Ok, am I being pranked?

Dave Church

Dave Church

Well-known member
Saturday brought a beautiful sunrise and sunset. I saw one mallard and he was high enough to have a stewardess and a frosty bill. Sunday was 70 degrees. Where are these ducks?

dc
 
Same for us on the Upper Susq. No Birds!!
I have a freind from Toronto CD. He has not seen any either!
And this is the year of the Ducks, 35 % More than last year!
Someone needs to learn how to count!!
 
Steve, I had a customer tell me last week that he is still shooting teal and woodies in Northern CT! I know the weather has been very strange this year, but I am very surprised at how few birds I have seen. There seems to be plenty of geese around but the ducks are non-existant. I am almost ready to petition a 2-3 year shutdown of the Atlantic Flyway to bring the numbers back up. It worked for the geese back in the late 80's.

dc
 
duck season was going great until saturday in ct, (for me anyway). my buddies and i were consistently shooting 4+birds a person. but on saturday something changed. no high flying flocks of mallards like i have been seeing, no teal, we had a lone drake woodie come into the spread which became my first woody. then we had two drake hoodies come in. this usually means that migrators are on the way. so in great anticipation of the migrators we headed to the ct sound. the black duck were extremely numerous but are extremely wary already. we only saw the birds we scared up when getting to the spot. then only a single black came in which my buddy got.

we need the cold since the residents are already gone and so is the first flock of migrators
 
I was in Summerville, SC this past weekend.... saw a snow goose in with a group of Canadas.... but not much for ducks..... assumed these were migratory birds with the Snow in the group?

Dave
 
We've been seeing a good number of mallards and blacks. Had a TON of woodies on Friday but numbers really dropped come Saturday morning. Been seeing increasing numbers of Canadas and a couple flocks of snows.
 
Dave skipped this past weekend for my moms 75th BD. Good thing I did, club members said only two ducks seen at our camp in Cambridge. MD. Geese too high and with a flight agenda that did not provide a stop in our area. Up high and moving on!

Lets hope Decembers start will bring us better hunting.
 
Hell don't Blame us..

It is -40 F. Today and if I went down to the power house on the Chena R. or over to Ft. Wainwright's cooling pond, I could find ducks..
 
We need a cold front--and it looks like one is here. Prediction is for teens tonight up here, cold tomorrow, and snow/sleet/rain on Wed.

I've been hoping for this all fall. Now it's come, and I'm in the middle of working with a plumber to replace my boiler. No heat or water in the house tonight, and no way to hunt until after turkey day when the boiler is installed and I'm done with my bird roasting duties.

But duck numbers seem to be on the upswing here. Starting to see some divers, and saw my first big flocks of mallards both inland and on the coast yesterday. I think the hunting behind this front could be good.
 
Seems like conflicting reports across the northeast. Everyone has their honey holes... some better than others.
 
Sit tight down there. I have good news. First real cold night last night, 12*! I hunted the St. Lawrence River and saw an unbelievable amount of waterfowl. Flocks of 20 to 50 birds (Mallards/Blacks) flying in from every direction. Widgeon and Gadwall whistling and gakking at first light. Goldeneye whistling around. Thousands of dark geese as usual. Bufflehead, Black Scoters, and one imm. Brant. I had my 4 greenheads and a black duck by 7:30 or so. Great to see.
They're on the way, maybe......
-
 
This is one of those years that proves why MD should keep the majority of it's 60 days as late in the season as possible.

It doesn't matter how many ducks are out there if it never gets cold enough for them to migrate. Same with the geese. It was a below average nesting year for the Ungava Canada geese which make up the majority of MD's Canadas. When they have a bad hatch they don't hustle down here as quickly.

This is definitely the first Thanksgiving week I can remember in a long time that I have no urge to duck or goose hunt. I still have decoys to organize and grass mats to make for hiding the boat.

December and January will be good to us, I have a feeling.

-D
 
Have had pretty good gunning just a bit north of you in South Jersey for the past week and half. Lots of teal, black ducks, and some spring, which are the mainstays in the area that I hunt. So relief is not far away!
 
Chris,

The resident mallards/blacks aren't gone, like the geese, they probably never leave. They are just in the parks being fed bread by the old ladies until the freeze comes.
 
Two nights in the teens and days in the low 30's in central Maine. A little warmer on the coast. Up to a foot of snow today for much of Maine, with rain and sleet on the coast. I'm not sure what that does your for you guys in the Mid-Atlantic, but this is the weather push that usually puts ice on the smaller waters and pushes birds to the coast, river, and big lakes up here.

I wish I could be out this afternoon hunting the NE then NW wind on the back side of this storm, but I am having work done on my house all day and need to supervise, then start my cooking duties for tomorrow.

Unfortunately, it looks we are in for another warm up and (another) string of warm days with southerly winds through at least the end of the weekend.
 
Thanks guys for all the info. I will be off early today but scouting has shown me no change and it is blue skies and close to 70 today. Might go out tomorrow morning just to run the bigger duck boat since I haven't had it out yet this season. I had figured the back coves that I had been using my sneak boat would have been froze up like they did last year, but thats not the case. If nothing else, I will hunt a diffeent spot tomorrow and then zip around looking for some birds. Good luck to all and I will post my results.

dc
 
Dave, this early split has been a bust for us in Cambridge. Going back to deer hunting in Va this weekend and next. Gonna hit the ducks in the December - January split.

Bill V
 
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