(State) Iowa’s Spring Snow Goose Season runs through May 1st.
The special conservation order snow goose hunt was put in place by the Fish and Wildlife Service along with Ducks Unlimited in the 1990’s according to Bryan Hayes with the Iowa DNR. “They just saw a need to have a spring season to extend the snow goose season mainly for habitat protection. Up in the tundra where these snow geese nest they were just destroying the habitat. Basically it came down to too many geese and not enough land and they were grazing everything down the bare dirt and really causing some habitat destruction.”
Snow on Thursday slowed the migration. “Held the geese south in places like Missouri. Once the weather straightens out and the wind shifts back to the south the geese will start to advance. Right now we have open water in our lakes and ponds, but you don’t get too far north and you’ll see ice conditions on lakes and ponds. The geese will be following that trend. As things open up they will move further north.”
Hayes says there are typically between 1,000 to 1,500 hunters participating. They average around 8-10 geese each.
