SoDak Snows 2024
Spring time is finally here after the mild winter in the midwest, birds are showing up, warm weather is teasing us every other week, and we decided to head west to go chase some white birds. With it being relatively warm this winter, we talked to the guide and slightly adjusted out date to the middle of March instead of the end, with hopes that birds would be all over. But, you can never truly trust mother nature, leading up to the hunt the temperature dropped into the 20s and 30s, but the week we were scheduled to go hunt it came back up to 40s and 50s. The drive was pretty uneventful, but once we got to the lodge we started throwing back the Busch lights, our guide got to be one a podcast with Midwest Flyways when they got done hunting for the day so we hung out with a couple of the other guides and got the skinny on how the hunting has been so far this year. Running a migrator spread can be tricky depending on weather and the amount of adult birds in the area, snow geese can be such a tease, flying just out of shooting range around the decoys, and then grabbing the wind and heading back up to basically outer space. It was a running joke all weekend that we are only allowed to point out birds that were within two miles, there are so many birds migrating this time of the year that you are always on the lookout, and even when the snow geese aren’t working, its always so cool to bird watch. The birds are all in full plume and you get to see a little of everything, mallards work into the spread like crazy, speckled bellies are always flying really low coming in to check the spread, Canadian geese giving it a look, it is just so enjoyable just to see the birds in those kind of numbers, especially since where we are from in northwestern Wisconsin we don’t get to see all the different varieties.
The first day of hunting was the best day we had, but we had to shake the rust off and figure out how to shoot birds again. We ended up killing 27 birds, but we probably could have been closer to 40 if we rained out all the birds that came in. We had a lot of 4-10 bird volleys coming in, some of the shots were a little far, but they sit and hover over the pit and circle the decoys without dumping in any lower. Day two we ended up with 14, and it was a little bit slower. The wind was really picking up out of the north and the bird just weren’t moving like they were the day before. Day three we didn’t even see a snow goose, but that didn’t stop us from enjoying our time being out in the spread, bullshitting with the guys. Its not always about how many birds you kill over the weekend, but the memories you make while you are out there.
One thing I took away from my 2nd trip out to South Dakota hunting a migrator spread is a good day hunting snow geese is the 10-15 bird days, great days are 20-25, awesome days are 35-50. It isn’t all what you see the guys post on instagram, it isn’t always tornados of birds coming into the spread. I really can’t thank our guides Jake and Nate enough for always making the experience unforgettable, these two are straight killers, they truly care about making sure we have a good time, Nate is always honest about what the hunting is looking like when I talk to him, and Jake is always great about working with how many guys we have and if we want to adjust our date. They use the Pepper Slough Lodge during the snow goose season and it is awesome, nice area to hang out and drink, pool table, full kitchen to make whatever you want, and a great area to clean birds after the hunt. If you are thinking about going out for the spring conservation season, definitely hit up Jake Wightman at Wightman Outdoors! Thanks for reading guys!