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Reelfoot Lake Duck Hunting
West
Tennessee Duck Hunting Report
2025-26
Fowler's Point
Guide Service
DUCK SEASON DRAWS TO A CLOSE FOR
WEARY HUNTERS
By Steve McCadams
Hear that? It’s the fat lady singing. Dreary duck hunters are about to
witness the fall of the curtain.
Statewide season ends Friday as the last day of January has been the
traditional closure for Tennessee’s duck season for several years. Some
are disappointed. Others are breathing a sigh of relief.
For the lion’s share of waterfowlers in the Kentucky Lake region it has
been another challenging season. High expectations were greeted by low
numbers of ducks. Sound familiar?
As if a long tough season wasn’t challenging enough, just a few days
before the final stretch severe cold weather sent ice to the region,
freezing up many public hunting areas and boat ramps, denying access to
hunting spots.
A brief warm up arrived three or four days before the finale but for
most it was too little too late. The ducks were disrespectful this year.
Empty skies hurt the feelings of many weary waterfowlers.
Known to be an optimistic fraternity duck hunters are accustomed to hard
times to some degree. For many the investment versus the dividend has
traditionally been a sore subject. However, guided by hope and
anticipation of what could happen, if the stars were lined up right,
ducksters return each season with pep in their step.
By season’s end each year a lot of weary waterfowlers have traded in
faces of enthusiasm for the realistic look of long frowns of disgust.
Ducks don’t respect the time and effort put in each year. Nor do they
understand the expense involved.
Doing a lot of dirty work, traveling long distances, rising in the wee
hours of the morning and pretty much wearing out your pocketbook and
physical limitations after battling the swamps is still no guarantee the
ducks will visit.
Gambles taken; lessons learned.
For most any corner of the waterfowler’s world weather is usually the
big factor. It’s the active ingredient in the recipe for seeing and
shooting ducks.
Weather pushes the ducks to move whether they want to or not. It
stimulates the annual migrations, greatly influencing the timetable of
movement throughout the flyway from their breeding grounds to their
wintering grounds.
Under the umbrella of weather can be flooding that distributes ducks
over wide areas when searching for new feeding and roosting
opportunities. Weather can also mean dry conditions that greatly alter
traditional routes of movement from year to year.
We had some of all that this year here on the Mississippi Flyway and
especially right here in the Kentucky Lake and west Tennessee region.
There were ample cold fronts where north winds and temps sort of rode
the roller coaster at times, a scenario that usually stimulates duck
movement in our sector or the world.
When heavy rains enter the picture and flood out Mississippi River
tributaries such as the Obion, Forked Deer and Hatchie River bottoms
ducks usually follow the water. That means spreading out over our region
and occupying the abundance of backwater swamps and agricultural fields
where grain buffets await the web footed visitors.
All that sounds good on paper. However, this year either the ducks
didn’t get the memo or chose not to read it.
While a few ducks did venture to our locale, although arriving in below
average numbers compared to times past, the numbers of mallards seemed
below normal. Nothing wrong with having other species. They’re fun to
see and shoot. And they make a splash just like the other species.
However, it’s king mallard that best sets the pace of the season.
Mallards rank at the top of the food chain in terms of the duck hunter’s
harvest desires.
It’s the mallard that best responds to the quacks of a caller’s cry. And
the vast majority of decoys in any hunter’s spread are generally mallard
blocks.
Practically all species will respond and relate to some degree a decoy
spread comprised mostly of big fat mallards bouncing in the waves and
moving about.
When mallards numbers are down---as they were this year---it has a
negative rippling affect across the whole winter migration, or so it
seems.
Wood ducks are wonderful. Pintails are pretty. Gadwalls are finicky and
coy. Greenwing teal are faster than a speeding bullet. Diver ducks are
beautiful in their own right when swinging out over open water and
bombing the blind and decoy spread.
All have a time and place. Majestic and peculiar. Each with their own
personality and disposition.
Some can fill in the void when the other ducks don’t fly but it takes
pretty good numbers in any given season in a variety of species to
formulate what most hunters refer to as a good year.
Here in the Kentucky Lake region we didn’t get good duck numbers despite
having good duck weather at times.
There were some sectors west of here toward the Mississippi River that
did pretty good at times. Most of those who consistently saw and
harvested ducks were in prime locations near state or federal refuges or
crossing areas that ducks traveled on refuge routes.
High dollar hunting clubs in today’s waterfowling world pretty much
attract and hold the ducks. If they don’t then they’re very close to
areas that do.
There are a few exceptions but for a lot of hunters to have luck it
takes a lot of ducks across the region.
When low numbers of ducks frequent an area it comes as no surprise that
a low number of hunters have success rates worthy of consistent
conversations.
And so it is that local waterfowlers chalked up another poor season.
Seems that’s gotten to be the norm in these parts.
A lot of hunters scanning almost empty skies where not many ducks were
flying. “Maybe next year” is the rallying cry among the ranks. “Maybe
next year”!
FUTURE OF PINTAIL POPULATION
For the first time in nearly 30 years, duck hunters in the lower 48
states could have the chance to shoot three pintails a day as soon as
the 2025-26 season—a possible outcome of an interim population and
harvest strategy being put into use by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service.
However, it’s important to note that despite a change in the model, the
daily bag limit for all future seasons still depends on the pintail
populations and habitat conditions on the breeding grounds. The data
will become clearer in August when USFWS releases its annual Waterfowl
Population Status report. So, despite speculation by other media
outlets, there’s no guarantee of a three-pintail bag limit for the
2025-26 season.
Based on a new integrated population model for pintails, the USFWS
Regulations Committee on May 17 adopted an Interim Northern Pintail
Harvest Strategy to guide setting of regulations for the 2025-26
waterfowl season. The new strategy, which was developed based on
banding, population survey, and harvest data, allows four options: Bag
limits could be three pintails daily, two, one, or a closed season for
the Mississippi, Central, and Pacific flyways. The Atlantic Flyway will
have a three-pintail daily limit every season unless the model calls for
a closed season in the other three flyways.
“The new model, the new data is some of the best science we’ve ever had
on pintails,” said Jerome Ford, USFWS assistant director, during the
meeting. “In this application (of the new strategy), we’re trying to
learn. The Service Regulations Committee supports the implementation
moving forward with the Pintail Working Group proposed Interim Harvest
Strategy. The revised strategy addresses stakeholder concerns with the
current strategy, and the important technical updates conform with the
idea of using the best available science to support harvest management
decisions.”
Under Adaptive Harvest Management, which was put into use in 1995 and
updated for pintails in 2010, only three regulatory options for pintails
exist: two birds daily, one, or closed season. Regulations for the
upcoming 2024-25 season are already set: The daily bag limit is one
pintail daily in all four flyways.
The USFWS will use 2024 breeding population survey data obtained this
spring to determine 2025-26 regulations using the new Interim Pintail
Harvest Strategy.
“The biggest difference is the new model factors in the harvest rate,
which is the percentage of the population taken by hunters, rather than
just looking at the total harvest from the prior year as a predictor of
the upcoming season’s harvest,” said Dr. Chris Nicolai, waterfowl
scientist for Delta Waterfowl. “The new model makes predictions based on
the observed proportion of pintails shot, not on the estimated number of
what hunters shot the previous season.”
Here is a phone video clip from a Reelfoot Lake youth hunt..."Smokin
Teal"
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