| Kentucky Lake and Lake Barkley Outdoor Guide- Fishing, Hunting and everything outdoors...... | |
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| Kentucky Lake and Lake Barkley Outdoor Guide- Fishing, Hunting and everything outdoors...... | |
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Home Sporting Goods, Bait and Tackle Hunting Stories and Information Fishing
Stories
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Overall the opening weekend hunt in the Kentucky Lake area and throughout west Tennessee was fair with some units scoring better than others. Generally speaking, it was better than most hunters had anticipated after the long stretch of warm weather leading up to the opener. I had a pretty good opening day bagging a few mallards and rounding out the bag with some gadwalls, widgeons, and greenwing teal. I hunted open water and the gale winds were almost too much for the ducks and the hunters. However, I saw more ducks than anticipated and we had decent shooting. Several of the WMAs reported action with Camden bottoms and portions of West Sandy faring well on species such as gadwalls, greenwing teal, mallards, wood ducks, and some divers. “The top spot was Camden bottoms as several blinds there bagged limits of mallards and other species,” said TWRA’s Ronnie Cole, manager for several local Wildlife Management Areas. “ They had a good corn crop in there this year so that was likely a factor.” Some blinds in West Sandy (Springville bottoms) had a lot of shooting on wood ducks and ringnecks but mallards were somewhat scarce as to the overall numbers. Big Sandy had only fair shooting for a few blinds while Gin Creek was slow. On Lake Barkley Dover Bottoms had fair shooting the first day with most of the hunters taking wood ducks and gadwalls. The second day (Sunday) was much slower for most areas as it was a drastic change from the day before with no wind to stimulate movement. Further west the Obion Bottoms had pretty good hunting as recent rains have inundated swamps and corn or soybean fields on many farms and duck numbers were ahead of last year at this time. Hunting was pretty good in several western areas on the first day with more mallards to the west due to the abundance of flooded crops and timber. Although duck hunters love wind, we had too much on Saturday as 30 MPH plus gusts were recorded and it made it difficult for ducks to work many open water decoy spreads. Most of us are hoping for cooler weather both here and to the north to stimulate some movement for the second segment. Duck numbers are fair now but need a boost from a good cold front. With the second segment of duck season opening Saturday and running through January 30, 2005, waterfowlers have a big window of opportunity left to catch some good weather and improved hunting. Yet local hunters were hoping the 5-day closure after last weekend’s opener would let ducks rest, rest, and return to popular hunting areas. While that may happen to some degree, the weatherman has been stubborn to predict any significant cold weather in the forecast. It appears another mild weekend will greet duck hunters as temperatures are expected to be in the mid to upper 50’s. The area, and the entire section of southern states for that matter, needs a strong north wind pushing some spitting snow our way to stimulate a migration. Until that happens, local hunters could see tough sledding as not many new ducks have entered the area and those here will get a quick education once gunning pressure returns. On a final note, seven hunters were both unlucky and lucky at New Johnsonville Saturday. Their boat capsized (seven hunters were in one boat!) according to TWRA but all survived. Some were rescued by a barge and others made it to shallow shorelines or islands nearby. Winds were very high that day and the overloaded boat no doubt contributed to the mishap. It’s a miracle there weren’t fatalities from either drowning or hypothermia. Meanwhile the most recent waterfowl count available from area refuges is below: Cross Creek National Wildlife Refuge took a ground count there on Monday, November 22. Numbers of ducks were similar to the week before with 9,866 using the refuge. The bulk of the count was comprised of mallards (5,100) and gadwalls (1,900). Numbers of geese were up 30 percent from the week before there. There were 2,087 Canada geese on the refuge this week. Tennessee National Wildlife Refuge is expected to make aerial or ground counts this week as no recent report has been received since back on November 5! Steve McCadams is a professional hunting and fishing guide here in the Paris Landing area. He has also contributed many outdoor oriented articles to various national publications. |
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