Mississippi provides countless acres of great habitat for puddle ducks; hunters in the Magnolia State should take full advantage of their opportunities.
There is something romantic about duck hunting: the sights and smells of the dawn, the sound of whistling wings and banking birds as decoys bob and dip on the wind ripples of a pond.
Truth be told, waterfowl hunting may well be the oldest hunting sports in Mississippi. I say “sport” because market hunters, who supplied wagon loads of game to local markets for sale, had little or no interest in the aesthetics of the outing. Using punt guns loaded with pounds of shot and black powder, they did nothing for the conservation of our natural resources, but from that misuse sprung forth a conservation movement that grew to every corner of the nation.
The Mississippi Flyway is a great funnel that empties the vast prairie pothole nesting grounds of the United States and Canada and brings waterfowl south for the winter. Mississippi, Louisiana and Arkansas are among top producers of rice, soybeans and corn, making the harvested fields along the Mighty Muddy ideal wintering habitat. Some ducks travel on to the coastal marshes for their winter vacation, but the vast majority are called short-stoppers, flying only as far south as they need to find open water and ample food.
Within Mississippi, waterfowl will predictably mass themselves near the bigger bodies of water, but enough will scatter eastward into other drainages to keep things interesting for hunters. Where there is water and food in winter, there will be ducks. The Tenn-Tom Waterway offers hunting opportunities, as do the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers lakes: Enid, Sardis, Grenada and Arkabutla. Flooded timber, be it seasonal as found along the Mississippi River or beaver ponds scattered across the hill counties, will attract ducks.
Dabbling in puddle ducks
For the most part, ducks can be divided into two groups: divers and dabblers, monikers that relate to the feeding style the ducks employ. Divers, as the name implies, submerse themselves and feed on plants and invertebrates at depths to 5 feet. Divers’ feet are located toward the rear of the body, so propulsion is enhanced as the bird swims below the surface. Common diving ducks include the bufflehead, canvasback, hooded merganser, lesser scaup, redhead, ring-necked duck and ruddy duck. Hunters can identify diving ducks by the way they take flight. Divers “run” a short distance on the surface of the water before becoming airborne.
Dabblers have feet and legs more centered on the body and feed at or just beneath the surface. Also called puddle or pond ducks, dabblers favor shallower water. Mississippi’s favorite dabblers include the mallard, gadwall, blue- and green-winged teal and wood ducks. The widgeon and pintail are also fairly common. Unlike divers, dabblers take flight by propelling themselves upward with their feet and legs and taking flight immediately.
Bag limits dictate the numbers of ducks that may be harvested. Some knowledge of ducks is required for hunters to remain on the right side of the law.
The good news
Mississippi is blessed with a plethora of duck habitat. Several Wildlife Management Areas offer draw hunts for ducks and manage the property expressly for waterfowl. Mahannah WMA is a prime example. It features ponds where seed-producing crops flourish during the summer, only to be flooded in the fall for approaching ducks. Hunting is by a permit-only basis, but chances are good of being drawn. Pay a visit to the area this winter and make a note on your calendar to submit your application in 2021.
The Mississippi River offers an open opportunity for waterfowl hunters with a boat and the grit necessary to make a hunt happen. As a younger man, I hunted the flooded timber south of Rosedale with good success. The gadwalls were plentiful, as were greenheads. Another area where the ducks decoy for us was the flooded timber where Lake Chotard connects to the river.
“Due to COVID-19, many breeding waterfowl survey efforts were unable to be conducted this year,” said Houston Havens, waterfowl coordinator for the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks. “However, the department’s waterfowl surveys showed strong numbers…. waterfowl breeding habitat was in good shape for much of the prairie pothole region, and … there should be plenty of ducks ready to head south toward Mississippi this hunting season.”
Experts say to brush in your duck boat with willow limbs, sheaves of shore grass and other natural material, as well as camouflage netting. Decoys need to be scattered and, of course, the more action they have, the more realistic they will appear to a passing flock looking for a resting place.
Ducks are attracted to decoys for two main reasons: the security found in numbers, and the promise of an easy meal.
Target the shallows
“Dabbling ducks prefer shallow water,” said Dr. Mike Brasher, a biologist with Ducks Unlimited, a national conservastion group. “Flooded soybean fields are prime habitat for dabblers of all kinds. The same goes for flooded hardwoods, where smaller acorns such as water oaks are plentiful. Boats are not an issue here as they are in deeper water, but a quality pair of waders makes the hunting far more comfortable.”
Art Bradshaw, an avid hunter and former conservation officer, enjoys hunting wood ducks in the hill country of Scott and Smith counties; he was involved in efforts to trap and band wood ducks. Some of his favorite hunts were also some of the shortest.
“There are beaver ponds where woodies come to roost, and there was a surprising regularity to their habits,” Bradshaw said. “They had a favorite roost but fed in the Strong River and the feeder creeks to the river. Every evening, they would return to this one particular roost just minutes before legal shooting light was gone. It was easy to bag a limit, but then it was over.”
Bradshaw said one of the wood ducks he helped to band was harvested by a hunter in Georgia, proving woodies take part in a migration of sorts. For the most part, wood ducks spend most of their lives in a relatively small area. Wood duck boxes in small ponds all across Mississippi aid in the ducks’ population. Simple to make and easy to place, they are one thing hunters and conservationists can do to insure future numbers.
Mike Kavanagh of Vicksburg hunts in the lower Delta, just a shotgun’s echo away from Eagle Lake. This year, his daughter, Madelyn, harvested her first ducks — three green-winged teal — while hunting with Jeff Terry at his Chilhowie Farms.
“I have hunted with Jeff for 30 years,” Kavanagh said. “He really likes helping young people, and first-time hunters get the quality experience they need to build interest in the sport.”
Don’t overlook the Pearl River and its many oxbows and tributary creeks and streams. The Pascagoula River is another popular stopping place for all sorts of ducks.
Other state-managed lands with good waterfowl hunting include: Twin Oaks, Muscadine Farms, Howard Miller, Sardis Waterfowl and Sky Lake. Even some state lakes such as Neshoba County Lake offer some duck hunting.
On the federal side of the ledger, the Noxubee and St. Catherine national wildlife refuges offer the waterfowler excellent opportunities. Matthews Brake, Morgan Brake and the Theodore Roosevelt complex offer duck hunting as well, but some boots on the ground time is required to find just the perfect water for your hunt.
Duck season details
Migratory bird seasons come under the purview of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Mississippi is given a framework that allows the Commission on Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks to divvy up the days so hunters have the maximum opportunity allowed.
For the 2020-21 season the dates are: Nov. 13-29, Dec. 4-6, Dec. 9-Jan. 31, 2021. Feb. 6-7 2021, is set aside for youth, veterans and active military.
The daily bag limit is six ducks, including no more than 4 mallards (no more than 2 hens), 1 mottled duck, 2 black ducks, 1 pintail, 3 wood ducks, 2 canvasbacks, 1 scaup and 2 redheads.
The merganser daily bag limit is 5, with only 2 being hooded mergansers. The daily bag limit on coots is 15.
The possession limit is three times the daily limit.
In addition to a valid hunting license, waterfowl hunters are required to have in their possession a valid state and federal waterfowl stamp, often just called a “duck stamp.”
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