It all kicks off next weekend.
The fall hunting season begins and even though it’s always an exciting time of the year, this one might be less than satisfying.
The guns have all been oiled and cleaned.
The gear has been taken down from the attic and a good supply of shells laid in.
Because it’s that time of year.
If the town seems a little less crowded next weekend, especially short of fathers and sons, it’s because you’re looking in the wrong place. You should be looking up because November 5th is the first weekend of duck season.
And I hope you wished them luck because it isn’t going to be a very good one.
"We do have birds that nest locally, but a good majority of the birds that migrate and come to Texas, they're coming from the northern states,” says Larry LeBeau of Texas Parks and Wildlife. “A lot of those northern states, they had moisture, they had rainfall, they had good rains in the spring and they had good nesting conditions. So, we will get a migration of these northern birds coming into this state."
But Lebeau told us, because of the dry conditions, they probably won’t stay long.
Because they’ll need food.
'Agricultural fields, which have been the traditional hot spots, they have been a total failure,” he says. “So folks are going to have to look for native food sources. Once again, waterfowl. They are migratory birds and up through the north and into Canada, there were good nesting conditions and reproduction of the waterfowl this year is actually very good."
But if there’s no food or water, they’ll move on to Mexico or Louisiana. So hunters need to get them before they move on.
And this is youth week. That means kids under 16 can hunt legally, if they are licensed.
But bringing anything home, that’s another story.
Texas Parks and Wildlife urges caution and a good safety course, by the way.
Last year there were 25 recorded hunting accidents, 4 of them fatal, so be careful out there.