Last year the teal numbers were in the hundreds. You couldnt hunt much for puddlers and not come home with 2 or 12 depending on the day (and the # of people you were with)

This season I have had the best duck season to date - with my boat seeing 92 ducks thus far and thats only hunting 21 days total (still have weekends up to 3 January 2014 =) but as far as teal numbers - going through my books - I have shot a grand total of 8.

My hunting partner - who hunts on days I cannot - has shot a total of 12.

So we started asking around Ontario to see if anyone had experienced anything like this.

Seems like this is all over the Ontario region.

I have the fortune of being friends with my taxidermist - Steve - a sort of Grizzly Adams character with a lifetime of knowledge in waterfowl in the SouthEastern region of Ontario - having grown up here.

He's also got a masters in Biology.

After talking with him and a few other contacts in Ontario we came to a conclusion:

Teal are mainly an Eastern bird in Canada. They like the coastal areas around Halifax, New Brunswick and even into Quebecistan.

If you go over the forecast that SE Ont has had in the last few weeks/months we've had little to no Eastern winds but have been absolutley POUNDED by severe Western winds. 60mph+ some days...

The Teal simply wont fight that kind of wind during their migration and will simply keep further East.

Subsequently - we've had a surplus of Wigeon and Pintail (a common central or Western Bird) in the area as they havent had to fight much during their migration.

So many so - we've renamed a few areas on the water as 'Wigeon bay' and 'Pintail Paradise'

yeah i know - kinda corny - but I have yet to go to either of those spots this season and not leave with either a Pintail at PP and a Wigeon at WB.

Every time!

I am wondering if any of you have seen similair bird patterns in your respective areas?

OR - have another theory why the Teal have been virtually non existent in our areas this season?

Thoughts?

Generally had the same pattern, however we have shot more pintails this year than in the last 5 combined... Still waiting on a good push of birds (mallards) into the area, reports have been that they are starting to move into the area.

Interesting comments, but why the hell did you call the great province of Quebec "Quebecistan". Vivre le quebec. Go celebrate moving day with your blochead brothers.

idk about the wind here affecting our migration, but I could see that winds up there could affect the way we get birds, lat year we shot more pintail than normal, this year we ate actually shooting a few mallards, don't know why, but I think it's more the drought than anything. but oddly we don't have a lot of greys this year, which I would gladly trade for mallards lol

All the teal are in South LA right now!




Sent using Morse Code from my not so smart phone.

I'm in Minnesota (obviously on the southern border of Ontario) and we had tons of teal this year! We shot way more this year than last year. Matter of fact, we had big flocks of GWT here just a week ago (which is unusual--there's usually long gone in MN by Nov!)

Quebecistan!!! I love it....

sent from the former Republic of Texas.

They are all on the coast of LA, and that's pretty much all we have had for the last couple of weeks.
Hopefully we will have some more big birds down this weekend.

I predict excellent weekend for east zone opening in LA.

i hear its gonna rain and i am going bass fishing

i live to ruin your day