:58 pm to SpillwayRoyalty
We see birds start showing up as soon as we have water available in mid to late October. But definitely the majority of the birds show up after Thanksgiving and as a matter of fact, we have more birds right now than at any time earlier in the season . Although it is not in near the numbers that I once saw, this timing has always been the case. I have been involved in hunting, guiding, and Rice farming to some degree over the last 40+ years.
Posted on 1/8/25 at 10:25 am to VernonPLSUfan
Que all the DA temu biologists who don't know shiz
Posted on 1/8/25 at 11:09 am to White Bear
Theres a ton of reasons but the biggest is drought which equates to crappy duck numbers. Then going into farming practices and don't give me the stupid crap about farmers being stewards of the earth/conservationalists. As a whole they could give a rats arse about the environment. Then combine urban sprawl, spinning wing decoys, every idiot with a shotgun hiding behind a tree from canada to louisiana doesn't help the cause. Think about it more ducks are killed now than when commercial hunting was allowed. You can't go very many places in any state in the Ms Flyway and not hear a gun shot in all directions during the waterfowl season. Folks that cry about flooded grain need to stop. If that's the case fed gov should ban hunting on anything not flooded naturally.
Posted on 1/8/25 at 12:35 pm to Park duck
Agree with you that there are many different things that have affected Water file numbers coming into Louisiana. Not the least of which is over hunting, excessive hunting, motorized ATVs, gator tales, etc. These things in combination with competition for waterfowl habitat, and changing weather patterns, I believe, and also according to biologist that I have worked with have had the greatest impact. Not too sure that I understand the statement about Farmers.
Posted on 1/8/25 at 5:00 pm to SpillwayRoyalty
Yeah I hunt on holly beach and we do our best killing during the first 3 weeks. After that it kinda falls off. Still have good days here and there but the first split it is normally loaded for us. Late season the birds are smart and all stack up in pot holes and want nothing to do with a decoy or a call.
Posted on 1/8/25 at 5:16 pm to choupiquesushi
quote:
habitat loss/degradation, changing hydrology, ever increasing mechanized human traffic, changing land use patterns and throw in invasives for good measure.
Yep.
There’s a great youtube series that I’m about halfway through. It has about five hours of total content. it’s a bunch of guys of varying backgrounds, but all very involved with waterfowl pretty much all
their lives. They don’t give definitive statements about what needs to be done, but it is filled with detailed information and it’s very interesting. Agree or disagree with what they say, but it is definitely the most fact filled discussion I have ever seen even only halfway through.
XO State of Waterfowl
Posted on 1/9/25 at 12:38 pm to TigersBy90
quote:
Yeah I hunt on holly beach and we do our best killing during the first 3 weeks. After that it kinda falls off. Still have good days here and there but the first split it is normally loaded for us. Late season the birds are smart and all stack up in pot holes and want nothing to do with a decoy or a call.
This. LDWF's bag checks for many many years have said marsh/coastal hunters do the vast majority of their killing the first few weeks of the season, then steadily tapers from there. "We want to hunt late"....but the bag checks say those who are going aren't killing.
So there's always a (loud) few that want to hunt in February, but because we can't, want every minute of Jan 31, regardless of what day of the week that might be (see this season's WZ schedule closing on a Friday).
1.) By first to second week of January, if you haven't gotten birds showing up to you, it's highly unlikely you'll suddenly see them leading up to Jan 31.
2.) By that late in the season, marsh birds are slick and only want small potholes, and for tidal marsh hunters, you're likely dealing with mud flats. Nice !
Posted on 1/9/25 at 12:54 pm to Tigah D
We need three zones like they had it before
East zone
West zone
Coastal zone (all the marsh south of the rice line)
It is ridiculous that coastal marsh (hackberry and Venice) where the early migrators want to go has the same season as the people on the red river which won’t shoot anything but local
Wood ducks the first few weeks of November
The red river folks want it as late as possible and late January is crap for marsh ducks
While Venice and hackberry are doing their best the first split, you may get a decent opening day in north Louisiana and then they are gone. There is almost never any backwater during the first split in north Louisiana.
East zone
West zone
Coastal zone (all the marsh south of the rice line)
It is ridiculous that coastal marsh (hackberry and Venice) where the early migrators want to go has the same season as the people on the red river which won’t shoot anything but local
Wood ducks the first few weeks of November
The red river folks want it as late as possible and late January is crap for marsh ducks
While Venice and hackberry are doing their best the first split, you may get a decent opening day in north Louisiana and then they are gone. There is almost never any backwater during the first split in north Louisiana.
This post was edited on 1/9/25 at 12:58 pm
Posted on 1/9/25 at 12:59 pm to Ron Cheramie
^^ agreed, but can't recall why we went back to 2 from the 3 a few years back.
Note as far as splits, proposed to go back to 2 splits for WZ in the 2025-2026 (next) season. This 3 split nonsense has to go, we should be hunting this weekend.
Note as far as splits, proposed to go back to 2 splits for WZ in the 2025-2026 (next) season. This 3 split nonsense has to go, we should be hunting this weekend.
Posted on 1/9/25 at 2:01 pm to Tigah D
January has always been my most productive month of the year to hunt greys not because of some flush of new birds, but because of exactly what you said. They're easier to pattern and easier to kill because they typically like smaller water.
The idea that we lost two weeks in the middle of January is absurd. Also saw that it appears they've done away with this ridiculousness next year, so that's good.
The idea that we lost two weeks in the middle of January is absurd. Also saw that it appears they've done away with this ridiculousness next year, so that's good.
Posted on 1/9/25 at 2:37 pm to Ron Cheramie
quote:
We need three zones like they had it before
East zone
West zone
Coastal zone (all the marsh south of the rice line)
This!
The majority of the ratoon crop isn't even harvested by the opening day of the west zone
Posted on 1/9/25 at 5:22 pm to Midtiger farm
quote:WTF?
ratoon crop
Posted on 1/9/25 at 6:11 pm to VernonPLSUfan
Don’t like it all. Coastal zone hunters - best duck hunting is week of Thanksgiving until Christmas. One the water and grass is gone, it’s over. Needs to open early, close early and have the most available hunting days mid November - End of December. The 2 weeks during the first split were the most ducks we had. Shame. The ate all the grass while we were sitting at home.
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