Best Strategies for Late Season Duck Hunting: Why Access Matters

Justin Hunold

12/15/2023

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Duck season is in full swing, long gone are the easy unpressured days of Teal Season, Resident Goose or even opening morning. Just about every time you go duck hunting the birds you encounter will be educated. How can you adjust to duck hunting pressure? What are some tactics and strategies that can lead to some of the best duck hunting of the year? Let’s dive in, pun intended.

We are going to look at puddle ducks primarily, but these tactics and tips can cover a lot of situations when goose hunting or hunting big water for divers. Every animal needs Food, water, shelter and mating prospects. Ducks are no different.

Best Duck Hunting Gear Tips for Late Season:

Let’s face it as we creep into winter our gear selections need to change. Here are five gear tips to help you decoy more birds, shoot better, stay warm and have a more enjoyable hunt overall.

Best Waterfowl Gun Tip: Keep it Dry

This seems simple, don’t dunk your waterfowl shotgun in freezing water, duh right? That will help but that is not what we mean by keep it dry. So what do I mean by keeping your best duck hunting gun dry?

A long time ago I was sitting in a stick blind overlooking a spread on a particularly cold North Carolina Duck Season morning when a bunch of mallards came into our spread. And although I was using a premium waterfowl gun and the best steel shot available at the time all that gun did was click.

I cycled the action manually assuming that the steel shot shell had a bad primer or other malfunction just in time to swing on a greenhead and hear another click. In the end I pulled my gun apart on shore, and found that the firing pin was impeeded. That wet lube that had worked so well the rest of the year was hanging the mechanism as it got more viscous in the cold.

Now before the temps dip below 35 I take my duck guns apart and lube them with a dry gun lube like Otis Technologies Dry Lube or something similar.

Motion Duck Decoys: A Time and Place

I am an advocate of motion in a decoy spread. Plane and simple after watching tons of ducks and geese I’ve never seen a raft or flock sitting totally still at a time when birds should be awake and living. The question becomes how much motion and where and when to use it to your advantage.

Now, with that, there are a lot of times when a spinning wing decoy is not the right choice in late season. Once a completely deadly tactic, some shine has been taken off of these duck magnets over the past decade or so. They are still deadly, especially on fresh birds and when multiple spinners are used at differing heights. Don’t leave em at home, but be very judicious about matching the hatch so to speak. Does that spinner make the spread more realistic? Then maybe it is best to keep it in its case.

Late duck season is a time when jerk rigs, quiver decoys, pulsators, and swimmers can really shine. These on-water in-the-spread options really help add to the realism of that fake brood seems to come alive.

If I had to to bring a blind bag, gun, and less than a dozen decoys like I do in my kayak from time to time a jerk rig makes the cut every time. Especially in the later season months.

Speaking of smaller spreads….

Duck Decoys: Adjusting Spread Size for the Conditions

When I was a younger man you’d find me in a local watering hole the night before Thanksgiving, me and everyone else who was back in town for the holiday. Most of the time this was the move to see if any of us could find a date for Christmas Parties during the later college breaks and spend some one-on-one time. Ducks are no different.

As duck season creeps toward the holidays and beyond, those huge flocks that were mingling around Thanksgiving will be breaking down. The ducks will be more concentrated with breeding pairs emerging consistently. Also, a smaller raft of puddlers is just more likely to be seen kicking around local waters with hunting pressure. Your spreads should match this philosophy.

The other duck decoy tip is to add something to help define it visually. When hunting in the Northeast two Black Duck decoys would always be on the “outside” of my spread. These big dark decoys still looked realistic but would also help draw the eye of some passers-by…in the sky.

The Best Duck Hunting Waders: Staying Warm When the Cold Weather Sets In.

Gone are the days of being freezing cold in cheap neoprene waders that would leak at the most inopportune times. With advancements in materials, electronics, designs and rising hunting budgets hunters are now spending their days in a duck blind warm and dry.

The best duck hunting waders on the market can range in price from a few hundred dollars all the way up to one thousand plus depending on brand and size. With that in mind these waders are generally built to be warm, dry, comfortable, feature-rich, and most of all durable. So start with a budget in mind and go from there.

When I am looking for the best duck hunting waders, I like a boot foot, breathable, camo or brown set. I like a front pocket, shell holders, and a built-in hand warmer or kangaroo-style pocket like a hoodie. I don’t like wearing gloves when calling so this pocket gets a hand warmer or two stuffed in it and I can keep my hands relatively warm. My cell phone, headlamp, earplugs, sunglasses, and a few other things live in the additional internal pocket. With my Boss shells tucked into the shell holder, I stay warm and efficient. What's nice is when I grab my waders I know in a pinch I really don’t “need” anything else to hunt other than my gun and paperwork.

You don’t need to spend a grand on waders but you also should forgo the old neoprene, cheap plastic, and uncomfortable rubber waders and invest in a good pair of breathable waders. Remember a comfortable hunter is a better hunter.

Shotgun Shells for Duck Hunting: Steel Shot and Other Alternatives

The only thing that kills ducks are the pellets coming down range. Duck hunters have never had more options than today. Years ago we had to make the switch to nontoxic loads and with today's technology there is no reason to long for the days of lead. Let’s break down what to look for in a late-season load.

If you’re shooting steel shot do your best to size up maybe two shot sizes and see if you can get a shell that delivers its load on the fast side. If you can find a #2 steel shot going 1500 fps, there isn’t a duck in any flyway that won’t succumb to that combo.

Moving up in size and speed has two reasons. Number one the ducks are a bit thicker for winter, be it fat or feathers a bit more momentum won’t hurt. Number two the air is much denser when it’s cold so a shot string that is going 1500 fps in optimum conditions will be going a good bit slow in old dense air. This means switching from 1250 fps to 1500 can mean the difference between a dead duck and a story of the one that got away.

Denser than steel alternatives like Bismuth or Tungsten just kill better. Steel Shot has a place in Duck hunting but after a lot of experience with all of these materials, I have settled on a Tungsten shell of some sort. I have fewer cripples, fewer guesses on whether I hit the bird, and fewer shells used in a day. I can also use a bit smaller shot size which can lead to a denser pattern overall. I suggest looking into this route.

What Do Ducks Need in Late Season

When we mentioned the things animals need earlier we mentioned a few things that are key to late-season success when duck hunting—food and Cover or Security. The funny thing is that come this time of year these are both at a premium and ducks know it. Let’s base some strategies on both.

Food

Puddle Ducks eat a variety of foods, but during the late season gone are aquatic insects and easy-picking veggies like Smart Weed, Pond Grass, and Wild Rice. They will have to concentrate in areas that harbor food. This is what makes access to farm fields so deadly in the late season. Barley, Millet, Corn, and other agriculture is the best meal these ducks can get when it comes to late season fuel. When possible a bit of water in or around these food sources is absolutely dynamite.

Cover/Security

When we are looking at cover or security for ducks in the late season finding any open water is key. Ducks cannot swim on ice, and being as other creatures can walk on the solidified water it’s not that safe for them. With that in mind that secondary creek or back bay that you crushed Wood Ducks on is not a likely go-to during late season.

Look for moving water, like creeks and rivers that have ice on the edges but stay open in the middle. Also, look at areas that are open on standing water and set decoys in and around that water. Ducks view open water as their best safety option, which can be the key to your late-season success.

But in the end how many of these duck magnets exist on public lands and water that so many of us frequent? Beyond that, how many of these magnets don’t have hunters posting on them daily, increasing and concentrating pressure on the birds?

You may be googling private hunting land near me, hunting property for lease, and hunting land for lease by owner, and I promise you this is not the way to find a Duck Haven. If you’re anything like me, time is the issue. Do you have time to, door knock, look for a hunting lease, scout that lease, or invest time and money to maintain the relationship once you find your secret location?

Using Infinite Outdoors, you can unlock prime waterfowl hunting, which has what ducks need in the late season. For the days you have available to hunt you will have an unpressured, hunting-centered, exclusive piece of private hunting land. You can plan those late-season trips knowing you have a leg up on the competition. Access.

At the end of the day, a lot of the movement for late-season ducks will focus on going from open water to food. If you were trying to concentrate on that pattern on public land you’d be fighting off other hunters and not concentrating on the things that put ducks on the strap. With a little online research and a small investment, you can take what could be your only few days fighting public land conditions and pressure and turn them into those dream hunts you think of the whole year.

Access is key when ducks are concentrated in the late season, and to get access to your next dream duck hunt, check out Infinite Outdoors Waterfowl Properties here.