Utah waterfowl season should be just ducky

Ducks should stay in Utah longer this season, and that should mean better hunting for the state's waterfowl hunters. Utah's 107-day waterfowl hunting season kicks off Saturday.

"The number of ducks coming through Utah this fall should be pretty similar to last season, but there's some good news for those hunting marshes along the eastern shore of the Great Salt Lake," said Tom Aldrich, migratory game bird coordinator for the Division of Wildlife Resources.

The wet winter and spring have raised the level of the Great Salt Lake by more than a foot. That increase has created thousands of additional surface acres of water for ducks to rest on when they leave the marshes to escape the hunting pressure.

"As soon as the hunt starts, the ducks start looking for a place to escape the hunting pressure and rest, and the Great Salt Lake is the best rest area we have," Aldrich said. "The birds rest on the lake for a while, and then they make flights back into the marshes to feed. When the weather gets rough, the birds also come into the marshes looking for a place to ride out the storm.

"With all of the space that's available on the lake right now, the birds have plenty of room to rest, and that should keep more birds in Utah longer into the season. Because more birds will be around for a longer period of time, hunters should enjoy a better hunt this season."

In addition to the news about the lake, two other changes await hunters this season:

• For the first time in four years, the pintail duck season will be longer than 61 days. This year, pintails may be taken during the entire 107-day season.

"Pintail numbers are still way below their 50-year average, but a wet spring on the southern Alberta prairies helped the birds bounce back this year," Aldrich said. "Hopefully that trend will continue."

Hunters are still limited to one pintail a day.

• Canada goose hunters can hunt geese into late January this season, and that change should result in some of the best goose hunting seen in Utah in years.

Utah's 107-day goose season is split into two parts. The first part runs from Oct. 1 to Dec. 1. The season will then close, but it will reopen Dec. 17 and run until Jan. 29.

"As soon as the shooting starts in October, many of the Canada geese in Utah head for urban areas where they spend most of the season and where they can't be hunted," Aldrich said. "In January, the geese start moving back to the marshes in preparation for the breeding season."

Data the DWR has collected from four different harvest surveys across the state shows the number of Canada geese taken by hunters starts to climb in early January.

"Even more geese will leave the urban areas later in January, and we think hunting will get better and better as the month progresses," Aldrich said. "Canada goose hunters should enjoy some great hunting this season, and I think they'll take more geese."

And it's not only Wasatch Front hunters who should benefit from the change.

"Geese across the state become more active in January," Aldrich said. "I think this change will benefit hunters across Utah and that goose hunters across the state will enjoy some great goose hunting this season."