Hunting

10 Tips for Bagging Late Season Snow Geese

Now that duck season is officially over, many of us will drag out our snow goose decoys and electronic callers to pursue the snow geese as they are getting ready to migrate back north for the summer.  Many people will find that this is much easier said than done.  I will give you some tips and tactics to help you kill as many snows as possible this conservation season.

  1. Know your area. Are you going to be hunting the feed or are you running traffic?  If you don’t have permission to hunt the field that the birds are actively feeding in, try and get in the flight line from the roost and run traffic on the birds passing overhead.  If you are hunting the feed, try and locate the X.  Snow geese are aggressive feeders and can clean out a field in no time.
  2. Get Hid. The most conventional way to hide from snows is in layout blinds.  They are compact and have a low profile that will keep you hidden from the birds.  However, your shooting is very limited and your mobility and line of sight are hindered greatly.  I have ditched all of my layout blinds for the new A Frame blind from Avian X.  It is a very lightweight and portable blind.  You can sit and shoot much more comfortably with far better results than shooting off of your back.  Try and use cover from the local area, but not from the immediate area you are hunting.  http://www.avian-x.com/blinds-accessories/a-frame-waterfowl-blind.html
  3. The old school logic of needing a thousand decoys to kill snows has come and gone.  Sure, more decoys can help you.  BUT, it is not a necessity to have that many.  I personally use around 60 Avian X fullbody snows/blues and about 400 Silo Socks.  This is a fairly inexpensive spread as far as snow goose set-ups typically run.  I will try and create an aggressive feed in my spread with more birds in the upwind side and small groups feeding off to each side with a slight V in front of our blinds.
  4. Snow geese are suckers for motion decoys.  My favorites are Reel Wings and the 360 Air Wings.  The reel wings fly in the air and the 360’s are mounted on small fiberglass poles.  Both of these will add a great deal of motion and realism to your spread and are fairly inexpensive.  I try and run at least 6 of each with most of them close to my V or kill circle. http://snowgoosewarehouse.com/
  5. This is what separates guys that kill 20 and guys that kill 100.  Everyone should shoot THEIR lane.  Don’t try and overshoot to get at the lowest birds.  Resist the urge to shoot at the closest bird and shoot at the ones in the middle of the flock to leave those super close birds for your 3rd, 4th and 5th shots.  Pick out a single bird, then go to the next.
  6. Don’t be Greedy. We all want that super vortex of 500 birds grinding down on us from the heavens and it is indeed a magical moment.  However this is not the norm, if you get 6-10 down in the blocks, you had better go ahead and kill um.  Greed will cost you a lot of birds at the end of the day when in reality you will shoot much better when there aren’t 1,000 barking and grinding overhead.

    Photo By Boone Barton

  7. E Caller. The E Caller is an awesome tool to lure the geese even closer to you and adding that 3rd dimension to your spread.  However, more and more people are running them, so experiment and see what birds like and respond to on a given day.  It is not a cure all for a bad hide or poor location.
  8. Guns/Loads. The days of a 10 gauge with a 30” barrel used to shoot geese have come and gone.  I personally shoot a 12 gauge with 3” shells and BB’s as my shot size of choice.  I use an extended range patternmaster choke tube and have had very little issues with my set up.  We can take out our plugs for the conservation season and that gives me 5 shots.  My good friend Boone Barton uses a 10 round magazine extension called “the snow plow” that gives him the ability to throw a steel curtain into the air and that gives him that many more chances to kill snows.   Every hunter should bring a minimum of 6 boxes of shells each.  You don’t want to be out there and run out of shells when the geese are still flying.  Shells are by far the cheapest part of the equation, and I have never killed a goose I didn’t shoot at.
  9. Little Things. Just like the song by Bush “Little Things Kill” keep your eye out for little things.  When your blind is surrounded by red hulls, pick um up.  When you park your trucks or side by side, park a minimum of ¼ mile away with ½ mile being preferable.  When the birds are finishing slightly to one side, move that extra 30 yards to finish them in your grill.  Don’t let a few little things add up to be one big thing that costs you dead snow geese.
  10. Hire a guide. Snow goose equipment is very expensive and there are a lot of people that don’t want to spend the money to hunt snows a few days a year.  Hiring a guide will put the odds in your favor to kill more birds and not have the investment of a large snow goose spread.  Most of these guides have all the gear, knowledge and land to consistently put you on birds.  Please do your research and hire a guide that has a good reputation and clients to back it up.

Snow goose hunting is a great way to extend your waterfowl season.  If you have never been, I highly encourage you to try it.  It is much different than duck hunting or even hunting lesser Canada’s or Specks.  It can be a lot of work, but can also be some of the most fun you can have with your waders on.

Shane Smith

TFG Editorial

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