Delaware Snow Goose Hunt

CGeminski

CGeminski

Well-known member
I just got back from a Snow Goose hunt in Delaware with a guide. The first day he combines our group of 7 guys with 7 other guys to put out 2000 decoys, we end up shooting 16 birds (our group shot at least 80% of them). The birds which came in were mostly singles and the guide let everyone shoot and rip them to shreds. How would you like to try to mount a snow goose which just got shot 10 times? How about eating one of those breasts? Then the other group took our birds to pose in front of for their "hero" photos.... worse yet, they gave us the worst looking birds back and kept the only mature bird which was in decent enough shape to mount!
Day 2 was even worse... On the way down there the guide tells us its hard to kill birds in soybean fields. First light on day 2 reveals soybeans! Wait.. it gets better, guess where the field was? How do you think the gunning is at the end of the Dover Air Foce Base runway when C-5 and C-17 cargo planes are practicing touch and go landings every few minutes? Needless to say, we had a great airshow, but didnt pull the trigger once the whole day! I think the head guide knew we were not going to do well, he left us with one of his other guides and took off at first light after we put 1000 decoys out.
If anyone here is looking to go on a Snow Goose hunt in Delaware, Maryland or New Jersey... PM me and I will tell you "where not go to".
 
Wow, 14 guys in one field is a lot, even with a spread of 2k decoys. You should've just complimented the other group on their superior shooting and given them the birds.
 
The best part (sarcasm) was when one of them shot across all 7 of us to take a bird we were letting one of the older guys in our party take. The bird was coming right at him and he was excited to shoot a snow... Then all of a sudden.... BANG, from 40 yards to our right. Not only did he take a bird coming to us, but he shot directly across all 7 of us!
 
That sounds about as bad as it gets and the idea of gang shooting is one reason I have resisted the temptation to travel south to Texas for Geese.

I did have an excellent hunt in Dauphin Lake in Manatoba with my brother for snows - guide set us up and let us call em in etc but my lab was never quite steady again after all that racket.

Also would recommend PEI for Canadas if you have the time and $ - small groups, great people and enough mussles and oysters to come home with the gout.

Hope your next hunt is a 180 from that trip.

regards,

sarge
 
next hunt is going to be eiders and oldsquaw in Maine. Just two guys and we are going to bring along the wives... Hunt ducks in the AM, let the wives spend our hard earned $$ at LL Bean and the outlets in the afternoon. Might also try brant in NJ if anyone has any suggestions for guides there, let me know...
 
Bummer.I guess it is important to know in advance how many guns will be in any given place/blind.I don't even know that many waterfowlers,except on this site.Greedy guides should be identified quickly.I was Tower Chief at Dover,a few decades ago.Don't remember Snows,but we had millions of Canadas.Not one reported bird strike that winter.
 
Sorry you had a bad experience in DE - I hope it doesn't reflect on the whole state. Snows are tough to hunt, because you have to hunt the fields they were in the night before. The reason you hunted the bean field after he said they were tough to hunt (which is true, because ground blinds stick out like crazy) is because they were most likely feeding there the afternoon before. It's really tough to get a truely great snow goose hunt, and to do it as a guide consistently - I just can't imagine how much land you would need access to.
 
One of my pals guides here and their daily avg last year was approx 140 birds per day over decoys. This was with 4-6 gunners. Their spread and audio is unbelieveable. They still have a few hunts open for this spring if anyone is interested. Price is premium as is the gunning.....
 
At times I wish guiding for wildlife had been out lawed in the Lacey act or in other similar treatys and legislation. In ND Guides and Outfitters are looked down upon by many people. We are so fortunate here that most people have pride about free lance hunting and would never think to "pay to play" I hope we stay as an exception and not have it become the norm here too.

Sorry to hear you had a bad hunt, If I were you I'd call the head honcho and give him an ear full. I would also not be withholding his name. If you would have had a good or great hunt would you also be with holding the outfitters name only to share via PM? Word of mouth is the best/worst type of advertising for an individual or business.
 
Tower chief at Dover? Sounds like a cool job. While we were on the hunt your current day counterpart must have told a C-17 pilot to get the heck out of dodge quick just after he took off... There was a flock of several thousand snows about a mile past the end of the runway, as soon as he took off he got to about 1000ft altitude and rolled hard to the right to avoid them.

In answer to the other post regarding "who" the guide was, well lets just say stay away from anyone with a black background on their website.

I see one person posted about a friend who guides snows... you can use electronic calls? This guide did not call to the snow geese at all, they did call to canadas though...
 
You can use e-calls during the conservation season but not when other duck or goose seasons are open.
I can't believe he didnt call at all. Given how vocal geese are when feeding, that seems pretty weird to me.

Did he tell you he was going to combine parties when you booked? Did he ask you if it was OK? If not, I would have refused to hunt with the other group. I hunted once out in TX for snows and the guide let us know (there was only 2 of us) that we were going to combine with 6 other guys. Turned out to be not to bad. But I cannot imagine having 14 guys in one group.
 
Canada goose and ducks were open... so thats probably why no e-calls. But this guy didnt call to snows even one honk.... Yes, he asked us, we had never hunted snows before, but had all heard that more decoys equals more birds so we said ok.... This was the day before our hunt that he made us the offer however. What we didnt think of is that its also more guys shooting at those birds... You live and your learn I guess.
 
Sorry to hear of your troubles. I've hunted snows for years. Sounds like you had an average day and a good day. Skunks being the average.

The guide you used scouts his but off and has the best access to the areas the DE geese use. Believe it or not he's the best, and is a hard working and honest guy.

I hunted what was probably the same field near Dover last year and we took 57 birds. One w/a band and neck collar. Trust me, the planes don't bother the birds.

The only hope with snow goosing in the area is to figure out where they are feeding, set out as many decoys as you can, HOPE AND PRAY they use your field again. E-Calling is ILLEGAL in the Atlantic Flyway and calling at all is not effective. Frankly I don't think the snows can hear the calling over the racket they're making. Occasionally they'll shut up and listen, but only then would calling make sense. Even 14 guys can't mimick 2000 voices anyway. It's a waste of breath.

Your choice to not rub the guys name in the dirt is a commendable one and I hope your next snow goose hunt is better.

IMO, welcome to snow goose hunting. They're devilish birds that command a lot of respect, and are anything but easy to hunt.

-D
 
ditto again. Snow geese are extremely wary. 3 days hunting in mississippi flyway totaled 5 snows for me. We only set out about 800 rags and half shells with a few flyers so it seems they tried very hard to have you prepared.
 
That's pretty sad stuff. I guess I don't feel for the guide because he knows what he got himself into but the fact is...I'd be losing sleep over that gig and I'd bet he was fairly stressed about it(albeit numb). I would hope it was his absolute best option and it probably was but I guess "that don't make it right". And, I would voice my concern to him in a professional manner and see if he'll square you away somehow.

I've guided on and off for a variety of things for 12 years-mostly fly fishing but lots of canned pheasant hunts as well and some waterfowl(and turkey starting last year)and I can honestly say that many times it's the other "sports" that ruin the day-I'm sure mine have done the same thing to other groups. Whether it's another guides boatlaod of gomers or a nearby group of pheasant hunters they can really destroy the potential. Other times you end up meeting some real straight shooters...you just never know. At some point when you hit "seasoned" on the guide gauge you can start to make some very diplomatic and strategic moves and occasionally resort to being downright assertive to mitigate this issue. But, when you have to put all your eggs in one basket so to speak then it can turn into a real cluster. And that is why I won't go there when it comes to waterfowl. Either you run small groups and have your shit wired tight(Ira's buddy)or you're going to piss a fair number of folks off(first and foremost A#1)...it's just the odds.
 
We hunted a field on day one which was only 1/2 mile from the water the birds were spending the night on.... that field was rye and we did ok in it, also saw signs of the birds haven been there.... goose crap everywhere. Day 2 there was no visible goose crap anywhere in the field.... the birds had not been using the field at all... I just dont understand why he didnt put us back in the day 1 field where we at least had a shot.
 
IMO, welcome to snow goose hunting. They're devilish birds that command a lot of respect, and are anything but easy to hunt.

-D
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well said dave. The day that a man can pattern a roost flock of 80,000 and consistantly harvest in the hundreds daily, is the day i'll make and eat yellow snow.
Like dave said, Welcome the the game, its muddy, its bloody, its a ball!
 
I know the guide you were hunting with and he does work hard to produce birds.IMO he is the best guide for snows in Delaware. Sounds typical of a DELMARVA snow goose hunt.I guided some snow goose parties in the early 80's and can say it was my least favorite of all waterfowl hunting because there was no consistency for the parties.I've scouted, got permission to hunt fields they were loading into on a Friday, rigged out with 1000+ decoys on a Saturday only to get skunked.
 
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