Southland > Hunting News June 2007

Duck hunting’s what you make it

Most hunters will be aware that Fish & Game conduct a duck hunting harvest survey. This is an important survey for us to estimate the harvest pressure that hunting places on the various gamebirds that we manage. Basically one survey is conducted for opening weekend, and then additional surveys every fortnight throughout the season. For each survey 120 licence holders are randomly selected from our database and telephoned, and their results are extrapolated out to an estimate for all licence holders. With surveys conducted every fortnight, over the season approximately 20% of Southland hunters are interviewed.

Results and interviews always produce an interesting range of stories each season, and to me highlight the different levels of motivation, enthusiasm and skill amongst our hunters. It would be wrong to assume that all hunters strive to shoot bag limits of ducks each time they set out, although some would certainly like to!

For some, opening weekend is the beginning and the end of their season, with only another 363 days until they’re out again! However, for the majority, they’ll take a wander or two back out to their pond, or jump-shoot a few here and there. Their expectations are much lower than for opening weekend and a simple pair may be adequate to satisfy their mornings’ endeavor.

One thing that frustrates me when conducting telephone interviews are anecdotes from hunters who jump-shot a pond and found 100 ducks took off and they only shot three or four. These guys would generally love to have shot more, and have absolutely squandered a brilliant opportunity to do so. There’s nothing wrong with jump shooting ducks, but if you know that there’s 20 or 30 (or more) living on a pond, it’s well worth considered hunting them as you would for opening weekend. Turn up early (and these mid winter mornings it’s not very early) set a dozen decoys out and get ready. Ducks that are now settled living on a pond will generally turn up content and look to land whether you’ve got decoys there or not. Actually, that’s one of the topics that’s covered in the introduction to duck hunting DVD that we’ve produced, and is available from our office for $5.

After a dry, calm and relatively warm May, early June certainly turned the tables! The coastal belt in particular has received a lot of rain, which changes duck’s habits. Surface water and feeding opportunities abound, and the ducks that I shot last weekend are extremely fat, and were beautiful roasted!

There are plenty of opportunities to shoot ducks around the province at this stage of the season, but the situations in which you hunt ducks are likely to be quite different to opening weekend. For example, ducks will follow stock on fodder crops in the evening, finding abundant worms that are stirred up by hooves. Simply obtaining permission and settling down in the crop with a call may well present you with one or two opportunities. If you’re keen, you’ll find a way to shoot a few ducks, but you may have to think outside the square a bit. One thing’s for sure, you won’t shoot any sitting in front of the fire at home, so get out there and have a go!

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