Duck hunting the bays and rivers

What are the laws about duck hunting the sea ducks in the bays and rivers? Is it all open to hunting as long as you're a certain distance from a man-made structure? I want to start duck hunting down there now that I have a place to stay and a boat.

Waterfowl | Outdoor Alabama

All tidal waters are open public waters. No restrictions on where you can hunt outside of normal safety zones and in the rules in the link above.

No permanent blinds on public tidal waters. Guy cut bamboo or phragmites cane & stick it in the bottom around the boat & then put up their boat blind.

Be aware that for opening day, there is a "gentlemen's agreement" in place since the 1940s that you go out before opening day and stick a temporary blind with a small sign your initials and year on it. No one is supposed to hunt "your" spot opening day. After opening day, all spots are first come first serve. No "owns" blinds on public tidal waters.

Make sure to do plenty of scouting and channel marking with your GPS. the spots that hold ducks are shallow grass beds. Certain areas you can go from 12' of water to 1' in a matter of feet. Stumbling your way around in the dark is no way to learn how to get around.

Unless you hunt the timber in the Delta, don't plan on seeing mallards. Tons of woodies up in the timber lined creeks.
But our main puddle ducks are gadwalls, teal and a smattering of widgeon (haven't killed one in 10 years) & pintails (killed 1 last year). We get tons of divers too, mostly lesser & greater scaup, ringneck, buffies, and redheads with enough canvasbacks to make having 3 or 4 can decoys in your spread a must. Also tons of coots, thousands in some years.

On the open bay, big spreads are the norm. I never hunt over less than 5 dzn decoys, some days 8 or 9 dzn. Depending on where I am, it might be almost all divers or mostly gadwalls with just a few divers. When the gadwalls get educated, I use 4 dzn coots, 1 dzn divers and 1 dzn gadwalls.

Where do you plan to hunt? On Wolf Bay, Perdido Bay and MS Sound, its almost all divers, scaup, buffies and redheads. On Perdido, be mindful of safety zones and direction you are shooting. And where the FL line is.

On Upper Mobile Bay and lower Delta, depending on where you are on what day, it can be almost all divers, all puddler's or a mix.

Some years its great, some years it just sucks. From 97-2005, we had tons of birds. Limits were easy. Then we had Katrina and 2 years of drought followed by poor migration, 2006-2013 were horrible. Lots of guys gave up. Things have steadily improved the last three years. Last year we had a great season, it was like "the good old days".

But its not easy & its not Louisiana or Arkansas. Don't expect to see clouds of ducks or every days easy limits. Gotta be mobile, gotta learn where the birds are on what tide and what wind and how to hunt those spots without running out of water when the tide drops out!
http://www.gulfshorespierfishing.com...tid=5536&stc=1http://www.gulfshorespierfishing.com...tid=5537&stc=1
http://www.gulfshorespierfishing.com...tid=5535&stc=1

BTW, we see very few seaducks, I've seen a few (less than 10) whitewing and surf scoter but never killed one.
I've seen 1 oldsquaw, ever.
My buddy who has hunted here for 30 years has killed 2 scoters, all on upper Mobile Bay.
Every now & then they show up off the beach or in parts of MS Sound or Perdido Bay. In really cold years they are more common. I think it was back in '99 or 2000 a bunch showed up off Orange Beach. But they aren't predictable.
I've killed around 6 goldeneyes since 1997.

Duck season & bag limits are on pages 24-26:
http://www.outdooralabama.com/sites/...NAL%20COPY.pdf

Safety Zone:I
t shall be unlawful for any person to hunt or attempt to hunt within 100 yards of any dwelling belonging to another, whether occupied or not, without the permission of the owner or lessee of said dwelling. Provided further, it shall be unlawful for any person to discharge a firearm while hunting in such a manner that any projectile strikes any dwelling or building used for human occupation, whether occupied or not, or any commercial vessel, without the permission of the owner or lessee of said dwelling, building or vessel. This regulation shall not apply to a landowner or member of his or her immediate family hunting on his or her own property provided that no projectile strikes any of the above stated property of another without the permission of the owner or lessee of said property.

It is unlawful to hunt or discharge a firearm from, upon or across any public road or railroad, or the right-of-way of any public road or railroad. You may not hunt or discharge a firearm within 50 yards of the right-of-way of any public road, highway, or railroad with a centerfire rifle, a shotgun using slugs or shot larger than number four (4) shot or a muzzle loading rifle .40 or larger.

__________________________________________________ ____________

Safety Zone is important if you hunt lower Perdido Bay in Old River or around Robinson or Walker Islands. Even if you are 100 yards from houses, if you rain shot on someone's house, you can get a ticket. And people down there will call the wardens.
There has been a move afoot locally in OB to somehow ban waterfowl hunting south of Bear Point. Its not a state-driven move, I can tell you that.

Hey, Carl: A "gentleman's agreement would be a nice thing. Here in north Alabama, there is so much pressure that you have to camp out 2+ days to get a decent spot on opening day. Unfortunately, we've had so little rain that the rivers and the management areas won't even have enough water in them to hunt in the beginning of the season, which will make Guntersville even more of a zoo than normal.

Do the net boat guys come drag through your decoys like the a-hole that professed to be a tournament fisherman did to me one time on the Flint River? Not very smart of him with two guys with shotguns sitting in the boat blind. He must have been absent the day they taught about sportsman's etiquette.

Only net boats active during duck season in the areas we hunt are mullet boats. Most of the area I'm hunting are too shallow for them. Only once did I have one set close to me. Over in MS Sound. He later apologized, thought I was a buddy of his who hunted that blind a lot. Actually on calm bluebird days mullet boats tend to stir up the birds sitting out on deep open water so it's not a bad thing sometimes.

I know guys who live in north AL and hunt Guntersville. They say the opener is a zoo, they simply stopped hunting the first two days.

Actually bass fisherman are worse than mullet boats.

Carl: I'm sure I know some of the same hunters that you know up here in north Alabama. I have known and hunted with Eric Patterson for years. I put the very first post on the Duckboats.net page as a test case for Eric when he was building the initial site, but haven't posted on the forum since. I have read some of your posts on the duck boat forum over the years.

Small world! I think I'm one of the first 50 DHBP members!

I live on the Bon secour river and planned on hunting really just redheads and buffies. So where around there would be best?

I've never seen redheads on Bon Secour River or Bay. The redheads feed on submerged grassbeds and there are none that I know of in Bon Secour River or Bay.
Not saying you wont see any, I just never have seen or heard of them being there.

I have seen lots of buffies, some scaup and a few goldeneyes. and Lots of mergansers.

Best bet is to get out and scout once the ducks show up.
Look for them along the wider spots on Bon Secour River or along the shoreline of Bon Secour Bay. You may have to do a lot of riding. W
atch the weather, if you get caught in a strong north or west wind, it will get nasty.

Look in Oyster Bay too, when there is enough water.

Thanks everybody for the info!