Outdoors Online Licensing

By Doug Leier
With the possible exception of a first driver’s license, few people spin a nostalgic tale about buying a license “back in the day.”
In fact, I struggle trying to come up with any story associated renewal of my North Dakota driver’s license. Same goes for my fishing license, except perhaps buying a trout stamp [...]

Slip Bobbers for Crappies

The Deadly Drag
Dumbing-down to a crawl dupes springtime crappies for panfish pros
By Brian “Bro” Brosdahl with Tom Neustrom
“Slow and steady wins the race.” I’m a disciple of the philosophy. In real life, the examples are countless. Consider the marathoner. The guy who paces himself for 26.2 miles is sure to pass the jackrabbit before reaching [...]

Catch and Release Fishing

‘Swimming Pools’ for Fish
A Little Advice on Caring for Your Catch
By Tony Roach
Have you ever caught the same fish twice in a single day? How about the same fish two or three times inside a week? I’ll bet many of you have. Even on a massive fish factory like Mille Lacs in Central Minnesota, [...]

Homemade Musky Baits

By Nick Simonson
Muskie anglers love to throw the biggest, flashiest baits. But in these days of dwindling discretionary income, spinners with oversized blades, magnum flashabou skirts and price tags to match are becoming cost-prohibitive. However, you can produce a bait at home for half as much as you’d pay for popular store models [...]

Sculpins

For the Presidents’ Day weekend, I had planned out a solid day of fishing on a lake near my mother-in-law’s house where I knew the fish would bite all day. A couple hours at sunrise put me on some good-sized, fast-biting bluegills with the occasional crappie mixed in. The agenda was to meet [...]

Low Impact Ice Fishing

By Doug Leier
The “Dog Days” of winter for some begin in December and aren’t officially over until the last drift of snow disappears from the shelterbelt.
I know, Dog Days is generally a summer term referring to a lingering hot and humid period in August, but it also seems appropriate for a long stretch of midwinter [...]

Fish House Spotters

By Nick Simonson
Shantytowns are generally a bad sign. Economic downturns, natural disasters and tribal wars all come to mind when such a place is shown on the evening news. However, in the ice belt and points north, it is the sign of something good – a hot bite on frozen waters. While [...]

Walleyes on Soft Plastics

Walleyes Come as No Fluke
By Brian “Bro” Brosdahl with Mark Courts
Admittedly, I’m a meat and potatoes sort of guy. I’m eyeing the porterhouse steak on the menu long before the canary food, organic “meals under 500 calories”. In fact, I’ll take the whole right side of the menu, please. This instinctive weakness for hearty meat [...]

The Glo Bug Fly

By Nick Simonson
Last week, as I braced myself against the wind and made my way up the walk in the glow of the front porch light, I saw through the blowing snow that first sign of spring. It wasn’t a robin, hiding its head under its wing in the late January cold. It [...]

ND Predator Hunting & Trapping

By Doug Leier
In the early 1980s trapping fox, coyotes, badgers, muskrat and a bonus mink did more than just pay for gas. Fur prices were strong and fox outnumbered coyotes to the point where a coyote pelt brought a nice reward, and the intense hunting and trapping effort helped keep numbers in check as well.
My [...]

Building Fish Habitat

By Doug Leier
More than 40 years ago the North Dakota Game and Fish Department, in an effort to create structure for fish and create artificial habitat within Heart Butte Dam (Lake Tschida) in Grant County, sunk some old car bodies into the reservoir.
As you might expect, the practice of using car bodies for building fish [...]

Life List Lunkers

By Nick Simonson
There are hundreds of days booked in my fishing logs and countless others banked in my memories. From watching a field of tip-up flags pop for northern pike on a chilly winter morning to a steamy July evening spent fishing an inexhaustible school of white bass, it is tough to keep track [...]

Wetlands Key to Spring Flood

By Nick Simonson
Reports this month have many people across the region looking out their front windows with worry. In the wake of back-to-back blizzards, the National Weather Service (NWS) released its early-season forecast for this spring’s flood potential for the upper Midwest. Some form of flooding is expected when the snow pack melts, [...]

Give New Memories a Chance

By Doug Leier
Most hunters and anglers remember their first deer, goose or big fish, but it’s the little things that happen in pursuit of game and fish that also help keep people interested in the long term.
Think about it. I’d bet most readers would have a favorite story to share about getting stuck on the [...]

Make Custom Crappie Jigs

Our Outdoors – By Nick Simonson
As winter blankets, and blankets, and blankets the region with snow, it is becoming more apparent that it will be a long season indeed. That’s not a bad thing if you need some time to get your tacklebox ready for one of open water’s early quarries – prespawn slab [...]

Keep the Ice Clean

By Doug Leier
One of my biggest outdoors pet peeves is trash. Empty cans along the river bank or discarded chip bags floating near the dock, even if it’s just one, seem to steal away the peaceful serenity that draws most of us outdoors.
Maybe to a fault, I carry extra trash bags along to make sure I [...]

Trickle Down Techonomics

Our Outdoors – By Nick Simonson
A post on the ice fishing forum of a website that I help moderate asked: “I paid $300 for an old sled shack and a Vexilar, did I get a good deal?”
My response was as it usually is for these kinds of questions, “You’ll wonder how you ever fished without [...]

Open Water Tactics in a Hardwater World

By Jason Mitchell
I have often felt that it is much easier to learn a lake during the open water period. Structure and bottom contours can be broke down quickly when using a boat equipped with good sonar and GPS. Often during the winter (just like during the open water period) the sweet spots that attract [...]

Here’s to 2010

By Doug Leier
The driving theme for the past year outdoors is weather. In fact, any time we’re discussing fishing, hunting and outdoor recreation it’s a safe bet that weather is like flour in a recipe – one of the main ingredients.
I’m sure few would argue if I said that weather is a dominating variable every [...]

Fly Tying for the WinterTime

Our Outdoors – By Nick Simonson
From Bismarck to Brainerd to Balaton, the region has been blasted with the most epic blizzard since those doubled-barreled every-other-weekend storms from the winter of 1996-97. My wife and I crawled along I-94 to visit my family just before the Gulf-fueled, moisture-laden monster dumped 16 inches of snow. [...]

How Cold Will This Winter Be?

By Doug Leier
I’ll precede my annual glance over the shoulder – one last look at the past year’s outdoor topics and issues – with a short holiday guide to the outdoors. What I offer are mid-winter outdoors opportunities, for the hunter, angler or even a parent looking for a vacation diversion or snowy excuse to [...]

Hottest Ice Fishing Gear of 2010

By Nick Simonson
The ice on most northern lakes is now thick enough for anglers to safely haul out their toys thanks to a cold stretch at the beginning of the month. Though nighttime temperatures have been below zero, new innovations and advancements in tackle, gear and shelters are helping anglers heat up the early-ice [...]

Challenges of Stocking Fish

By Doug Leier
Since the late 1990s a number of North Dakota lakes have lost their fisheries because of declining water levels. Now, after near-record snows last winter and abundant rain this summer and fall, many of them are “topped off” again and have the potential to support fish.
This is part of the natural cycle of [...]

Cold Weather Pheasants

By Nick Simonson
It’s a cold day with clear blue skies following the winter’s first blizzard, which left six inches of snow as an early Christmas present. A group of buntings flits from the shoulder to the field edge as I turn my hard-starting pickup off of the highway. We rumble down the gravel [...]

Trolling on the Ice

“New Wave” Fish Finding Tactics on Ice
By Tony Roach
When you spend your winters guiding on a huge lake like Central Minnesota’s Mille Lacs, doing all the things it takes to find biting fish can test your resolve. There’s only one way to the fish – drilling lots and lots of holes. My guides and I [...]

Piggybacking Ice Spoons for Bull Bluegills

By Jason Durham
Bluegill fishing is about balance. Each trip is a constant trial and error to figure out if the fish want a tiny speck of an ice jig – the flash, vibration and, meaty profile of a jigging spoon, or any presentation that falls in between. Each presentation has its strengths and weaknesses so [...]

Late Season Pheasant Hunting

By Doug Leier
Growing up as a kid in the 1980s, across the prairie from Williston to LaMoure and Valley City, December was a time of transition in our house. After the close of regular deer rifle season, the collection of my Dad’s gear in the “ready” position shifted from primarily hunting, to a mix of [...]

Small Ice Fishing Jigs

By Nick Simonson
It’s the evening of the first day when the temperature has stayed well below freezing and I’m sitting in the not-quite-bright-enough light of the living room, squinting as hard as I can in an effort to thread a wisp of one-pound test through the eye of a 1/64 ounce Genz worm in preparation [...]

Ice Safety Tips

Mild Weather Hampers Ice Formation – Ice Safety Tips
While November was kind to North Dakota’s hunters, unseasonably mild temperatures did little to help usher in the ice fishing season. Knowing this, winter anglers are encouraged to use caution and allow ice to harden significantly before venturing on state waters.
North Dakota Game and Fish Department water [...]

Tracking Martens, Fishers, and Otters

By Doug Leier
The list of creatures and critters I’ve never witnessed in North Dakota is much longer than I’d prefer. While I’ve watched North Dakota prairie chickens, bighorn sheep and peregrine falcons, I’ve yet to see a whooping crane or a live sage grouse, among others.
But just because I’ve haven’t seen one doesn’t mean they [...]

The Fifty Pointer

As I joined the mad rush at 5 a.m. on Black Friday with my wife in the aisles of the Virginia, Minn. Target store, I caught the stare of one half-awake fellow in a camouflage hunting coat, pinned down between a cart full of pink baby clothes and a display of 42-inch plasma TVs. [...]

Thanksgiving Time

Over the years I’ve tried to make this column somewhat seasonal, writing about fishing in the spring and hunting in the fall, and following the latest conservation issues and outdoor topics.
Since this column will come out around Thanksgiving, that’s the theme for the week. I’m thankful and feel blessed with the opportunity to interact with [...]

I’m Thankful For the Outdoors

Our Outdoors: I’m Thankful
By Nick Simonson
I’m thankful for Gunnar,
And his powerful nose.
As he sniffs out the pheasants,
From harvested rows.
I’m thankful for trap shoots,
In June and July.
That cut down on fall misses,
So I don’t wonder why.
I’m thankful for crappies,
Dressed in black and green.
And bluegill and white bass,
And yellow perch in between.
I’m thankful for harvests,
That turn [...]

Deer Hunting Points

By Doug Leier
More than 30 years ago, when the North Dakota Game and Fish Department began managing deer in smaller units and issuing a specific number of buck or doe licenses – for example, 38,000 total licenses in 1980 – some “want to be” potential deer hunters actually had to stay home.
Fortunately, that is not [...]

The Bye Week

By Nick Simonson
My guess is whomever was in charge of setting up the 2009 NFL schedule was a deer hunter and a Minnesota Vikings fan. What other alignment of the stars could explain last week’s bye for the Favre n’ Harvin show falling precisely on the opening weekend of deer firearms season in the [...]

Artificial Ice Fishing Baits – Coming Alive

Clever ice anglers are successfully combining traditional live bait tactics with artificial approaches
By Jeff Gustafson
Times are a changin’. Used to be when we went ice fishing, our presentation always included a jig tipped with some type of minnow or hunk of meat, no matter what species of fish we were targeting. As the fishing tackle [...]

Spring Steelhead Fishing

By Nick Simonson
As my offering drifted around in the pool eddy, I hoped that my brother would see a fish caught – if not by me, then by another angler, or maybe himself – and he would experience the finned allure of the north shore of Lake Superior beyond the lichen-covered bluffs and pine-shaded streams [...]

Live Bait Rig Fishing

Walleye fishing icons Gary Roach and Doc Samson won’t be giving up live bait anytime soon
By Ted Pilgrim
Livebait is back, baby. You better believe it. Despite the buzz about plastics, the reality is, walleyes eat live bait. Period. In the end, all artificial lures lack two potent, inimitable ingredients: organic random movement and instinctive flight [...]

Deer Management

My guess is that most deer hunters don’t tire of the “Turdy Point Buck” tune on the radio until the backside of deer season. For a change, though, I’d sure enjoy listening to a refrain about hunting doe in North Dakota.
Then again, doe hunting doesn’t quite get the credit it deserves. In fact, when stories [...]

Taxidermy Tips

By Nick Simonson
At a near run, you step over the crest of the small hill to the other side that leads down to the oak bottom and wonder where the deer bounded after it left your sight. With the scent of gunpowder fading, you follow the sign in the brown leaves and dry grass [...]

Sportsmen Against Hunger

By Doug Leier
Good news for North Dakota deer hunters this year is that the Sportsmen Against Hunger venison donation program is back in full operation
Last year, the program only accepted deer donated by bowhunters, because of concerns over the possibility of lead particles from bullets remaining in processed venison.
In North Dakota, the program works like [...]

THE HUNT FOR AMERICA’S BEST TRUCK IS OVER

Silverado is America’s best truck for many reasons. To start, Silverado XFE offers an EPA estimated 21 MPG highway. No competitor has better fuel economy. Not Ford, not Toyota.1 And if you’re looking for the best 4X4 fuel economy, look no further- no competitor offers better available 4X4 fuel economy.2 Silverado comes with another powerful [...]

Not the Same Old Safety

By Nick Simonson
Year after year, the approach of the deer firearms opener causes something to stir in the souls of outdoorsmen. Tags are placed in secure spot, the final preparation of shooting lanes occurs in the woods and walking hunters map out their favorite draws, ravines and creekbottoms for opening day. With all [...]

Lightning Bugs – Pheasant Tail Nymphs

Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
Of all the game birds sportsmen pursue, none is more colorful than the ringneck pheasant. Which makes it a pretty odd fact that the most popular fly used by outdoorsmen is the generally drab looking pheasant tail nymph – or simply, the PTN. Of course, trout, bluegill and other fish don’t seem [...]

Thin To Win in the Blind

By Chris Hustad
It’s around 15 degrees, and my watch says 8 am on a late October morning in 1993. I have my head tucked under a staked-up snow goose shell, as I watch a flock of 8 snows coming at us 200 yards away. Luckily, there’s just enough wind this morning to keep [...]

Raising Nightcrawlers off the Bottom

‘Nightcrawler Secrets’ Revisited
By Ted Pilgrim with Tom Neustrom
“Never before have I asked you, or anyone, to keep an angling secret. I’m going to break this rule now and ask you point-blank NOT to pass on this information. It is much too deadly, it took many years to accumulate, and it’s worth too much to just [...]

Fall Trout Fishing Time

By Nick Simonson
With all the hunting opportunities around us, it’s tough to set the shotgun or the bow down for an evening and pick up the fishing rod. However, fall provides an excellent chance at some fast trout fishing, particularly in those deeper pits and ponds where agencies have stocked trout for put-and-take fishing.
If [...]

Learning Crawler Rigs and Roach Rigs on Walleyes

Please Pass the Meat…the Fresh Stuff
Walleye fishing icons Gary Roach and Doc Samson won’t be giving up live bait anytime soon
By Ted Pilgrim
Livebait is back, baby. You better believe it. Despite the buzz about plastics, the reality is, walleyes eat live bait. Period. In the end, all artificial lures lack two potent, inimitable ingredients: [...]

Go Green with Mallards

By Doug Leier
The next time you find yourself kicking cans in the shop, killing time at the gas station or coffee shop with the crew, I ask you to raise a question about favorite ducks.
No doubt the wood duck would garner a share of votes, and the pintail has subtle grace and definition–that pointed tail [...]

Double Down on Pheasants

By Nick Simonson
This year’s pheasant opener was unique in a number of ways. It was the first time I had opened the season somewhere other than North Dakota, with kickoff usually held at my grandmother’s farm near Watford City, N.D. in the company of my dad, brother, uncle and cousins. The hunting report [...]

Sun Showers

By PJ Maguire
One crisp fall morning in the recent past, I was sitting at a counter waiting on breakfast in Lawton, North Dakota. We were at Doris’ Café, which happens to be attached to the only gas station in town. In my opinion it is probably the last place to get a good breakfast for [...]

Dave’s Band

By PJ Maguire

 
I met Dave Easton in the fall of 2000 at the Phi Delta Theta fraternity house on the University of North Dakota campus in Grand Forks. Dave had a burning passion to pursue game in the outdoors and a Jeep. I had three-dozen mallard floaters and knowledge of waterfowl passed down from my [...]

Nebraska Duck Hunting – Early Teal Season

By PJ Maguire
Ever since I heard of the early teal seasons held by states south of Minnesota and North Dakota, I have wanted to participate in one of these hunts. When I first started hunting with my friend J.D. from Omaha, he told me tales of hunting these little ducks in September. Finally, this fall [...]

A Duck Band’s Beginning

By Chris Hustad
It was right around first light when I ventured outside of our sleeping quarters at J. Clark Salyer National Refuge Headquarters near Upham, ND last week (in early September). I noticed the picnic table was still full of grills, empty plates of goose, and some empty beer cans. Luckily, I packed it in [...]

Staying HIP

By Doug Leier
For almost a decade, migratory bird hunters have had to get HIP. No, not the “hip,” that loosely means “aware” or “fashionable” according the Webster’s Dictionary, but HIP, as in registered with the Harvest Information Program.
What is HIP?
HIP is a survey method developed by states and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) [...]

Hunting Sunrises & Sunsets

By Chris Hustad
If you’ve read about the 5 stages each hunter goes though in his or her life, you’ll understand how we progress as individuals and how we relate to our surroundings. One thing that seems to never get old to me is watching the sun rise or set when I’m out and about each [...]

Respecting Diversity in Hunting

By Mike Taddy
As the hot summer days begin to fade away, the increased anxiousness and irritableness of the waterfowler is the one certainty that exists in the North Dakota hunting world. Now, before you go on the defensive because you

’re a waterfowler, please take time to read this with an open mind.
North Dakota and the [...]

Canvasbacks of Lake Catahoula

By PJ Maguire
The Internet is a beautiful thing. It has given me hunting opportunities I only dreamed of as a young boy paging through outdoor magazines wishing to hunt ducks in the exotic places featured in the stories. So… when I got the chance to hunt waterfowl on Louisiana’s Lake Catahoula how could I say [...]

Ducks vs. Geese

By PJ Maguire
I have often been asked what I enjoy the pursuit of most: ducks or geese. It is a difficult question for a person who would prefer to spend his time scanning the skyline above decoys for waterfowl. For me, I cut my teeth hunting ducks at my family’s lake cabin with my dad and [...]

Pay Me to Be Outdoors

By PJ Maguire
Ever since I can remember it has been a dream of mine to have my own hunting and fishing show. The dream has always been to find a way for me to hunt and fish for a living. After many discussions with other outdoorsman I know I am not the only one that [...]

The Duck Stamp

By Doug Leier
Even if you’re not a duck hunter, I think you’ll appreciate what thousands of duck hunters across the prairie are doing this fall. It’s about as simple a task as you can make it, and much of the time they don’t get enough credit for how they’ve contributed to the good of the [...]

Dead End Slough

By Chris Hustad
When I look back at the hunting and fishing memories throughout the years, I can really tell how much it influenced the blueprint of my life. I can remember my first walleye, largemouth bass, pheasant, and duck to name a few like it was just yesterday. But more than just the creature itself, [...]

Dream Hunt

By PJ Maguire
It was an unbelievable day. The snow was coming down sideways and the birds were committing suicide. I filled my Swan tag with a black neck collared bird that was sporting a tarsus band to boot. I picked the bird out of a decoying flock that came in at first light.
Matt and I [...]

2004 Greenskins Classic Review

By Jed Fluhrer
The 2004 GreenSkins Classic proved once again that opening weekend isn’t really about duck hunting. Opening weekend is all about hanging out with friends and family and enjoying the outdoors.
From the beginning this years Greenskins was different. Not only was the man who started it all, Chris Hustad, not going to be in [...]

Delta Waterfowl

BISMARCK, ND-Duck hunters from Minnesota to Louisiana are organizing rallies and planning public hearings in an attempt to answer the most nagging question in the outdoors: “Where were the ducks?”
Delta Waterfowl President Rob Olson says one reason hunters across the country have been disappointed by recent duck seasons is that the Canadian portion of the [...]

GreenSkins Classic Recap

By Chris Hustad
The North Dakota resident opener proved to be a huge success for all those who took part. In our group’s extensive scouting around the state, we’d witnessed large masses of ducks for weeks. The trend appeared to be the more northeast you go, the more ducks you’ll come across. Local canada geese are [...]

GreenSkins Classic Recap – 2003 North Dakota Duck Opener

By Chris Hustad
As I sit here typing my first keystrokes, I’m looking out an airplane window watching North Dakota disappear behind me. As I prepare for my out of town business all week, I can only sit back and recap the prior weekend in my mind. It was the duck hunting opener for North Dakota [...]

Rory and the 2001 Hunting Season

By Doug Panchot
Having gone every hunting seasonexcept for last, without having a dog to hunt with of my own, I came to the conclusion that a gun dog is something that everyone should have the opportunity to have. Sure I have hunted with others who bring along their dogs when we hunt together. But there [...]

The Good Old Days

By Perry Thorvig
The Nodak crew shot the greenheads big time again in this year’s duck opener. They celebrated the tenth anniversary of the breaking of the drought of the 1980s and early 90s. Ironically, we may be heading back into another drought cycle. But, there are still birds around and then can provide some great [...]

Hunting the Honey Hole

By Perry Thorvig
Kenny Z said that he first “discovered” the honey hole when he was 16 years old. Now it is 39 years later, and he is still hunting the same spot.
There aren’t the numbers of birds around that there used to be. But, hey, shooting the birds is only half the fun. The favorite [...]

Purple Loostrife & SaltCedar – Noxious Weeds in the Outdoors

Jim McAllister
Sportsman, are you aware of noxious weeds that can limit habitat in wetlands for wildlife. In the last 10 years, the state of North Dakota has had two noxious weeds move into our wetlands. They both can have devastating effects if not properly controlled. They are purple loosestrife and saltcedar.
Purple loosestrife has been in [...]

New Life on the Prairie (2002)

By Jason Phillips
 Just when it seemed like it’s over, the action on the prairie potholes continues….on perch and northern pike that is. Well it looks like old man winter decided to get the last laugh this year and brought us some of the coldest weather of the season…in March. While it is tough to lose [...]

The Streak

By Perry Thorvig
My brother-in-law, Kenny Carlson, loves to hunt and fish. As most hunters do, he got started hunting during his high school years. Kenny is a lean six-footer. I guess that’s a kind way of saying that he must have been a pretty skinny kid in high school. He was not a Friday night [...]

Wildlife and Habitat Management: The Joint Venture Concept of the North American Waterfowl Management Plan

By Robert A. Langager
Introduction
Migratory waterfowl have traveled the North American continent for thousands of years. They have awed many who have seen their great winged migrations. Waterfowl inspire many to watch them, hunt them, and study them intensely. As a resource, waterfowl and other birds generate nearly $20 billion in economic activity and create more [...]

The Value of Temporary Wetlands

By Doug Leier
A recent rainy spell has rekindled somewhat the time-worn debate over the value of wetlands, small ones in particular.
North Dakota has hunreds of thousands of these small, shallow wetlands. They’re often called temporary wetlands because they typically only hold water for a few weeks after spring snow melt, or after heavy summer rains [...]

Water Up – Ducks Down

By PJ Maguire
When flights of ducks returned to the prairies of North Dakota from the south, numbers looked good for the 2004 waterfowl season. The annual spring breeding duck index was the 3rd highest on record, and was up 9% from last year. These numbers were surprising considering that there was a 16% decrease in [...]

All I Want For Christmas

By Chris Hustad
 

 
Christmas season has come and gone yet again, with plenty of memories to crown the year. This will be a very memorable Christmas for people all over the country who’ve never had a white Christmas before. On the weather channel, I saw some areas in the Gulf Coast of Texas received between 4-12 [...]

Junior Duck Stamp Contest Winner Announced

By Chris Hustad
A pair of blue-winged teal were the top winning waterfowl chosen as the 2005 Best of Show in the North Dakota Junior Duck Stamp Contest. “The Sun Watchers”, is the title of the Best of Show winning drawing by 18-year-old, Daniel Dwyer from Bismarck. Daniel used oil paints to depict a pair of [...]

Who’s Going To Look After the Ducks?

A Day in the Field With Delta Waterfowl – By Jed Fluhrer
Who’s going to look after the ducks? While I have spent many days in the marsh and field scanning the skies for ducks, it wasn’t until I stood in a wetland east of Bismarck, North Dakota surrounded by a group of Cub Scouts and [...]

All My Heroes are Duck Hunters

By PJ Maguire
The Old Man and I spent many summer afternoons discussing the usual topics; investing, religion, fishing and of course duck hunting. He was a strong Catholic, the kind that kept a painting of the last super by the dinner table. We said grace before we ate our meals, and we enjoyed many a [...]

Alternative Land Use Services Moving Forward

Federal, provincial and territorial Agriculture Ministers meeting in Kananaskis Alberta approved a four point policy agenda which would include testing of an ecological services plan called Alternative Land Use Services (ALUS). Often referred to as the “Farmers Conservation Plan”, ALUS was designed by the farm community across Canada. ALUS has been widely recognized as the [...]

The Mysterious Coot

By Doug Leier
Have you ever thought about hunting coots?
To be honest, most hunters never even consider bagging one and bringing it home, even though they are readily available on many North Dakota waters and regulations allow a daily limit of 15 and a possession limit of 30.
But this season, I might think differently when I’m [...]

The Best Waterfowl Hunt

By PJ Maguire
I have often been asked, “What is the best hunt you have ever been on?” I am a very modest person, but I have a long list to choose from when it comes to this topic. I have been blessed by befriending some of the best waterfowlers in the country. Being lucky, and being [...]

First Forecast

By Perry Thorvig
This year’s first comprehensive summary of agency reports and anecdotal observations concerning the prospects for the 2004 waterfowl season.
Last month you read that I was pretty discouraged about duck hunting prospects in general because of increased commercialization of the resource. In the space that follows, I will summarize the agency and individual reports [...]

Memorable Hunting Retrievers

By PJ Maguire
Life is just a series of moments where you connect with another person, place, or feeling. Every bird dog I have ever owned has had it’s own moments. These were times when dogs did remarkable things based on minimal training and experience. These moments seem to burn deeper in my memory for the [...]

Survey Says

By Doug Leier
With the final shots of North Dakota’s bird hunting seasons behind us as of the close of turkey hunting on Jan. 11, we’re actually only weeks away from the opening of the 2009 spring snow goose conservation season on Feb. 21. Beyond that, the spring turkey season is only a couple of months [...]

Montana Goose Hunting

By Chris Hustad
My phone rang late last summer and my good friend Lyle Sinner was on the other end. His call was straight to the point, “Hey Chris, are you interested in heading to Montana to goose hunt?” While it took all of about 2 seconds for me to decide, my decision was an obvious [...]

The Other Migration

By PJ Maguire
One thing that waterfowl hunters can always learn more about is the migration patterns of ducks and geese. To be successful as a waterfowl hunter it is important to understand how and why ducks and geese use certain migration patterns. Of course weather, moon phases and the calendar all play a major role [...]

August Goose Hunting

By Doug Leier
Non hunters and hunters who don’t target Canada geese may be a bit take off guard when learning those hunters they’ve seen and heard are out taking part in the early Canada goose season in North Dakota–for good reason.
In 1988 the US Fish and Wildlife Service annual spring waterfowl survey indicated about 18,000 [...]

The Canada Goose

By Doug Leier
I  don’t think of myself as a veteran hunter. But when I put pen to paper and add up the years, I realize it’s been nearly 25 of them since I took hunter education in LaMoure in 1984.
During that time, I’ve already experienced some significant changes in our hunting landscape.
In the mid-1980s deer [...]

Hunting Ethics from an Old Soldier

By Daniel D. Narum
On an early morning in September, I awoke just before my alarm sounded and spared my wife the noise. It was 4:45 a.m., and a balmy 63 degrees outside. My gear was already loaded and I had a cup of fresh hot coffee to enjoy on my way to the field. A [...]

The Spring Snow Goose Blues

By PJ Maguire
The blues have always been American. As American as apple pie, extension tubes, electronic calls and a high enough population of the North American Lesser Snow geese to warrant a Conservation Order. In the last month, I have gone from a blues bar in Chicago on one weekend, to snow goose hunting the [...]

A Spring Goose Hunter’s Lament

By Richard Kaplan
Note: Article Written at the end of April
Hello. My name is Richard. I’m addicted to hunting spring geese and today is the seventeenth consecutive day I have not checked the Spring Snow Goose Migration Report at Nodak Outdoors.
My support group believes that writing this article will be therapeutic for me. You see, I [...]

Waterfowl Hunting Memories

By Chris Hustad
Well here I am, back in another airplane for a cross country trip home from work. As I write this I’m on the first lag of my trip back to North Dakota from Blacksburg, Virginia. After a long exhausting week, it feels good to know I’m going home. And this isn’t just any [...]

Ducks, Geese, & UV

By PJ Maguire
Every year waterfowl hunters are bombarded with new equipment and ideas. As waterfowlers there is a lot of stuff we need in order to pursue ducks and geese. A wise goose hunter once told me that in order to be successful, you have to lead the pack and not follow. Since then I [...]

Bird Band – Duck Band – Goose Band

By PJ Maguire
Every year the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service and agencies ran by the states, place leg bands on a variety of birds across the country. Migratory birds, like ducks, geese, and most recently doves are some of the most commonly banded birds. Harvesting a bird sporting a leg band is a special joy [...]

First Time on the X

Richard Kaplan
Most of my goose hunting success depends on my ability to run traffic over my decoys. I almost always hunt for geese in a harvested field within a mile of a heavily-used roosting area to ensure that a sufficient number of birds would fly over my decoy spread on their way elsewhere to feed. [...]

Hunter’s Choice Waterfowl Regulations

By Doug Leier
About 15 years ago I attended my first Game and Fish Department advisory board meeting. I was a fisheries and wildlife management student at North Dakota State University, and had a goal of one day working in the natural resource field. I decided it might be a positive learning experience to attend this [...]

2006 Midwest Waterfowl Festival

By PJ Maguire
Right now it is August, and I can feel the fall creeping in. The nights are cooler and the days are shorter. It is time for me to organize decoys, check gear and count the shotgun shells I have remaining from last season. It is also time to check out new gear and [...]

Sudden Ludden

By Chris Hustad
Forecast: 40% chance of rain turning to snow with 25-35 mph winds out of the N with winds gusting over 40 mph at times. The day was the last day of goose season in 1990 and it was on that day that I learned the phrase “Sudden Ludden”. And it was the night [...]