Late Season Goose hunting 2-14-09

For the past two years Indiana has opened a hunting season for resident goose populations in February. The season is to control a population of geese that the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) introduced into Indiana several years ago. These geese do not migrate like the original native populations do but stay here year around and are becoming a real nuisance. Last year Blake, Skyler, and I were very successful in getting several geese on the opening day of the season. The daily bag limit is five per person and we limited out.


This year Blake and Skyler went on opening day and both got one goose. We have hunted several times since and have watched hundreds of geese fly by, but have not had any within range. Saturday we went to a spot on a farm not too far from our place where a low spot in a field flooded with all of the rain and snow melt creating two samll ponds. It was a perfect setting, there were even a couple of flocks of geese on the little temporary ponds when we got there. Since there was a really steep hill leading down to where the ponds were and we didn't want to get stuck, we hauled all of our decoys and gear down to the ponds, set up and waited for the geese to return. The morning started out with great promise. Pairs, singles and small groups circled but kept going. One small flock did come within range and we got one. As the morning wore on the wind began to pick up and we began to feel the chill of a non productive hunt. Our resolve began to yield to our desire to get some warmth in our finger and to the cell phone reminders that we had other demands on our time.

We gathered our decoys and gear, trudged up the hill to find that the cold had been replaced with overheating and to watch a nice pair of geese land right in front of where we had been 10 minutes earlier. Ah the joys of hunting.