Unguided Missouri Private Land Goose Hunting
An Unguided Missouri Goose Hunting Account
This past December I scouted and located a small farm pond out of sight from the road. The pond had cover on three sides with cattle pasture outsides the levee. Since we jumped a couple of ducks and found a dead goose on the pond (we assumed it was wounded and died there), my younger brother and I decided we were going to duck and goose hunt the pond. We put one dozen full body goose decoys on the land and about eight goose floaters in the water. We arrived one half hour before shooting time and there was about thirty honkers roosted on the pond. After setting up we waited for the sun to rise over the hill hoping for the geese to come back. The geese never came back, but we ended up having three flocks of ducks work us. Surprisingly, the birds were not call shy, so we had some good action. We ended up with four green heads and two divers. I am proud to say as of today, my brother and I have yet to shoot a hen mallard this year and we have had many opportunities.
Many of my old spots close to home have not been producing this year, so I decided to scout some new areas with lakes and crop stubble near by. I located a lake with crop next to it and loaded my mother's blazer with a dozen full-bodies, a dozen goose floaters, mallard decoys and laydown blinds. As I arrived to set up my decoys the night before, I noticed numerous large groups of Canada's flying over the lake looking for a place to go. The three of us had the decoys set up in about a half hour. We decided to not use laydown blinds because the edge of the lake had a nice patch of rippy grass to hide in. The next morning we woke up at 5 AM to get there just prior to shooting time. As we arrived to our small spread we noticed heads bobbing up and down around the decoys. It was a flock that had landed in the decoys before shooting time. The action started off fast in the morning with groups of singles, doubles and triples working our decoys in close range. We blew a couple golden opportunities, but it turned out great in the end. It took until noon to get our last bird and headed home telling "what we should have done stories" all the way. It was a long drive to the farm, but it was something that needed to be done in order to be where the geese were.
JJ
Mid-America Hunting Association's single greatest advantage to goose hunting in Missouri and that of Kansas are its thousands of acres in crop stubble along the local flyways of the Missouri River, surrounding larger well know waterfowl areas of north central Missouri around Swan Lake, Norwest Missouri between Bob Brown and Squaw Creek waterfowl refuge and south of Kansas City along the Neosho and La Cygne on the Kansas side of the state line extending east to Urich, Settles Ford and the South Grand River region of the osage Watershed.
This acreage covering different regions allows the goose hunter to preplan his hunt through finding the region (northwest, north central or south west central Missouri) where the geese currently are working. Sources for that information come from the Missouri Department of Conservation web site updates plus that known by the Association. Hunters can then travel to that region with greater confidence of getting on geese. Getting on geese in that region starts with scouting where the geese are working, move to a nearby field and setup a spread.
This one aspect alone, of being able to go where the geese currently are during any portion of the season rather than just pick a spot and hope they show, accounts for more season wide goose hunting success than any other factor. This advantage of having access to a large amount of private hunting land acreage and allowing the unguided hunter to make his own hunt is possible through Mid-America Hunting Association.
While we emphasize Missouri goose hunting on this page our eastern Kansas lands, both northeast and southeast kansas have good goose hunts. Our Missouri acreage has the same and very often better waterfowl hunts for ducks and goose simply due to more standing water structure both natural and manmade on our private wetlands as well as other.
Missouri Sub-Basins
South-west-central Missouri goose hunting extends west into Kansas. On the Missouri side most goose hunts are on crop fields extending into adjoining water. The further west traveled into Kansas the hunt conditions charge to filed only setups.
Missouri's northwest watershed in the Missouri River Valley proper is characterized by large flat crop lands broken by rivers, tributaries, cannel and flooded fields. heavily used for both duck and goose hunters during the regular through spring seasons.
North central Missouri covered by the Grand River Sub-Basin is a region dominated by marshlands rather than the flooded fields of northwest Missouri and the sloughs and timber of the Osage region.
All three regions are well known goose hunt locations variable by the effects of weather and migration.
