July 2008 Updates 14
25 July
North Zone Duck Report
The Holt County duck marsh was due to plant to corn, but rain continued into July, so they were forced to plant beans, which is still a very attractive feed for ducks and geese.
Many of the fields surrounding the duck marsh are planted to corn which should also draw in a lot of birds and improve the hunting.
In Linn County, our plans were to drain and plant the south half of the west marsh, but the first week of July a torrential rain flooded the Fountain Grove bottoms like we’ve never seen before. The blinds and levees on the east marsh survived the floodwater, but the west marsh took a beating.
Blind 6 washed to the south fence line. It will take some work to move it back, but at least we have it in sight to work with. The south levee has several large cuts, but it appears they are just above the over flow line, so we should be fine for the season unless something unexpected pops up.
A photo taken 7-14-08 of the south half of the west marsh, from the SW corner facing NE.
At this time, it’s too risky to drain this much water and attempt to plant, so we are keeping this marsh as is for the 08 season.
The north half of the west marsh is holding some water, but there are several cuts in the dam that must but repaired to make it huntable this fall.
We might have to resort to sand bags or some type of temporary fix because we have a completely full holding lake ready to go.
On the positive side, the repair work we did last fall on the levee around blind 4 worked and is holding water. Since the bar ditch is so deep and close to blind 4, we are going to designate this as a wade-in area and it looks real good right now.
