There’s nothing like that first light flight. As the first cobalt glow lights up your decoys and the distant dark specks on the horizon take the shape of incoming birds, every duck hunter feels the buzz. It’s a glorious and iconic time to be duck hunting, yet at the same time, if you’re only hunting during those first few hours of the morning, you’re missing out on a lot of duck-killing opportunities. While we all think of the magic hour of sunrise as the best time to hunt, there are a lot of times when you’ll get on more birds during the middle of the day.
Midday duck hunting is a bit more refined than hunting in the mornings or even evenings. Generally, it works best in certain places and under particular conditions. However, with the right setup and a bit of preplanning, you can hit the midday flight just right, leading to some of the absolute craziest duck action you’ve ever had. That is, so long as you hunt in the right spots during the right times.
Hunt and Marshes and Flooded Areas
Hunting at midday means hunting in places where ducks are constantly moving. Accordingly, places like lakes and large rivers where ducks move and feed in the morning and then settle down on the water for the day aren’t really ideal for a nooner. However, areas with constantly shifting water levels and large amounts of food, such as marshes and flooded timber and agricultural fields, will usually have ducks moving in and around them all day long.
Marshes are especially favorite midday spots of mine, mostly because I have several close to my home. During the early part of the season, hunters will absolutely hammer ducks on these marshes during the morning and then pick up their decoys and head home in the early afternoon, with most never realizing that they’re missing one of the best parts of the day. As the sun reaches its zenith, marsh ducks that have been lying about after a morning meal or birds that have been blown off by hunting pressure will suddenly reactivate. With hunters having moved off and the chance for a good feed on grasses, weeds, and invertebrates beckoning, the ducks will take to the air again in the mid to late afternoon and make a beeline straight for my midday setup.
I’ve seen similar afternoon flurries of duck activity on flooded corn, barley, and rice fields, as well as in flooded timber. Even on calm, blue sky days when they can comfortably roost and wait for nightfall, the need to pack on calories will suddenly drive some birds into the air during the afternoon. However, capitalizing on these flood-feeding birds usually means relocating from your morning set-up or at least knowing where the ducks were feeding at first light, as afternoon ducks will generally go into areas that haven’t been hit by morning birds.
If you’re hunting flooded areas during midday, take note of where the birds were concentrating during first light. Then during the lull after the morning flight, find a comparable-looking location with similar water depth, food, and cover that’s relatively close to where the ducks are concentrating and get set up, because that’s where the afternoon ducks will be heading.
Sleep In During Cold Fronts
During cold weather, ducks are pretty much like the rest of us. They don’t want to get out of their warm bed and face the chilly weather and instead will have a bit of a lie-in. Whether it’s from a sudden blast of chilly air coming down from the north or just a particularly frosty morning, cold ducks often just won’t get going. When it’s cold outside, you sometimes won’t see birds start flying and feeding until the late morning or even the late afternoon on especially brutal days.
Another reason you should hunt the midday during cold fronts is to capitalize on the migration. As winter begins to rear its ugly head, snow and freezing water in the north begin to force ducks to fly south, so you stand an excellent chance of running into midday birds. This is especially true before an incoming afternoon low-pressure system. These walls of rising air, high winds, rain, and snow will push clouds of migrating ducks in front of them like massive invisible snowplows, giving you ample opportunity to capitalize on midday migrating birds so long as you’re in place before the weather arrives.
Hide Your Decoys and Talk Duck
Whether you’re hunting a wave of migrating mallards or just a small flock of local ducks bouncing around on a marsh or cornfield, hunting midday birds is all about drawing attention. Unlike morning birds, which fly in unison to a singular feeding ground or roosting area, midday ducks are a bit more scattered. They range around a bit more, looking for safe, hidden areas to land, and you need those birds to hear you, see you, and decide to commit. The best ways to do that are with hidden decoys and calling.
Now, when I say hiding your decoys, I don’t mean keeping them in the bag or leaving them in the truck, but rather spreading decoys out in small hidden areas that midday ducks are looking for. Instead of throwing a few decoys out in open water along the edges of vegetation, throw out a lot of decoys right in the middle of the thick stuff. Look for open pockets and potholes of water that are surrounded by cattails, standing cornstalks, and other vegetation, and then fill gaps with spread-out decoys in groups of threes, fours, and fives. These hidden spreads represent ducks at ease, something that midday ducks are constantly searching for and will be drawn to, especially when they hear the right calling.
Midday ducks need to hear the right kinds of calls at the right time in order to get them to come in for a landing. If you’re seeing a lot of ducks at a distance, you can still blast out a series of loud hailing and greetings to get them to turn. However, once midday ducks have spotted your decoys and have begun to circle in for a closer inspection, or if they’re just flying low and close, tone things down with subtle quacks and feeding calls to convince curious afternoon birds that something good is going on and they won’t want to miss out.
The Late Bird Still Catches The Worm
As much as I love duck hunting during those magical morning hours, I also like my sleep. During the early duck season excitement, getting up at 4 o’clock in the morning and lugging my gear down to the water repeatedly is pretty easy. However, by midseason, the idea of just shrugging off the morning flight and staying in bed begins to have more appeal. This is at least part of the reason why knowing how, when, and where to hunt midday ducks has so many advantages. For while I may miss those first beautiful predawn hours, I can get my rest and then still go out and knock down a limit of ducks without anyone judging me for sleeping in.