Well, our Spring Aleutian Goose season has started out here on California’s North Coast, and man has it been tough! There are more birds than ever this year (about 120,000), but they are very wary and fly in tremendously large flocks numbering in the thousands. It seems that people have come out of the woodwork to hunt the spring season this year, and it shows with the amount of skybusting and illegal shooting (such as shooting from roads, sneaking onto other people’s property, etc..). Anyway, I was finally able to bag my first Aleutian of the Spring season today after work, and I’m stoked! I also dropped a 2nd one out of that flock, but somehow it managed to get up and fly away before I could reach it. I really hate when that happens. Anyway, anyone else doing any spring goose hunting? If so, how’s it going?
Snow geese make great jerky when prepared properly! A few years ago some buddies and I hammered snows (100+ in one day, there is no limit on snows here in Nebraska). We breasted them out, took them to my father in laws locker plant, and had them made into jerky. He used the same recipe that he uses on deer and it was really good. We got more shooting in on them than I have ever done in one hunt. With all due respect, they WERE well worth the shells, and then some. I can speak for my buddies and say that that was a hunt none of us will ever forget. Don’t get me wrong, I do still beleive that they are still a filthy animal, a sky rat. That is also why we need to thin them out. If you get the chance, “TAKE EM”.
I have made jerky out of canadian geese before and i like it better than any other kind,but havent ever had snow goose I would say there aint much difference.
Stick you are correct there aint much difference at all as far as jerky or sausage goes.But as far as eating snows any other way at least compared to Canadas and Specks there is a hell of a difference
No doubt about that.I mean they dont eat much different than a duck but they are at the bottom of the list as far as geese go.My dog training partner and his buddys have been going after them pretty heavy the last two weekends to the tune of over 600 of the damn things killed.Most of em they have made into snack sticks like a slim jim.As for me I kill em when they are working with the Canadas and Specks but I am not going to put in the kind of effort and cost for a proper snow rig to shoot something I am not that high on eating no matter how much fun they seem to have doing it.Now if we had a conservation season for Specks…....Katy bar the door on that cause it gets no better than a Speck as far as table fare goes.
Oregon does!!! But for some reason, they decreased the spring speck limit down to only 1 bird this year after rumors of it going to 6. Stay tuned next spring to see if it increases. That might make it worth the trip!
Yes I has read about that spring speck season but I dont know about just being able to kill 1 bird unless there is a chance of killing a snow or two with out having to run 600-700 decoys to do it.My buddy and his crew are using 700 ghg full bodys and if needed a 1000 silo socks and a electronic caller as well.I got invited but just didnt want to drive that far for a whole weekend to get in on it.If they were closer to home I may have gotten out a day or two but as I stated above I am not that high on snows.
What is the speck limit in Oregon during the regular season and what is driving them to call for a spring season on them ?
They can take 4 specks during the regular season I believe. The specks are doing to Oregon what the Aleutian geese are doing to North Coast California and that is overgrazing and destroying farmlands and contributing to ranchers and farmers taking massive financial hits. I believe the speck/snow late season in Oregon is private land only, much like the Aleutian season in California in order to try and move the geese off private lands and onto public areas to do their grazing. If they bump the spring season back up to 4 or higher specks per day next year then I’m going to get up there! This year they left it 4 per day, but they broke it up to 1 speck and 3 snows. I could care less about the snows, but I’m not going all that way for 1 speck.
I cant say as I blame you on not wanting to travel for one speck,but for four of them I would be willing to do some driving for that.We get two per day here from early Nov. untill early Jan. then it opens back up for the last nine days of our Canada season in Feb. so that isnt to bad but damn four per day that would be a blast.
I cant say as I blame you on not wanting to travel for one speck,but for four of them I would be willing to do some driving for that.We get two per day here from early Nov. untill early Jan. then it opens back up for the last nine days of our Canada season in Feb. so that isnt to bad but damn four per day that would be a blast.
Quack Addict,
Was never much for waterfowl, till I tried Nate’s goose recipe using what my father-in-law said were Aleutian geese. By the way Nate, I found “Old Bay” seasoning and now understand that I totally messed up the recipe!
Trevor,
We have a 25 per day limit on snows in SD. If they’re good for jerky, I’ll drop some!
