“mississippi flyway”

Blue-wings and September swelter mark an exceptional visit to Louisiana’s Honey Brake Lodge.

Among all the duck-hunting haunts up and down the Mississippi Flyway, a spot in the middle of a water-filled woods just south of Tunica, Miss., between the Mississippi and Coldwater rivers provides wingshooters with a glimpse of Southern tradition. This is Beaver Dam Lake, made famous not only by its fabulous fowling but by one of the South’s prominent sporting scribes, Nash Buckingham.

Formed more than two centuries ago by the largest earthquake east of the Rockies, Tennessee’s only natural lake, Reelfoot, is filled to the brim with history, local legends and perhaps the state’s best duck hunting.

After more than 30 years with the daily limit set at one bird, hunters will now be allowed two black ducks per day.

Turkey hunters have the slams. Deer hunters have wall hangers. What conquest do waterfowlers have? Try hunting all four flyways in one season—yeah, that’ll do for some accolades.

It looks prehistoric with its lanky body, pointed bill, sharp talons and 7-foot wingspan. But it’s the temperament of the sandhill crane that definitely suggests the bird should join the cast of “Jurassic Park.”

Web Managing Editor Shawn Skipper recently joined SPG Outdoors and Browning for a weekend of waterfowl hunting at Honey Brake, part of the nearly 40,000 acre Louisiana Delta Plantation. Get an inside look at his hunt with this gallery.

Wingmead is a name of Scottish origin that means “meadow of wings,” which is what the Grand Prairie of Arkansas becomes each year when ducks migrate here.

On Arkansas’ Grand Prairie mallards are cause for celebration and calling brings ’em in close.