Mississippi duck hunters look forward to great January

Ag fields and converted catfish ponds produced ducks last season, as Jacob Sartain (right) can attest.
Ag fields and converted catfish ponds produced ducks last season, as Jacob Sartain (right) can attest.

Delta waterfowl hunters say habitat is best it’s been in years, hope weather makes 2019 equal to last season for duck numbers.

Magnolia State duck hunters are forecasting another great January in the Mississippi Delta, hoping it will match the 2017-18 season that many consider the best in decades.

“After last year, and with the habitat in the shape it’s in, you better believe we’re anticipating another great season,” said Trip Burns of Southaven. “We had a lot of deer hunters quit deer hunting to go duck hunting; it was that good last year. I’ve never seen that many ducks in the Delta, not in the 20 years I’ve hunted.

“We got limits early and often, and it was quality ducks. Mallards were as plentiful as I’ve ever seen. Most days, we had to work hard for a limit of six because we had to stop at four mallards each. We had to work to find enough off-birds to fill the limit, but we did, mostly thanks to the green-winged teal and (gadwalls).”

The thing is, hunters say the Delta is in better condition entering into the 2019 than it was last year.

“That’s the big thing right there,” said Timmy Hearns of Greenwood, a farmer who prefers timber hunting on public lands. “We’ve had an extremely wet fall and summer, record-setting in some areas. The habitat is as good as I’ve ever seen it in the past 15 to 20 years. Not only does the entire Delta have plenty of water, there’s plenty of food.

“I think the success that hunters had last year impacted their preparations this year. After seeing all the ducks we had last year, a lot more people who used to duck hunt came back to the sport. This year, I’ve seen more and more people manipulating land and crops just for duck season. That’s the kind of impact one really good season can bring.”

Public lands were good to Austin Partridge in 2017-18 in January. He got his first black duck hunting timber in the Delta at one of the many WMAs.
Public lands were good to Austin Partridge in 2017-18 in January. He got his first black duck hunting timber in the Delta at one of the many WMAs.

It would be tough to match last year, despite the splendid habitat.

“That’s true, because we aren’t guaranteed duck migration on a set schedule,” Hearns said. “Last year, we had those two sub-freezing arctic blasts in December, one kind of early in the month and the other about the week or 10 days before Christmas. We had frozen ponds here, so you know it was a total freeze out early in the upper Midwest.

“Ducks started pouring in early December and, at least where I hunted, they never left. Last year, we weren’t in the same great habitat condition we are this year. If anything, this year we have too much water. That could make hunting tough early in the year because the ducks won’t be concentrated. There are so many places for them to be.”

It can be so good, that it becomes both good and bad, like the proverbial double-edged sword.

“The good news is that when the ducks start coming in, even the early arrivers, because the habitat is good, they’ll stay,” Hearns said. “But, because there’s so much water, they can scatter and not be concentrated, and if hunted hard, they can jump move out to a new area. Consistency is hurt.

“But all of that goes away in January, once the main flight of the migration brings in the ducks. They will fly in, see the abundant water, find the food sources, and they’ll stay. They will not overfly the Delta.”

Bad forecast? Who cares?

A black lab makes a mad splash back to the blind after a retrieve in the Delta.
A black lab makes a mad splash back to the blind after a retrieve in the Delta.

Despite a smaller flight forecast from federal surveys, most hunters are not discouraged.

“Even if it is down 10 percent, like they said, you give me 90 percent of the ducks we had last year, and I’ll take it,” said Phillip Cummings of Grenada. “We were limiting every weekend at our lease in January, and usually before 8 a.m. Ten percent won’t hurt that much.

“I’ve duck hunted in the Delta for nearly 40 years, since I was about 12 years old, and I have never seen it as good, consistently good, as it was last year. We’d get in the blind before sunrise, pour a cup of coffee and never get a chance to finish the cup. The shooting was that fast and furious.”

Cummings learned a valuable lesson.

“I ran out of shells early, and when I went to get a few more cases, I had trouble finding what I shoot,” he said. “Not this year, no sir. I bought 10 cases of shells. I am not going to run out, I assure you.”

Timber or fields?

Mississippi duck hunters found a lot of mallards in the timber last January in the 2017-18 season, but then they found them all over the Delta. They are looking for a repeat this month.
Mississippi duck hunters found a lot of mallards in the timber last January in the 2017-18 season, but then they found them all over the Delta. They are looking for a repeat this month.

Cummings has the option of hunting timber or flooded agriculture fields, and last year said he was about 50/50.

“Both places had plenty of ducks, we just switched up to keep the pressure down on any one spot,” he said. “We did kill a higher percentage of mallards last year in the timber than we did in the fields, but we had more green-wings, pintails and gadwalls in the fields. We had to wait more for the mallards in the fields, but it was easier filling the limit because of the other birds. In the timber, once we had our four mallards, we struggled to get the other ducks needed to limit. We’d get

them, though.”

Hearns prefers timber, so he leaves the farmlands behind and goes to the many public lands available in the Delta.

“I love to hunt the timber, shallow flooded timber, and I don’t mind a good walk to get to it,” he said. “It’s work to do it the way I like to, but I stay mobile, and it’s just me and my dog, so we can cover a lot of water if we have to.

“Last year was the best season I’ve ever had, and without a doubt, January 2018 was the best month of duck hunting I’ve ever experienced. I hunted every day I could, and I don’t think I failed to get a limit a single time, whether I went to the timber or stayed close to home and went to a field. When you duck hunt like I do, there’s the luxury of being able to go where the ducks are.”

Bring on the cold

A common sight in 2017-18 duck season: A happy retriever after a morning of chasing ducks for his owner.
A common sight in 2017-18 duck
season: A happy retriever after a
morning of chasing ducks for his owner.

The No. 1 factor in hunting success or failure in the Delta, at the far end of the Mississippi River Flyway, is the severity of the winter weather. In a mild winter, ducks won’t reach Mississippi, stopping instead in Arkansas and Missouri.

“All the work we do, all the water we get and all the food we supply ducks, none of that matters if we don’t get the ducks,” said Jacob Sartain of Madison, whose business — and pleasure — is selling and managing property for recreational purposes. “We need a repeat of last year’s winter weather to get the ducks back in here. We’ll get plenty in January — we always do — but a cold winter will put them here early and keep them here.”

Sartain advises landowners for whom he manages duck holes to hunt them lightly early in the season, to keep from putting too much pressure on the waterfowl.

But not in January, at least not in mid- and late January.

“In January, I tell them that if they have ducks, hunt them,” he said. “By then, it’s time to reap the benefits of all the work we’ve done to provide food and habitat. Everything we did all year — and managing waterfowl habitat is a year-round job — is about having ducks in January so when you got them hunt them, then get up the next morning and hunt them some more.”

After the long flight down from the prairies of the upper Midwest and Canada, ducks are looking for food and security.

“That’s why I like the timber,” Hearns said. “Once the shooting starts in earnest across the Delta, those ducks will be looking for the security of trees. They may go to the fields during the day to feed, but it’s been my experience that they will not want to be exposed for very long. They are going to look for brakes, sloughs, oxbows … you know, water with timber so they can have cover.

“If you look hard enough, you will find hot spots in the timber where ducks keep coming back over and over, and usually because there’s some kind of food source there. If I find them, I don’t hesitate to walk in or let my dog Troy go in on them and jump them up out of a hole. There’s a reason they like that spot on that day, and once it settles back down, they’ll come back for that same reason.”

Austin Partridge, a firefighter from Terry, is another hunter who loves to hunt the timber and doesn’t mind a long drive or a tough walk to find a honey hole.

“I’ll go standby at a draw hunt just for the opportunity that somebody may not show up and I can go,” he said. “But if that fails, I still have time to get to public land somewhere nearby and get in some timber and shoot some ducks. If this year is anything like last year, I’ll get my share.”

Minimalist Hearns an ‘old school’ duck hunter

Timmy Hearns of Greenwood goes simple when it comes to duck hunting. Hunt where the ducks are. If they move, you move.
Timmy Hearns of Greenwood goes simple when it comes to duck hunting. Hunt where the ducks are. If they move, you move.

Timmy Hearns of Greenwood, a son of the Delta, is an old-school duck hunter, one who carries a single call, totes one sack of 12 assorted plastic decoys, only wears hip waders, takes a canteen of water, and perhaps a PB&J sandwich.

His dog Troy — pronounced T-Roy — usually lopes along beside him.

No ATV. No pirogue. It’s just a man and his dog.

“He’d likely be carrying one already opened box of shells, too,” said his friend, Johnny Thames of Jackson. “Truth is, he only needs six, and I’ve seen him limit with four.”

In an age of technology and gadgetry, Hearns is a relic, a hunter who eschews fancy clothes, waders and “gizmo decoys” and is never burdened by a half-dozen calls hanging around his neck on a lanyard filled with tags. He doesn’t even have a duck club or lease.

“It’s pretty simple really; I believe that to be a good duck hunter, the way I like to hunt, you have to be mobile,” Hearns said. “If I’m not in the right place where the ducks want to be, or they are stubborn about coming where I want them to be, then I can pick up and move in a matter of seconds. It’s how I like to hunt, and me and old Troy, we do okay.”

Okay?

In the 2017-18 season, Hearns claimed 26 limits in 50 days hunting, got at least a limit of mallards another 20 times and was never skunked.

In January, he hunted every day he could and said he limited every day.

“Best season ever, and January was the best month I’ve ever had,” he said. “We were overloaded with ducks in the Delta, even on public lands, but I’m not saying it was easy. I had to work at it. I covered a lot of land almost every day. I love it so I can do it, but it’s not the kind of hunting anybody else wants to do. My man Johnny there, he’s about the only one I ever let go with me, and he’s only good for a day or two.…”

Said Thames, a 34-year-old, pencil-thin, unmarried farm hand, “He’s right; I can’t keep up, and I’m a triathlete.

“He lives like he duck hunts, minimally,” Thames said. “He has no cell phone, doesn’t want one and has never owned a computer. Don’t ask him for duck pictures. He doesn’t have a camera, either.

“He has girlfriends, from time to time, but never in the winter. He lives rent-free on one of the farms he works, in a two-room apartment built into a barn.…”

Hearns interrupted: “Hey, one of them is a full bathroom; I’m not totally Neanderthal.”

His is the perfect lifestyle for an old-school duck hunter, even one with an agriculture-related degree from Delta State University. As a farmer, Hearns has the winter off from work, and he can concentrate on duck hunting. His living expenses are minute, so he doesn’t need an offseason job in the winter. Because he’s in the farming network, he’s made a lot of friends with farmers who own a lot of Delta land, and since he’s quick to help when needed, he gets a lot of invitations on land nobody else hunts.

“I hunt about 50/50 on private and public lands, but last year, I did most of it on public lands like Sunflower WMA and Yazoo (National Wildlife Refuge),” Hearns said. “I like to hunt timber, and the WMAs and refuges have the best.

“As often as I was going, I still had to be mobile. Ducks only have to move about 100 yards to be where you can’t shoot them, and they will move on you. The key is being able to move quickly, and then go where the ducks are. People think that if you move on ducks during a hunt, they will jump and fly away and not come back. That ain’t so. There’s a reason ducks want to be where they are and, when, they think it’s safe to go back, they will go back.”

Hearns gave an example from a hunt at Sunflower WMA last year.

“I found a hot spot on a slough and limited out three mornings in a row on greenheads, then on the fourth day, they started landing on the far end of the slough, about 300 yards away,” he said. “I gathered up my dozen decoys, and Troy and I walked over to the hole the ducks were using. Must have been 100 or 200 in there, and they all got up and flew away when Troy walked up. I was still 50 yards away, and it was a roar when they took off.

“I didn’t bother to throw out my decoys. I called ol’ Troy over and we huddled up at the base of this big tree and he looked at me and the decoys, like he was thinking, ‘Hey boss, you gonna get them fake birds out there or what?’ I told him, ‘We don’t need them, boy, they’ll be back.’ I was right. About 30 minutes later, those ducks started coming back. I shot two drakes out of the first group and two more out of the second, all greenheads. Took five minutes. We jumped up two wood ducks on the way out, and I had the limit. An added bonus from the ground I cover is learning where the little wood duck holes are so I can pick up what I need to fill a limit.”

About Bobby Cleveland 1343 Articles
Bobby Cleveland has covered sports in Mississippi for over 40 years. A native of Hattiesburg and graduate of the University of Southern Mississippi, Cleveland lives on Ross Barnett Reservoir near Jackson with his wife Pam.