The Minimalist Waterfowler’s Favorite Species: Hunting Wood Ducks

With the exception of parts of the arid Western US, wood ducks are a pretty common species throughout the United States and southern Canada. In many locations throughout all four flyways—especially the Pacific, Mississippi and Atlantic flyways—wood ducks can be found year-round. Their habits of living in a variety of commonly found habitats such as ponds, beaver sloughs and creeks make them an accessible duck for anyone. You don’t need much gear to hunt woodies, and they can be found in places migrating dabbling ducks and divers might not frequent. Talk to a few hunters, and a lot of them will tell you their first duck was a wood duck. Here are a few things to think about the next time you go after woodies.

You Don’t Need Much Gear, But It Can Help

Getting into duck hunting seems daunting because the sport is often portrayed as requiring thousands of dollars’ worth of decoys, calls, blinds, leases, boats, pure bred retrievers… That type of gear is helpful and sometimes necessary depending on your target species and location. Wood duck hunting is much less gear-intensive. I use No. 4 steel shot with a modified choke in my 12-gague Benelli for wood ducks.

Like most hunting endeavors, scouting pays off for wood ducks. Woodies are patternable and will often use the same routes day after day, flying creeks or railroad tracks and frequenting brushy wetlands. If you choose to use decoys, only a few are needed. A jerk string on a decoy to create some motion can work great. You can also find wood duck calls, which are another great tactic to bring in woodies to your location. One thing to note is that calls and decoys will be most beneficial if you set them at the destination the woodies are heading to anyway. Calls and decoys help you bring in birds to your specific location on a wetland they’re heading to, but are usually less successful tactics when set along their travel routes.

Drake and hen wood duck on a Mississippi flyway wetland - M. Pfaff photo

Having a method to retrieve your downed wood ducks is imperative. Wood ducks like brushy areas and are notorious for diving when crippled and can be hard to find in tangled wetland vegetation. A good retrieving dog is your best bet for recovering all your game, but if you don’t have a dog, choose your shots wisely and have a backup method for getting to your shot birds.

Tactics: Use What You Have

Scouting for the spots wood ducks want to be at first light will pay off. If you set up right at the spot the ducks are pouring into after they leave their roost site, you will have some great shot opportunities. Since wood ducks typically won’t respond to decoys in the same way that other dabbling ducks will, being as close as possible to the spot they want to be really pays off for hunting wood ducks.

Beautiful plumage on a drake wood duck- M. Pfaff photo

Especially during the early season, wood ducks will roost in large groups of dozens to hundreds of birds. It is tempting to hunt these roost locations packed full of woodies, but be careful doing so. Wood ducks are sensitive to pressure and too much shooting them off their roosts will often cause them to change their behavior and leave these spots. If you do choose to hunt a roost location, try to cause as little disturbance as possible by shooting your birds quickly and getting out. Too much pressure at a great roost site can ruin the spot pretty quickly.

If you want to avoid blowing a great honey hole, there are other great tactics for killing wood ducks. In addition to tangled wetlands, woodies will use brushy creeks and rivers, especially those with slow-moving pools. You can pass-shoot wood ducks as they move up and down these waterways. If there’s a current, be prepared to have a method for retrieving downed ducks as the current can take them quickly.

Jump-shooting wood ducks is a fun and popular way to hunt them. Walking along brushy creek banks, listening for or spotting wood ducks, then sneaking in until they flush can be a very effective tactic. Other hunters will use a canoe and travel rivers or creeks to shoot ducks that are sitting around bends in the creek or small, secluded areas of water. Another advantage of jump shooting is that it can be done mid-day and doesn’t require you to set up in the pre-dawn darkness.

Typical creek bend where wood ducks can be found in the fall, especially when there are acorn-dropping oak trees around. M. Pfaff photo

Harvested crop fields can provide another great wood duck setup. If you scout and observe ducks hitting a specific location in a field, try hunting it, setting up before shooting light. Wood duck activity in crop fields can be dependent on other food source availability. If it’s a poor mast year without many acorns for them to feed on, they might hit ag more heavily than they would in a year with great acorn productivity.

Final Thoughts

Wood ducks are beautiful and ubiquitous throughout their range! With so many ways to hunt them without requiring too much gear, they are a great bird to pursue throughout the season. They are also an excellent bird to eat and taste wonderful grilled. Woodies will produce up to two broods per year, unique among North American waterfowl. Building wood duck boxes for nesting pairs is an easy way to contribute to the conservation of this species, which is one of the best aspects of waterfowl hunting!

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