New to Waterfowl Help and Advice Please

[mwmjones]

I am new to waterfowl hunting and was looking for any help and / or advice please.

My son and I have recently started up waterfowl hunting just about a month or so ago. We have been hunting Big Game and almost everything else here in Colorado but now have been bitten and have the obsession for ducks and geese.

We have tried hunting several places up and down and along the river and some small ponds near Ft Morgan, Brush and even up near the Crook area with limited success and now was wondering if anyone could help or advise what next steps would be appropriate.

So anything goes and we would be open for any ideas, suggestions, help and advice towards learning something new.

We have all the gear and would love the time spent with any other hunters interested in going together, new areas to check out and maybe try or just some where and how to's

Any help is greatly appreciated. Please feel free to either PM or contact me directly via e-mail as well.

Thanks-Michael
MWMJONES@AOL.COM

[il2rmb]

I am new to waterfowl hunting and was looking for any help and / or advice please.

My son and I have recently started up waterfowl hunting just about a month or so ago. We have been hunting Big Game and almost everything else here in Colorado but now have been bitten and have the obsession for ducks and geese.

We have tried hunting several places up and down and along the river and some small ponds near Ft Morgan, Brush and even up near the Crook area with limited success and now was wondering if anyone could help or advise what next steps would be appropriate.

So anything goes and we would be open for any ideas, suggestions, help and advice towards learning something new.

We have all the gear and would love the time spent with any other hunters interested in going together, new areas to check out and maybe try or just some where and how to's

Any help is greatly appreciated. Please feel free to either PM or contact me directly via e-mail as well.

Thanks-Michael
MWMJONES@AOL.COM

Are you looking for new hunting places to try out? Most of the public land for ducks/geese is along the Platte. How's your calling? Where have you gone in the past?

[Mazin]

Camo Camo camo, ducks are color sensitive birds. Also try rivers / creeks no because of the fact most larger bodies of water are froze up pretty good right now.

[mwmjones]

Thanks again for all the advice, help hints and information and direction on what types of things to do from all of you so far and it has been an experience.

Well we spent two solid days researching by scouting all the SWA’s, state parks and trusts and all kinds of properties up and down the river along I-76 and man was it windy. We have learned a lot and found great, good and horrible areas.

I guess the next step is to take what we have learned and also wait until we get some weather and moisture that we really need to get things going to see and get some birds.
We have a reservation for Barr Lake for this Saturday and were wondering if anyone whom has either hunted in the past or could point us in the right direction or advise us to use a specific strategy for the area we would appreciate it as well.

Thanks again to all of you that have taken your time either private messaging emailing and or calling me with all the helpful hints on how to or go check this out and especially come along and invited us out we learned so much and had a wonderful time and we definitely want to say THANK YOU for doing so.

Best Regards,

Michael

[Mazin]

Let me know about Barr, I live down the street and it has always been on my :"to do list" just haven't gotten the time yet. GL and Good shooting

[mx'r]

Not sure about the ducks, but the place to go for geese is just east of Lamar. There is State owned land there and LOTS of geese. Even saw a crapload of snowgeese last year. I dont hunt them, but I drive through there all the time. Lot's of people doing good. I think it's highway 50 that runs through there. My only real advice is DONT EAT them. I think they're gross. I call geese "sky carp".

[Mazin]

LMAO, sky carp thats a new one.

[tat2man75]

[ROFL1] Skycarp...I second that..YUCK! I even tried goose jerky thinkin that would be better. Nope! Never again!

[mwmjones]

Well we have had a hard season of non stop hunting and finally we got our 1 st ever shot goose or should I say geese and to top it off our day's limit as well. Thanks Gary and WFA.

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[Larry Ashcraft]

Congratulations on a VERY successful hunt!

I hunted ducks and geese for years, but don't get the urge much anymore. As far as eating geese, if you breast them out and find a good recipe for a marinade they are delicious!

We plucked them and tried all different ways to roast them with limited success. A lot of work for a mediocre meal. Breasting them out is so much easier and the meat is many times better.

[spittoon]

hobo style goose duck huntn[Tooth] get you'r best fishing rod #6 hook and corn and head to your nearest park, golf course bait-n- cast wa la saves time on setting the deeks out and re loading the shells ,and just tell everyone it is a new kite[Coffee]but please chek the the local game reg's under fly fishing[ROFL1][ROFL1]

[buckshotbarlow]

When u say gear, here's what we've found to work out...
double reed and single reed calling (mixed by the hunters) with flutes. The more noise the better. We have a couple of zinc calls, good but the more tones you produce the better. We have flappers for attention getters, and motorized moving head decoys for added realism.

The best full bodies you can get are the ones that you can carry the most of, but make sure they're flocked. The glare will flare off some birds.

The biggest important factor for decoyed geese, is to make sure you get them in close where you can KILL them. I've seen other people at our lake blow a perfectly good hunt because they shot to early. We try to take most of our shots inside of 30 yds. We use Black Cloud and HeviShot and HeviSteel. The guys who use hevishot use 20ga's and just flat out kill the birds. I use black cloud 2's, it's good, and it's cheaper. The HeviSteel is our new choice. The old days of using drylock BBB's are gone.

Youtube has a bunch of good stuff, check it out by searching goose hunting.

[SA Friday]

I've hunted waterfowl off and on my whole life. It takes good camoflague, the decoys have to be set out in the right pattern and coordinated with wind direction, and skill, with multiple types of calls. Ill try to remember to post more tonight after class.