Pretty good information.
Tennessee Mallard Project Video
- Thread starter UT-longbeard
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Pretty good information.
Displaced_Vol
Well-Known Member
I literally just came here to post this- I've heard Dr. Cohen on a couple podcasts and know they're active on social media so I was vaguely aware of what they were doing, but that was a phenomenal video putting it all together.
I hunted with Brad a few years ago near whites lake. Super nice guy. Hes right. We trained them.
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Deer do the same thing.
Imagine you are a 1.5yo buck in Kansas. Limited season. Rut is archery only. That buck probably encounters (sees, smells, hears) hunters frequently and nothing happens.
Same again next year as a 2.5yo. Then maybe 3.5yo.
So that when that buck is finally 4.5yo he probably feels pretty safe to move around the lanscape.
Hence, you get good daylight mature buck activity.
I think he is missing something, he is only looking at a small portion of current data. The area he is doing the study has roughly the same hunting pressure or less then it has had in my lifetime. Some people are building new fields to flood and new blinds. But most blinds in West TN have been hunted for decades in the same spot. I have hunted the same area in WTN that the study is taking place for almost 30 years . He has actually asked to lease a portion of our hunting property to make a small rest area. Most of the public land around west TN gets hunted no more now then it did 20-30 years ago. In fact they have made most public land close at 3pm to give the ducks a place to rest in the afternoon.
I there has to be more to it to make the major change in ducks travel patterns then hunting pressure. There has been a big change in the past 5-7 years. There has not been a major increase in hunting pressure in that time.
I there has to be more to it to make the major change in ducks travel patterns then hunting pressure. There has been a big change in the past 5-7 years. There has not been a major increase in hunting pressure in that time.
MidTennFisher
Well-Known Member
This video needs to be forwarded to DU every time they give us this BS sob story about how we're losing hunters and need to aggressively recruit more.
Anyone who hunts public land, or even hunts private land but pays attention, knows dang well hunting pressure isn't decreasing anywhere in the country.
Whether or not we're seeing more hunters could be debated, though I firmly believe the number is increasing, but whether or not the number of hunters we have are hunting more, and putting more pressure on the animals across a constantly decreasing resource (# of hunable acres per hunter) is not even worth discussing. They are and the desire for social media fame is playing a huge role in this.
Put it this way, you think guys are paying $50k for duck leases as a result of less hunting pressure?? Come on.
Stop R3, stop giving money to organizations that promote R3. R3 really stands for Revenue, Revenue, Revenue.
Anyone who hunts public land, or even hunts private land but pays attention, knows dang well hunting pressure isn't decreasing anywhere in the country.
Whether or not we're seeing more hunters could be debated, though I firmly believe the number is increasing, but whether or not the number of hunters we have are hunting more, and putting more pressure on the animals across a constantly decreasing resource (# of hunable acres per hunter) is not even worth discussing. They are and the desire for social media fame is playing a huge role in this.
Put it this way, you think guys are paying $50k for duck leases as a result of less hunting pressure?? Come on.
Stop R3, stop giving money to organizations that promote R3. R3 really stands for Revenue, Revenue, Revenue.
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I grew up hunting public landin West TN. 20 -30 years ago very few people flooded fields and left crops for ducks. They mostly hunted public land and would flood fields if we got a big rain and they flooded. These days there is thousands of more flooded ac in west TN because farmers and land owners have found out that people will pay money to lease a property. But that just means around the same number of hunters spread over a larger area. I definitely do not see many more then in the past. Just because people have more money now to lease a property doesn't mean there is more demand.
Even if you say there is more hunting pressure in some areas, other have less pressure. I just feel like the answer is not that simple. Most ofthe refuges in West have been surrounded by flooded fields full of crops since the 1980s. They continue to flood more fields and leave more crops all along the rivers that ducks travel.
It seems to me like the ducks are getting as lazy as a lot of Americans on government assistance. They get tons of free food and don't move unless someone makes them. There is standing crops in every field for miles around the refuges. Why would they travel long distances to find other food?
It seems to me like the ducks are getting as lazy as a lot of Americans on government assistance. They get tons of free food and don't move unless someone makes them. There is standing crops in every field for miles around the refuges. Why would they travel long distances to find other food?
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WilcoKen
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Just my .02. More resting areas, whether intended or not, means less hunter success IMO. Now when they all froze up last Christmas we had a good time. I have about resolved myself to not hunting until that scenario happens. It was a huge difference in what the ducks had to do. And it was way more fun than watching ducks do exactly what he described in that video. I believe the resting areas will only continue to grow and the ducks will stay in those areas from 5:45 AM until 4:45PM.
Stlbaseball1
Well-Known Member
Look at the historical refuge count #s. West TN refuges do not hold near as many ducks as they used to which leads me to believe either there are less ducks or they are being held somewhere else.
MidTennFisher
Well-Known Member
I don't believe for a second that we have the same number of duck hunters hunting West TN, or anywhere in the country, today that we had 20-30 years ago. That number has increased significantly. Maybe it's not all TN residents, maybe it's some out of staters, and maybe it's TN residents hunting a lot harder than they used to. But there is no way anyone could convince me that any legally huntable species of animal is seeing less pressure than they saw 20-30 years ago.
Except maybe squirrels. That doesn't garner the attention on social media that bucks, ducks, and turkeys will.
And I don't really think that pressure is getting spread around because of the increased flooded crops. Not everyone can afford a lease, or is willing to. The prices go up every season and people will buy that lease from under you in a heartbeat. I've read several accounts of a guy paying, say $5k for a season, word gets out that spot was hot all Winter, then someone comes and offers 2x that or more.
Nothing about that says reduced pressure to me. That says guys are willing to spend mega dollars to have a place to themselves rather than fight with the increasing crowding on public land.
MidTennFisher
Well-Known Member
I hear and read about a lot of frustration from Southern states because Northern states are using ice eaters to keep flooded fields open. That keeps a lot of ducks in areas they'd normally migrate out of.
It's a complicated problem, and there isn't a simple solution. Pressure on the resource is only one part of the equation. Farming practices are part, weather(both here and to the north of us) is part, and season dates are a part. We can't control the weather, the season dates are set by the Feds, and are not likely to change at all, and farming practices are notoriously slow to change. No till farming has taken over and with it there are more waste grains left on the ground that isn't burned off or tilled in like in prior generations, so there is more of a food around. With tilling in/burning off of crop fields after harvest, there was a food wasteland and birds had to move more to survive.
With more food on the ground, there is no pressure north of us to make birds move as the northern areas seasons close, so they stay put unless weather forces them to move, and then they move only as far as the snow/ice line and not much farther.
And I feel like refuges need to change their practices somewhat to account for some of the issue of stale ducks sitting there on the refuge during daylight hours. On the refuge, ducks have all the food they want, water to swim and rest, and no pressure on them at all, so they get there and sit there until they decide to move on, and then they mostly seem to move on at night, or after season is closed.
As far as hunting pressure, I'm thinking it's only a matter of time before certain types of motion decoys are restricted or banned, at least on public hunt areas. Wouldn't surprise me much to see further restrictions to limit the number of decoys or size of blinds and hunting parties. And a drop in the number of birds in a limit would not shock me either.
With more food on the ground, there is no pressure north of us to make birds move as the northern areas seasons close, so they stay put unless weather forces them to move, and then they move only as far as the snow/ice line and not much farther.
And I feel like refuges need to change their practices somewhat to account for some of the issue of stale ducks sitting there on the refuge during daylight hours. On the refuge, ducks have all the food they want, water to swim and rest, and no pressure on them at all, so they get there and sit there until they decide to move on, and then they mostly seem to move on at night, or after season is closed.
As far as hunting pressure, I'm thinking it's only a matter of time before certain types of motion decoys are restricted or banned, at least on public hunt areas. Wouldn't surprise me much to see further restrictions to limit the number of decoys or size of blinds and hunting parties. And a drop in the number of birds in a limit would not shock me either.
Did you hunt West TN in the 1990s to 2000? I hunted public land that would have 50-100 boats on it every day of the season. The exact same boat ramp you might see 2 boats there most of the season. Most areas i hunt are somewhat busy on Saturday but during the week there is very few people hunting.
I know people are paying high dollar for leases. Almost all know of paying real high prices and using company money and calling it a business write off. Several of those are the big reasons that prices have jumped up. Along with people making a lot more money in the past 5 years. I know a lot of hunters and I could not name a single one that only started duck hunting in the past 5 years. I know there are some new hunters but there are also a lot that have quit duck hunting because you don't see the numbers of duck we use to 10-12 years ago.
Any theories as to why the refuge counts are down, outside of the ones I just tossed out? Every one's theories are just as valid as anyone else's
yellalinehunter
Well-Known Member
That is my strategy this year. Wait for ice up. May only get a day or two but it'll be productive. Or, atleast have odds in my favor.
