Duck harvest numbers up on Atchafalaya Delta WMA

Michael Broussard spent several of his days off on the Atchafalaya Delta Wildlife Management looking for just the right spot where he and a few friends might harvest some ducks on the opening day of the coastal zone duck season last Saturday.
During the interim, some lilies moved into his blind’s location.
Knowing the situation, Broussard took a gamble that they would move out by the opener.
Unfortunately they didn’t.
Broussard said, “My decoys were amongst a lot of lilies and didn’t stand out as much as I’d have liked them to. There were a lot of birds flying around right at daylight. We managed to kill just one mallard and a few teal, so we called the hunt around 10 a.m. that morning. We started cutting brush to build a new blind about 40 yards out from the old one and got away from the vegetation, so the decoys would standout more. We should have done better Saturday, but after our adjustment, it proved to be a good move for Sunday. We got our limits of teal.”
According to the Hunter Participation and Harvest Summary from the state’s four coastal Wildlife Management Areas, hunters bagged a whopping 4.1 birds per hunter — up from 2.1 birds last year. Out of 644 actual hunters checked, Atchafalaya Delta Wildlife Management Area hunters averaged 4.2 ducks per hunter.
Point aux Chenes Wildlife Management Area near Houma had similar numbers to the delta, where hunters also averaged 4.2 birds from 499 actual bag checks.
Nicholls State student Ty Barbier and a couple of his friends hunted the WMA.
“We hunted the Montegut Unit in Point aux Chenes,” Barbier said. “It was the best opener I’ve experienced in years. We killed mostly teals. We shot some redheads and a canvasback and got our limits. I hope this reflects how the season will turn out.”
To the west and just south of Jennings, David Smith, owner/operator of David Smith Hunting, normally experiences spectacular opening days. This year the outfitter says his numbers fell well short to nearly poor.
“This year opening day was way down compared to years past,” Smith said. “It was one of our poorest openers in years. We did better Sunday, but we heard reports from around the area where hunters were shooting three, four, five or maybe six birds is all. But, up until Sunday when the front came through, we haven’t had much water; in fact, we’ve been in drought conditions. Rice farmers usually plow in the spring, but a lot of them, including the one who owns the farm I hunt, did their plowing in the fall. With the rain we had, I look for things to improve. And with this cold weather we’ve been having, we should have some birds coming down, which will help out.”
From the Welsh Area, just north of I-10, Rick Moore, owner operator of Rick Moore Farms, said the blinds he hunts did well. The five blinds Moore hunted opening day hunters killed 86 ducks and two speckle belly geese or roughly just over 17 birds per blind. On Sunday, the numbers declined slightly but still averaged over 13 ducks per blind.
By Monday, Moore says his blinds still were in the double digits for harvest numbers.
Also from Welsh, Heritage Hunting Services owner/operator Brent Sawyer said they were seeing lots of birds.
Sawyer said, “The first few days of the season we are seeing lots of geese south of Welsh, with a few venturing north of I-10. The duck action has been fast and hot early in the morning with big numbers of teal and good numbers of gadwalls and pintails and the occasional mallard or mottled duck.”
Lafayette resident Danny Womack, who hunts the Forked Island area south of the Intracoastal Waterway, laughingly said, “The long and short of it we did good. I set up the blind for my grandsons on our lease. We managed to get our limits of 18. And with the shooters I had, there had to be a good many ducks to do that!”
Perhaps the biggest disappointment heard from opening weekend was the lack of big ducks. Green-winged teal made up 43 percent of the bag numbers checked on both the Atchafalaya Delta and Point aux Chenes Wildlife management areas. Blue-winged teal made up 25 percent and 17 percent, respectively, on these two WMAs.
Gadwalls averaged 7 and 8 percent. Mallards were 3 and 1 percent. Pintails were 1 and less than 1 percent.
Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Waterfowl Study Leader Larry Reynolds said his office wasn’t without complaints. There were many calls and emails Monday from frustrated hunters discouraged with the high preseason population estimates, but the lack of big ducks.
But, Reynolds summed it up in one sentence, “After the disappointment of last year, it was great to hear so many excellent hunting reports from opening weekend in the coastal zone.”
Those looking to book a hunt with Heritage Hunting Services can contact Brent Sawyer at 318-306-1532 or visit www.facebook.com/HeritageHuntingServices.
Those interested in booking a hunt with Rick Moore can reach Moore at 337-540-5211 or visit his Facebook page at www.facebook.com/Moore-Farms-Hunting.
And for those looking to book a hunt with David Smith Hunting, they can reach Smith at 337-305-1956.
If you wish to make a comment or have a story, anecdote or recipe you wish to share, you can contact John K. Flores at 985-395-5586 or gowiththeflo@cox.net or visit his website at www.gowiththeflooutdoors.com.