November 6, 2025 • 47 mins
Tune in as Dr. Mike Brasher & Dr. Jerad Henson team up with meteorologists Chance Gotsch and Scott Covert. Together, they break down current weather patterns, drought conditions, and long-range forecasts—including the impact of La Niña—on waterfowl migration and habitat. Whether you're hunting in the Mid-South or tracking birds across the flyways, this episode offers expert insights to help you plan your season.
We'll discuss:
Seasonal weather shifts and how they impact waterfowl migration
Tips for tracking the best hunting conditions in your area
Expert predictions on what the next few weeks hold for duck hunters
Don’t miss this unique blend of meteorological expertise and hunting wisdom!
Our Special Guests:
Chance Gotsch – Meteorologist for ABC17, Columbia, MO
IG: [@chanceabc17] / chanceabc17
Skot Covert – Chief Meteorologist for 5News, Fayetteville/Fort Smith, AR
IG: [@skotwx] / skotwx
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Whether you're a seasoned hunter or just getting started, this episode is packed with valuable insights into the world of waterfowl hunting and conservation.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
VO (01:42):
The following episode of the DU podcast features a video
component. For the fullexperience, visit the Ducks
Unlimited channel on YouTube.Subscribe and enjoy. Can we do a
mic check, please? Everybody,welcome back to the Ducks
Unlimited podcast. I'm yourhost, doctor Mike Brasher. I'm
your host, Katie Burke. I'm yourhost, doctor Jared Henson And
I'm your host, Matt Harrison.
(02:10):
Welcome to the Ducks Unlimited podcast, the only
podcast about all thingswaterfowl. From hunting insights
to science based discussionsabout ducks, geese, and issues
affecting waterfowl and wetlandsconservation in North America.
The DU podcast, sponsored byPurina Pro Plan, the official
performance dog food of DucksUnlimited. Purina Pro Plan,
(02:31):
always advancing. Also proudlysponsored by Bird Dog Whiskey
and Cocktails. Whether you'rewinding down with your best
friend or celebrating with yourfavorite crew, Birddog brings
award winning flavor to everymoment. Enjoy responsibly.
Mike Brasher (02:57):
Hey, everyone. Welcome to Waterfowl Weather
Live from the Ducks Unlimitedstudio here at 1 Waterfowl Way
in Memphis, Tennessee. I amdoctor Mike Brazier. I'm happy
to be joined by doctor JaredHenson. It's great to have you
on one of these episodes here.
Jerad Henson (03:10):
Mike, happy to be here.
We did a few of these last yearwhere we check-in with some
experts in the meteorologicalfield to kind of give you an
update on how things may haveunfolded over the past little
while and and then moreimportantly to look ahead at
what may be coming and how thatmight affect us as duck hunters
in the field And to kind ofamplify the value of the
(03:30):
information that we get from ourguests, we have duck hunter
meteorologists with us. They'rethey're joining us again. I got
two guys from sort of the MidSouth. First, we've got Scott
Covert, who is the chiefmeteorologist with five news,
Fayetteville, Fort Smith,Arkansas. Scott, great to have
you joining us again.
Mike Brasher (03:48):
Also joining from Missouri, Chance Gott, she's
returning, to help us out againthis year. He is a meteorologist
with First Alert four k m o vout of Saint Louis, a new
destination for for for Chancethis year. But, Chance, thank
you for coming back and joiningus here on the on this this
little event. It is Halloween,so I will say happy Halloween,
(04:10):
October 31 to everyone. We had afew costumes going around here
in the workplace earlier today,and but here, we're gonna talk
about weather and ducks andkinda look out a little bit and
see what we can get excitedabout.
Jared, I know you've been you'vebeen doing your own sort of
research on on various webplatforms, and you're getting
excited about or hoping to getexcited about what may be to
(04:32):
come.
Jerad Henson (04:32):
Hoping. You look out there in that, like,
fourteen day window, and thingskinda get a little exciting. So,
you know, I don't wanna get myhopes up too much, but so I'd
love to hear what the expertshave to say. And we also did
just get a really nice weatherevent that came through kind of
at least our area, and it itbrought us some rain that was
really needed.
Mike Brasher (04:53):
Badly needed. So badly needed. Had about, like,
five consecutive days of rain.It was some heavy, but some
kinda light and consistent, andand that was that was good. So
but enough about ourunprofessional chitchat about
about what's happening with theweather.
I think we're gonna go to Chancefirst, and we wanted to talk
about sort of these prevailingconditions that we've been
(05:14):
experiencing really across, Ithink, much of North America for
the first month, two months ofthe hunting season. So, Chance,
tell us what we've been dealingwith. A lot of folks will wanna
know what has been causing that.Chance, do you have any graphics
associated with drought oranything of that nature? We were
gonna bring some of those forpeople to see here if you're if
(05:36):
you're listening to this oryeah.
Hopefully, you were able towatch and see some of the
graphics we'll be able to share.So feel free to share your
screen there whenever you want.I think we got Yeah.
Chance Gotsch (05:45):
Let me go ahead and fire this up here for you
guys. But, yeah, just threw thistogether. So, really wanna focus
on what you're seeing here fromthis is going to be looks back
off from, this is this pastspring. So, you know, a lot of
times we're thinking of breedingwaterfowl during that time of
the year. And the main thing Iwant you to pay attention to in
a sec here, we're gonna go intothe latest update, which just
(06:07):
came out yesterday morning at09:30, so it's pretty much hot
off the press here.
But the whole Western Half ofThe United States has just been
extremely dry this past spring.A lot of relief that we saw
across much of the Midwest allthe way back off to the East
towards the Atlantic. So thatwas really good news for us, and
I know they're experiencing alot of issues the last several
years up towards the Dakotas andthat area there. But when we
(06:31):
look at the latest update,there's a couple things that
really stick out. So I'm goingto go ahead and kind of scroll
down here, and we're going to gothrough this.
I mean, you look at that massivechunk that was basically over
Colorado and the Dakotas, and wewere in d three, which is just
extreme drought across a lot ofthat area, and it's carved out a
lot the last several months,which is really good. But you
(06:51):
look back towards kind of ourneck of the woods here, little
bit into the northern andsouthern part of the region
here, Missouri, Arkansas,Tennessee, Kentucky, The last
several months have been verydry. We've seen a little bit of
this erase, kind of like whatyou guys were seeing, a couple
of long standing rate eventsthat we've had. And a lot of
times when we're looking atdrought, you don't want you
(07:11):
know, you could have a threeinch rainfall within a day, but
that's not gonna solve drought.The thing that solves drought is
smaller amounts over a longerperiod of time because a lot of
that will just run right off thesurface, and they really can't
seep into the ground.
So we've seen a lot of a chunkof that eliminated. Still off to
the West, you're still seeing alot of drought. So that's
(07:33):
something that's gonna bedefinitely something that's
gonna be a little bit harder toface when you start to look back
towards the Pacific Flyway andthe western portions of the
Central. But Canada is lookingreally dry too. That's something
where I know it doesn't mattermost likely as much this time of
the year, but that's definitelysomething that we're continuing
to watch.
But there is a little bit ofgood news as we head further out
(07:53):
here, and I'm sure me and Scottwill be touching on that here in
a second for those huntersacross much of Canada and even
the Northwest. The South, thingsmight be looking a little bit
more bleak for you in terms ofthis with the rain.
Mike Brasher (08:06):
Yeah. Chance Chance, I'll jump in here a
little bit and tell you thatjust a couple of weeks ago, I
was up in Prairie Canada and andlooking at this North American
drought monitor map that you'vegot up there, you will see that
a good chunk of the PrairiePothole region is out of kinda
meteorological or hydrologicaldrought. That does not mean that
all of those wetland basins arefull of water. It had been
(08:28):
probably seven or eight yearssince I had been up to that
landscape this time of year. I'dbeen up there in the spring
periodically and seen someimproving conditions.
But this time of year, as acomparison to what I'm familiar
with, seven or eight years sinceI'd been there, I drove across
the landscape where I wasfamiliar with one of the that
Allen Hills region Southeast ofSaskatoon, and I spent an entire
(08:49):
summer there back in the latenineties doing some research.
Then the lack of water that thatarea is facing right now is just
astounding. There are so manyempty wetland basins, and it's
been that way for years hereover the past little stretch of
time. Talked to some folks andthey said, yeah, as bad as you
saw it, it has it's actuallyimproved from where it was like
(09:10):
two or three years ago. So Iknow I've talked a lot about
drought on podcast andeverything else that I do, but
to be able to see it that timeof year with a point of
reference late summer, earlyfall was just eye opening for
me, and it's no wonder thatparticular area isn't producing
ducks.
It just doesn't have the habitatright now. It's astounding. So
to your point, although this mapmay show it's out of drought,
(09:35):
that doesn't mean those wetlandbasins are full. Yeah. It's
working on saturating that soilso that they can run off into
those basins once we getadditional rainfall or snow.
Chance Gotsch (09:44):
Yeah. I feel like you said, like, I mean, you
know, three or four years ago,and that two or three year
stretch really set us back for alot of wetlands. And and we see
that here even in Missouri stillwhere it's it's gotten better,
but, I mean, it's still nowherenear where we need to be for
that long term average for a lotof the wetland areas.
Jerad Henson (10:02):
Yeah. I I kinda wanted to just jump in. Just
looking at these, and especiallysince we kinda have that Mid
South focus here, but we set upwith a really wet spring to the
Mid South. I mean, like Yeah.Had, you know, from what I
understand, you know, a year'sworth of precip by April.
Yeah. And then it got real dry.
Mike Brasher (10:20):
The faucet turned off.
Jerad Henson (10:21):
It seems like it does that.
Mike Brasher (10:23):
Seems like it is just wet, wet, wet, and then
boom.
Jerad Henson (10:25):
Shut off. I think there were some expectations
early, but but then it got realdry. So I was interested kind of
to hear what Chance and andScott had to say kind of
something about that. Yeah.
Chance Gotsch (10:36):
Well, and at this time of the year too, we look at
the fall months into earlywinter. Just on average, these
are the driest months wetypically see. So the rainfall
we've been getting is verybeneficial. I think I was
looking at a statistic. We hadclose to two inches of a deficit
of rainfall alone in August.
September was over two inches.And at the October, I mean, we
(10:57):
were at, like, almost fiveinches below where we should
have been. So really, it's kindof uncharacteristic to be seeing
the rainfall that we've beengetting recently to kind of get
us back out of there. I mean, Ithink in Missouri alone, we're
back to where we should be. Butlike you guys said, that's just
getting the ground saturated.
So that's not even gonna be alot of runoff. I mean, a lot of
that gets soaked up in this.And, yeah, definitely definitely
(11:17):
eye opening to see that. Butthis is this is a typical time
of year where we do see thatturn off, but at least we saw
some help this past spring.
Skot Covert (11:25):
Yeah.
Mike Brasher (11:25):
So, Scott, what are sorry. Chance, what else do
you have for us there?
Chance Gotsch (11:30):
Yeah. So I was gonna let Scott here in a bit,
I'll kinda go into a little bitmore of the long range forecast.
But Scott, I think, is gonnacover a little bit more in-depth
on our expected Enzo cycle
Mike Brasher (11:42):
Okay.
Chance Gotsch (11:42):
And what that means in kinda historic data on
that.
Mike Brasher (11:44):
Okay. That sounds that sounds good. You know, in
addition to what I will say tojump in here, are we how is our
screen sharing here first chanceso we can get it over to Scott
whenever we're ready there? Butyeah. The other thing that we
have been experiencing here thefirst couple of months has been
above average temperatures.
That was one of the themes thatI've heard from a lot of people.
(12:07):
Yeah. When it was up inSaskatchewan, what was it? Yeah.
Two weeks ago, or was it lastweek?
Yeah. It was last week, and had60 degree temperatures. It was
pleasant. It was great.
Jerad Henson (12:17):
I I have pink tomatoes ripening on the vine in
my backyard. Yeah.
Mike Brasher (12:21):
That's right. One of them was telling me that
their their tomatoes are still
Jerad Henson (12:25):
Yeah.
Mike Brasher (12:25):
And I think it was Frank Baldwin out of Winnipeg.
Yep. Yep. So it has been aboveaverage normal temperatures
throughout I mean, all the wayup, and I think pretty much
across the board. The otherthing that has happened recently
is had a couple of weathersystems move in.
Chance, you you mentioned one ofthose that had affected us here
in the in the Mid South, but thefolks in the Northeast certainly
(12:47):
welcomed that as well becausethey had been also enduring
extreme drought. So I know theywere happy to receive all that
rain as well. If you're a duckhunter, it means you can get
more more water for
Jerad Henson (12:58):
Yeah.
Mike Brasher (12:58):
For for your habit for duck habitat, more places to
hunt as well. So we're happyabout that. So, with that,
Scott, I think, yeah, we'regoing to jump over to you now
and we'll talk about sort ofmore winter forecasts,
predictions, prognosticationsbased on some of these larger
climatological cycles. So takeus through that.
Skot Covert (13:20):
Yeah. So I think it's first really beneficial to
start the conversation with thedifference between a
deterministic forecast and aprobabilistic. So deterministic
is gonna be just the same thingyou see on a ten day forecast on
a 10:00 news. It's gonna be whatyou see on on your phone apps.
It's gonna be specific numbers,whether that's temperatures or
(13:40):
or rain chances.
And we're really not gonna beable to talk those numbers
today. At this range, we canonly look at probabilistic
information. That gives us anidea. We're gonna be reading the
tea leaves in layman's terms.That's about the good the best
we can get when it comes tothese long range forecast.
So just keep that in mind as wekinda dive into some of this
(14:01):
data. You know, we're we'rehaving a very similar
conversation that we did lastyear. Last year, we were pretty
dry area wide. Certainly down inthe Mid South, the Mississippi
flyaway, other areas pretty dryout there as well. And also last
year, I'm I'm recalling we weretalking about La Nina.
There was a likelihood that LaNina would emerge, and, there
(14:23):
would be some benefits. Therewould be some some negatives to
La Nina kinda depending on whereyou're at across the continent.
And we're having the sameconversation again this year. I
would say the difference though,last year, we were anticipating
La Nina. A lot of the weathermodels suggested a weak La Nina
would emerge, and it reallydidn't until late late late in
the season.
(14:43):
Oh, I think it might have beenthe like the week season went
out. So like late January.Difference this year is La
Nina's emerged. It's here andit's it's weak, but it's here.
And it's expected to be a shortduration La Nina, meaning it
probably runs through December,January, February before
dissipating at that point.
So with with the table set, wegot La Nina. What is it? Just
(15:05):
coming up as a refresher. We'retalking about some trade winds
pushing back off towards thewest on the Equatorial Pacific
Ocean. Why in the heck does thatmatter to duck hunters across
North America?
Well, all of weather is dictatedby ocean circulations. Those
ocean circulations are gonna bedictated by how cool or how warm
the temperatures of the oceanare, and that really displaces
(15:27):
or moves the jet stream. The jetstream is the moneymaker. Right?
It's the one that brings theseweather systems through the
area.
And when that jet stream or I'lloften think of it as kind of
like a railroad track for stormsystems. When that gets moved,
weather patterns of course aregonna get moved there as well.
Typical La Nina, and a big biggiant asterisk on the word
typical. A typical La Nina kindalooks like this. Pacific
(15:49):
Northwest gets pretty wet.
Some of those wet conditions doextend into parts of Canada as
well. Upper Midwest, generallyspeaking, is probably gonna be
pretty cold. You get into theDeep South and you're looking at
drier than normal patterns,oftentimes warm as well. And
there is a part of the GreatLakes that can see some above
average precipitation. Now, tobe clear, you look at this map
(16:10):
and you're thinking, okay, I'min purple, I'm in dry.
That's not necessarily gonnamean you don't get any rain at
all. Right? Again, this isprobabilistic. All this means is
at the end of the season, whenyou tally it up and and you run
the average, you're gonna beprobably looking at less rain
than you typically pick up. Orwhen it comes to temperatures,
if you're in a warm zone in atypical La Nina, it means the
(16:32):
odds are stacked in a directionthat would lead to some above
average temperatures.
I think the key takeaway thoughis there's no such thing as a
typical La Nina. They're alldifferent in their own right.
Some of them are stronger, someof them are weaker. This one's
weaker. From what we can tellright now in some of the the
model data.
So you can take a look at theseasonal forecast that NOAA puts
(16:55):
out. They released this onOctober 16, so just a couple of
weeks ago. They are gonna updateit once a month. So we do
anticipate it'll be probablyabout the November. November.
It's always on a Thursday.They'll update this, but this is
kinda what they put out withregards to temperatures for
December, January, February. Itkind of resembles typical La
(17:17):
Nina in some fashion when itcomes to temperatures, when it
comes to precipitation. It alsohas a pretty good semblance of
of a typical La Nina. Now, letme just go abundantly clear
here.
The experts at NOAA, the climateprediction center, are the best
of the best. They're reallyreally really really good, and
I'm not gonna criticize theirwork. They have a lot more
(17:37):
degrees hanging on the wall thanI could ever even imagine. With
that said, you can look at someof the historical forecasts that
they've produced. I know there'sa lot of crazy colors on your
screen right now.
I'll walk you through it andmake some sense of this. When
you look at some of theirhistorical forecasts, which is
gonna be on the left side of
Mike Brasher (17:57):
Well, we I guess Noah didn't like what Scott was
about to say.
Jerad Henson (18:03):
Kidding. I lost Scott's
Mike Brasher (18:04):
on first page. So we still have his video. Maybe
we don't have his audio. We willwe'll try to get that back. Got
you.
Yep. We got your video. And sowhat do I wanna what I had a lot
of thoughts running through myhead there. I really appreciated
the graphic that we were aboutto get to there. It was pretty
(18:25):
cool because it does get to thisissue of typical and average,
and you can't one year, even ifyou've got the same kind of
strength of a La Nina or an ElNino, it's not gonna it mean
that you're gonna experience thesame conditions that you did in
a previous
Jerad Henson (18:40):
year Yeah. Regardless of where you
Mike Brasher (18:43):
one good thing that I was a little bit excited
about was there were somepredictions of a tendency for
well, I shouldn't saypredictions. There was a
tendency for there to be a bitmore moisture up there in those
northern latitudes, breedingareas, the prairies, so forth
during these years.
Jerad Henson (18:58):
We need that fall moisture going into a freeze.
Mike Brasher (19:00):
Fall moisture, we need spring moisture, and then
we need it to continue into thesummer. Right. Yeah. That's what
we need. And so, hopefully, he'sgonna be able to deliver that
for us whenever he he comesback.
Chance, do we still have you?
Chance Gotsch (19:13):
Yeah. Yeah. I'm still here. Can you guys hear me
okay?
Mike Brasher (19:15):
We can hear you. Yep. You got anything to offer
here? I'm sure you do.
Chance Gotsch (19:19):
Yeah. Yeah. I'll kinda let Scott come back once
he gets his audio right onexactly the point he was getting
to. But I can honestly, if youguys are cool with it, go to the
a little bit more now futureforecast if you guys are alright
with that. Been going to theeight to fourteen day away.
Mike Brasher (19:36):
Yeah. Let's do that. Let's do that. Let's go
ahead and eight to fourteen day,and then we'll come back when we
get Scott's Scott's audio fixed.
Chance Gotsch (19:45):
Okay. Yeah. So here's kind of what we're
looking at right now. There'stwo different things. We always
typically when we look attemperature and we look at
precipitation, and Scott kind ofalluded to this earlier, there's
three means that we typicallylook at it.
We look at above, near, andbelow average. That's kind of
the general consensus when we goso far out with these things.
(20:07):
You guys mentioned it's been alittle bit on the warmer side,
and a lot of our trends rightnow, I mean, even
Jerad Henson (20:14):
here in Missouri, typically our average afternoon
highs around 63, 62 degrees.That'll continue to fall to
Chance Gotsch (20:19):
the upper fifties until late next week. We're
gonna be looking at Wednesday ofnext week close to 70 degrees,
and most of the country is gonnabe kind of all in this realm. So
that's not saying we can't haveone or two little cold systems,
but as an average for thatextended period of time, eight
to fourteen days away, most ofthe country, I
Jerad Henson (20:37):
know Missouri actually opens up a lot
Chance Gotsch (20:39):
of their season tomorrow, is gonna be looking at
a warmer kickoff here,especially if that's when you're
starting out now. So it's gonnabe a pattern here that's going
to hold above average for thosetemperatures. On top of that,
we're going be looking a littlebit drier across much of the Mid
Continent area. Good news is tothe Northwest, and you're going
to hear this reoccurring themehere in the future when we look
(21:00):
again at the extended outlooksfor winter. The Northwest, the
Northeast, and the Southeast aregonna be looking wetter than
average.
And that's a lot of times has todo with these high pressure
systems. So there's twodifferent things we look at
whenever we look at these maps.So you can kind of see here, and
you saw when we were looking atScottsMap just earlier, we're
(21:20):
looking at pressure systems alot of times to give us these
forecasts on, hey, is it goingto be drier, or is it going to
be wetter? And when we'relooking at it, that polar jet
stream that you saw there, a lotof times, whenever it's gonna be
basic weather, not much change,a lot of times that can be
associated with, near or drierthan average conditions. We see
those jet streams what we callzonal flow.
(21:43):
So it basically goes straightfrom east to west. Right? So
there's not much of a wave init. But when we start seeing the
jet streams become wavy anddandy, that's when we start to
see a more active system. So wehave a high pressure system
across much of the Midwest andthe Central Plains and even the
Deep South, South Central areathere where we're gonna see high
pressure.
It's not gonna move too much,within the next two weeks here,
(22:06):
and that that's gonna lead tomost likely seeing those below
average trends. So not as muchrainfall, particularly, most
likely not snow. With that beingsaid, I know a lot of Midwest
this weekend is gonna be lookingcool. So that's a good good
thing for any Missouri huntersand, any areas nearby here, in
the Mississippi Flyway and eventhe Eastern central portions of
(22:27):
the region. So that's the goodnews there.
But the warmer temperatures,kinda like Scott was mentioning,
I'm gonna go ahead and
Jerad Henson (22:33):
shift kind of into those maps that you've
Chance Gotsch (22:34):
shown here. It's a little squishy here. Let's
see. So this was the three monthaverage. So Scott was showing
you December, January, andFebruary.
That's our typical winterseason. Here's what we're
looking at from November,December, to January. So we're
kind of easing into what couldseem like more of a La Nina
condition. So what that means isa lot of the South, you kind of
split The United States in halfand you focus that South, most
(22:58):
likely going to see warmer thanaverage temperatures. Now that's
an average, so that doesn't meanthat we're necessarily going to
be looking at you know, we couldhave a couple cold events that
still spur in there, butoverall, you're most likely
going to be hunting warmertemperatures than what we
typically see this time of theyear.
The good news is if you're upnorth right now where a lot of
the migration still is, it'sgonna be near where it should
(23:20):
be. And then we start to followthat pattern a little bit deeper
into the actual extent of theforecast, and you kinda start to
see the cooler temperaturescreep south with the extended
outlook. And what Scott was alsoshowing with La Nina, this is
the forecast from NOAA and theNational Weather Service. This
(23:40):
is very very much a traditionalaverage La Nina system setup.
And there is some support tothat with what we call the QBO,
which is quasi binennial binebimeonial oscillation,
basically.
And what that shows is it'sbasically two patterns, and this
one is pretty on top of it, interms of these two patterns,
(24:02):
where we have fourteen monthsusually where we're gonna be
seeing easterly trade winds andthen fourteen months of westerly
trade winds. And what that meansbasically and how that affects
you is whenever we start to seethe easterly in on typical years
of La Nina, that gives us morethan likely this pattern. It
gives us better chances of this.And a lot of times what that
could mean too is that polar jetstream that Scott was alluding
(24:24):
to and showing, it it becomes alittle bit more wavy. And what
that means is you can buy in thecooler air with wetter air for
much of the Mississippi Flywayoff to the north, and you can
see it here come into play.
That typically means that you'regonna get wetter and cooler
conditions, which oftentimes,when you have cold air and
wetter conditions, you have youhave a little bit more snow. So
(24:47):
things are looking, I would say,a little bit later on into the
season, December, January,February, things are looking a
lot better in terms of activeweather patterns across much of
the Northern United States. Offto the south, this doesn't mean
you have bad hunting. Right?Let's let's make that clear.
You gotta think it's cooler upnorth. Yes. It's warmer down
here, but when it's cooler upnorth, ducks gotta go south.
(25:07):
Mhmm. So that's that'sdefinitely gonna be something
good.
And I foresee this being a yearwhere, because of the QBO and
the La Nina, that interaction,where we're gonna have some
pretty impressive events, interms of, like, some pretty good
cold snaps, and we're gonna goback and forth a lot, which a
lot of times it gets the ducksmoving, so that's a good thing.
VO (25:35):
Stay tuned to the Ducks Unlimited podcast, sponsored by
Purina Pro Plan and Bird DogWhiskey after these messages.
Mike Brasher (27:33):
So one of the questions that I wanna ask here
sort of in response to chance,what he was showing and talking
about, Scott, it also relates toobviously what what you're
talking about these largercycles or climatological
patterns. You know, we we'llhear a lot about polar vortex
disruptions, that super cold airthat's sort of circulating at
(27:53):
the at the pole. So also kindaas we're going through this,
talk about what we know on therelative likelihood of more
frequent or less frequent, youknow, the incident instances of
those types of of developmentsoccurring?
Skot Covert (28:08):
You know, I think that's a a really good question,
and I I it ties perfectly intothe same conversation we had
last year. You look at thesetypical La Nina patterns, you
would think, oh my goodness.We're not gonna get a single
cold front, or it's not gonnarain. It's gonna be dry the
whole thing. No.
Not necessarily. That was thethe broad picture we painted
last year, knowing still wewould probably see a a a polar
(28:30):
vortex spin off a time or two,and that happened. I mean, I,
gosh, I lost a couple of days atleast last season because
everything was locked up. Theygot so cold this far south. I
would suspect that happensagain.
I I think, just because we're ina weak La Nina and and there's a
lot of orange and red on themaps, that doesn't necessarily
mean we're not gonna have somebig cold snaps. I think that's a
(28:51):
real likelihood for many of us.It's just a matter of how long
do they last. And still in theend, when you have several above
normal days, which still isgonna be cold. Right?
If the normal high is 40 and,you hit 43 and still counts as
above normal, not gonna makemuch of a difference more than
likely to your hunting successor not. It's just in the end, we
(29:14):
look at those averages. I thinkthe polar vortex spin off is is
likely at least once. I wouldn'teven roll out twice or even
three times. Okay.
Chance Gotsch (29:22):
Yeah. And I think that lines up pretty well with
even the QBO. A lot of times,that's what we see. You know,
you just you see it get reallywavy in the atmosphere. And like
Scott's saying, that typicallymeans we will see a few of those
active events.
Yeah.
Skot Covert (29:37):
And, you know, you look at some of these historical
winter forecasts, and I was notgoing to say anything negative
about NOAA because let me tellyou, I love him. I love him to
death. And right now, they'renot getting paid. So I I so I'm
really not gonna knock somebodythat's not getting a paycheck
Yeah. And they're still showingup to work.
You'll look at some of thisversus on the left versus what
(29:59):
actually happened those winterson the right.
Mike Brasher (30:02):
Hey. Hey, Scott. Let me clear. Scott, let me jump
in here. Yeah.
I'm not seeing your screen rightnow. We saw it a minute ago, but
we lost that share feed. Sobefore you Okay. Yep. Now we So
got the comparisons that you'retrying to make, so go for it.
Skot Covert (30:17):
Yeah. So what what was forecast on the left, what
actually happened on the right,there's a bit of a warm bias in
these seasonal forecasts,meaning their forecasts are
generally a little bit warmer onaverage than what actually ends
up happening. Now there arecertainly some years where they
nailed it, and then there areother analog years such as 2020
through 2021. You can see, wow.That actually didn't happen even
(30:41):
remotely close to what waspredicted.
So you might be looking at thismap and thinking, oh my
goodness. It's another reallybone dry, winter, and we're not
gonna have any cool weather. Iwouldn't I wouldn't believe that
for a second. I I think we'regonna have plenty of of fronts
to come through. And so I justwanted to point that out to say
these seasonal forecasts are notthe gospel, and they're not
(31:03):
perfect by any stretch of theimagination.
Jerad Henson (31:06):
Yeah. Yeah. There were two things on there on
those maps that got me excitedas a duck hunter. Number one,
I'm a Mid South duck hunter, sothat that puts moisture and some
weather up north. Right?
So that's that's exciting. Butthat also means ducks are gonna
move up and down the flyway. Theother thing I saw at some of the
later maps you always told inthe preset, there seems to be
some moisture in Canadathroughout the winter. And so
Mike Brasher (31:27):
Long range forecast?
Jerad Henson (31:28):
Yeah. Long range Predictions. But but there's
potential there.
Mike Brasher (31:31):
And so rather see the green than the red.
Jerad Henson (31:34):
That's it. Right? Right. And so, you know, I'm a
duck hunter, eternal optimisteternal optimist here. So but so
seeing
Skot Covert (31:41):
that, that's something I want
Jerad Henson (31:42):
to talk about.
Skot Covert (31:42):
More green. K. Yeah. I'll I'll show you a
little bit more green. I I don'tknow if, our producer can pull
that up.
Yeah. Perfect. So, you know, youcan look at these models, and
you can see what the normal LaNina and the normal El Nino. I I
don't really care a lot aboutthat. I wanna know what recent
well, I call them analogs.
What are some recent wintersthat had similar conditions that
are are weak La Nina? So Ipulled that composite together.
(32:06):
So this is gonna be from severalwinters that had similar
characteristics at this point inthe year, '96 to '97, 2001. Many
years, you can see those dateslisted up at the top of the
screen. This is the temperatureanomaly.
How did La Nina affecttemperature compared to average
versus normal? And and for thenorthern part of the country,
there's there's a lot of blue upthere. It was a little bit
(32:28):
colder than normal, and thatextended even into the mid
latitudes as well. Now you doget in the Eastern flyaway, the
Deep South, and and you'retrending a little bit above
average by a degree to two whenit's all said and done. You look
at these maps and you'rethinking, what are those lines?
And those are climate districts.They're not counties. They're
climate districts, and most theaverage person has no clue what
(32:51):
they are, but that's what thoseweird shapes are. When you look
at precipitation in the samelens, well, Liquella Nino often
leads to around normal or aboveaverage to the north. There's a
lot of light on there, whichwould indicate some normal
precipitation patterns.
Meanwhile, you get into the DeepSouth, a good chunk of Texas,
Oklahoma, the East Coast. Yeah.Yeah. There's some climate
districts that that generallysuffer a little bit less
(33:14):
precipitation. Not always.
Right? But this is using all ofthe analogs dating back to the
nineties of years that mightgive us some clues as to what we
might be embarking on, goinginto the next little bit. You
like blue. I heard you likeblue, so I got a little bit more
blue for you where it mattersthe most. So this is taking, the
(33:34):
European model.
It's it's one of the majorglobal models that James and I
rely on a lot. It's just onemodel. It's one of many that are
gonna have a little bitdifferent idea of kind of how
things shake out. This ishistorically what we see in
terms of snowfall as we'retransitioning into a weak La
Nina winter, just snowfall.Right?
So you look up in the Dakotas,and, of course, you don't see
(33:57):
Canada on the screen, but Ithink you can extrapolate out
that certainly in the thesouthern portion of the Prairies
at least, you're probablylooking at above average snow
conditions when it's all saidand done. Now you get into the
Deep South, we don't get a lotof snow to begin with, but those
odds are probably gonna be alittle bit lower where those
brown numbers are at.
Mike Brasher (34:17):
Now that was pretty cool. And so I found
myself sort of looking at thatfirst map, the composite sort of
temperature anomaly, and lookcold up down right there. Cold
up in the Northern Tier statesand Pacific Northwest, and then
it's above average down here inthe Southeastern all across the
Atlantic Flyway. And I foundmyself thinking, okay, how will
(34:40):
that affect me as a duck hunterif I'm hunting the Mid South,
South Atlantic, and even intoTexas? I mean, it may be a good
thing in terms of getting somemovement of birds out of the
prairies, out of those northernlatitudes, but then it might
mean that when we get down here,if we don't have a lot of I
mean, if overall ourtemperatures are above average,
that means we're gonna haveducks that aren't gonna have a
(35:00):
whole lot of reason to move,find a lot of food, you know,
for Right.
Regulatory demands, that type ofstuff. So it leads to this idea
of stale ducks kinda more timesthan not, if that be the case.
So that made me wonder, well,what's the precipitation gonna
do? It might be a situationwhere you would be looking to
hunt on those not not hunting somuch based on the temperature
(35:20):
changes, but availability of newof new rainfall
Jerad Henson (35:24):
Right.
Mike Brasher (35:24):
And and new habitat. So
Jerad Henson (35:25):
And when you get stale ducks, it's one the things
we talk about a lot. The onlyway to make a stale duck, a
smart duck move is change thelandscape.
Mike Brasher (35:33):
Yeah.
Jerad Henson (35:33):
You have to change the game. They find that safe
pattern. They stay on it
Skot Covert (35:36):
Yep.
Jerad Henson (35:36):
Until water on the landscape changes, whether it's
it shows up new or it freezessolid. Yeah. Hard water helps
too, but doesn't look likethat's gonna
Skot Covert (35:45):
be the case
Jerad Henson (35:45):
too much down there.
Skot Covert (35:46):
You just described my season last year perfectly in
Chance Gotsch (35:50):
two sentences.
Mike Brasher (35:52):
Yeah. Chance, any anything to add to that that
wonderful set of graphics andsort of descriptions we were
thinking about there?
Chance Gotsch (35:59):
Yeah. No. Scott I think Scott nailed it right on
the head. It it's a lot of goodstuff. I I feel like this season
compared to, you know, the lastseveral seasons that we've seen
outlook wise, I feel like it's agood thing that we're seeing, at
least across much of the area.
I mean, we'd love to see morerain across the South, but you
look across much of the Northand those breeding grounds. And,
you know, we're always thinkingabout, hey, let's get to next
(36:21):
breeding season. So getting thatarea from Canada, the Prairie
Pothole Region reloaded on rainand snow earlier can only help
us in that long term extent. SoI think this is a good thing for
much of the waterfowl or waterthat we're going to be seeing
across the north, which is goingto be beneficial. And, know, you
a lot of times you think aboutit, a lot of the river basins
are going to be flowing fromnorth to south.
(36:42):
So, yes, it's going be drier tothe south, but, you know, the
Mississippi, when you get offtowards Boothill in Missouri and
down towards Louisiana and allthat, that's a very important
thing to have filled up. And sothe fact that we're gonna be
seeing better chances of rain tothe north, I don't think it's
necessarily a bad thing, and Ithink it's a good thing. And
like you guys said, when we havethe cooler temperatures to the
north, ducks gotta pusheventually down south.
Jerad Henson (37:04):
Yeah. Yeah. I might emphasize too for those
that are in those areas that arepredicted to be slightly drier
and slightly warmer, gettingwater when you can get it is
gonna be important. Yeah. Mhmm.
And and finding those permanentwater sources, those are ducks
you're gonna key in on.
Mike Brasher (37:17):
Yep. So I know we've talked a little bit about
sort of longer range forecast.Chance, I think you were
covering sort of eight, fourteenday forecast. You might have
covered something even in themore immediate immediate future,
but I was trying to payattention to a few other things.
It might have been a little bitdistracted.
So for those like, we're here inthe South. Right? Our duck
(37:38):
hunting season is still and fora lot of states, their their
hunting season doesn't openuntil later on this month. So
we've still got some time to beoptimistic about some magical
combination of weather eventsthat's gonna really change
everything and make just a grandoccurrence of ducks show up. Now
the one thing I will say is evenwhen those ducks do show up down
here, they're gonna be welleducated because we don't
(38:00):
anticipate there have been a lotof production this year, and
then those ducks will have beeneducated by all the states that
get to hunt at them and get toshoot at them before us.
So some additional challengesfor us down here regardless of
how far you go. But yeah. Soanything for those those people
that are in the middle of theirhunting season up in the Midwest
a matter of fact, I'm gonna behunting up around the Great
(38:21):
Lakes next week. I'm kind ofanticipating anticipating maybe
doing more fishing than hunting,kind of but but I hope I'm wrong
on that, But they got goodfishing prospects even if that's
the case. So anything in thevery near term that we can get
excited about or, you know,across some of those areas that
are currently open?
Skot Covert (38:41):
Short answer is no.
Mike Brasher (38:42):
No. Nothing there. I I that's I disappointing.
Yeah.
Skot Covert (38:46):
I it kinda depends on where you're at. Look. If
you're you're in the PacificFlyway and you're in Northern
California and points towardsthe the border, yeah, you're
gonna have a decent amount ofrain, probably some active
weather patterns that are gonnapull some fronts through the
area, but, a good chunk of thecountry is gonna be dominated by
some high pressure through atleast the November. And, you
(39:08):
know, at that point, highpressure is gonna suppress a lot
of meaningful rain chances. Iwould say a good chunk of the
country is gonna see belowaverage rain chances between now
and, let's say, November 13 orso.
Jerad Henson (39:20):
Yeah. Yeah. One of the so one of the weather apps I
use, because that's how youcould tell a duck hunter really
quick is how many weather appsare on your phone. Because
Mike Brasher (39:27):
I'm I'm interested to see where you go
Jerad Henson (39:29):
Because
Mike Brasher (39:29):
because I've been looking at some things because
Jerad Henson (39:31):
I looked at one of mine that it will predict out
fourteen days or so, fifteendays, and it'll make it to
November 14 on that timeline.And both the global model and
the European model bothpredicted a little bit of a
front coming through on November14. You heard it from no
Mike Brasher (39:47):
chance. Jared Hinson.
Jerad Henson (39:48):
Both of them had it in the predictions. I'm not
saying anything. I'm not ameteorologist. I'm just looking
at one of one of these appsthat's giving me an optimistic
viewpoint. But Yeah.
Mike Brasher (40:01):
I I looked at a few forecast as well.
Jerad Henson (40:03):
Both the models talked about that. So That
Mike Brasher (40:05):
that's good. And so I I have several places that
that I that I save in thedifferent apps, and I look at
the north of us, one of them isis Saskatoon Mhmm. Saskatchewan.
And you look at the temperaturesover the next four fourteen ten,
fourteen days, and they justit's just a steady drop. You
know, it's not there are noforecast major fronts that come
(40:28):
through during that time.
It's just like the temperatures,the highs, and the lows are just
following those seasonaldeclines, but they're still
running about six to eightdegrees above average for both
the lows and the highs, but it'sthere's nothing significant in
the immediate future that isgonna drop those substantially
except maybe something right outthere. That's one of the reasons
(40:49):
why we wanted to push thisepisode as late as we could
during this week, is becausehopefully, you know, we would
have seen something develop outtwo weeks off, but Yeah. Yep.
Got something to maybe give someoptimism.
Chance Gotsch (41:01):
Yeah. I haven't seen
Skot Covert (41:02):
things change.
Jerad Henson (41:03):
Mean, this is gonna
Skot Covert (41:04):
be an active weather pattern. It's there's
gonna be some rapid changes.Yeah. The next two weeks
probably not looking the bestoverall, but I I I know it's
anecdotal, but gosh, last year,I'd spent all summer working on
on the the the family farm, youknow, planting millet, taking
care of all kinds of stuff, andand then it was just bone dry.
(41:26):
The second half of the summerinto the fall, you know,
everything I'd planted dead.
I got nothing going for me. Andthen a week before season
starts, we get 10 inches ofrain, and then that hole was
filled up, more so than I wasprepared for. So I I think
they're gonna change. It justmay not be early enough to put
some early water on thelandscape. Right.
(41:47):
Yep. Yeah.
Chance Gotsch (41:48):
I think what we got just recently was probably
the best we're going get forquite a bit of time. Even
looking, I think I was lookingout here next Friday, and, you
know, stuff gets a
Jerad Henson (41:56):
lot more limited. We do a ten day forecast here,
but
Chance Gotsch (41:58):
when you get out there, a lot could change. I
mean, I think we have 20% chancehere in Missouri for next
Friday. That's the next systemthat we really see, across
Midwest. And even then, it'sit's just not a big rain event.
So it's it's looking a littlebit more bleak for for rain and
in terms of, overall trends.
It's very similar, very steady.We talked about that high
pressure system, which basicallypaints a perfect picture right
(42:20):
here in that precip outlookScott Scott pointed up. And it's
basically just going to covermuch of the Central United
States, and not much changehappens across much of the area.
But if you're off to theNorthwest and the Northeast
where Northeast, AtlanticNortheast, they've seen a decent
amount of rain, even the systemthat they have currently. So
you're probably looking greatright now into the early season
going into about mid season justby what you have there.
(42:40):
But much of the Central UnitedStates, it's it's looking a
little bit more bleak in termsof rainfall.
Jerad Henson (42:46):
Yeah. And I will I will
Skot Covert (42:47):
There's also one other wildcard. Ahead, doctor
Jared.
Jerad Henson (42:50):
No. I was I was just gonna say quickly, I'll
preface that front I was talkingabout was in Canada and the,
like, Dakotas.
Mike Brasher (42:57):
That's where it has that's where it starts.
Jerad Henson (42:59):
That's that's
Skot Covert (43:00):
where it
Jerad Henson (43:00):
start. So it wasn't down here. It was up
there. It was it was some acooler cooler system.
Mike Brasher (43:06):
So Don't crawl fish now. Don't backtrack on
your on
Jerad Henson (43:08):
your I didn't backtrack. It's I mean, I get
excited when a weather frontcomes through. It's it's
probably gonna push some whitegeese
Skot Covert (43:14):
this way,
Jerad Henson (43:14):
for sure, because it's gonna be
Chance Gotsch (43:15):
timely for that.
Skot Covert (43:18):
You know, there's there's one other wildcard that,
you know, it's really tough topredict this at this range, but
we still have a a full month,literally a month from today of
hurricane season. No one likes ahurricane making landfall. No
one wants the devastation ordestruction. That aside, at
times, it can bring somemeaningful rainfall along the
(43:40):
Gulf States, even far inland,and, of course, on the East
Coast as well. You know, at thispoint, that window's closing,
but I I wouldn't rule out sometropical moisture, which could
be a significant game changer ifthat were to happen for at least
parts of the area.
Yeah.
Jerad Henson (43:56):
Did you have I was just gonna say, yeah, I can
remember some of those eventswhere, you know, hurricane hit
the Gulf Coast in September,October, and it put an awful lot
of water Yeah. All the way up,even up into to the Boothill,
Missouri.
Mike Brasher (44:09):
We don't ever wanna we don't ever wanna
necessarily hope for one ofthose. Certainly, we've seen.
Right. Seeing what folks down inJamaica are going through, and
that is just devastatingsituation there.
Jerad Henson (44:18):
Worst case scenario.
Mike Brasher (44:19):
Absolutely horrible to see some of those
images coming out of there. Justamazing. I know you guys have
been glued to the TV and all ofyour forecast and all the
different applications that youhave. Just an absolutely I mean,
just a a force of nature. Imean, that was we're kinda
getting off track here, but Iknow that we were all if you're
interested in meteorology or anykind of weather, those were just
some unbelievable, anunbelievable storm, unbelievable
(44:43):
impact, and, yeah, our thoughtsand hearts go out and prayers go
out to all the folks down there.
But, I mean, you guys must havejust had some incredible
discussions about about what wasunfolding there.
Skot Covert (44:57):
Yeah. The the science is is remarkable and
amazing, but it's really toughto appreciate the science and
the tools that we have knowingthe impact it's actually having
on places like Jamaica. Yeah.You you hate to see it, but at
the same time, it it is kind ofawe inspiring to see the power
of Mother Nature.
Mike Brasher (45:15):
Yeah. Well, we are going to wrap this up. Jared, do
you have anything else tocontribute here right now?
Jerad Henson (45:21):
I think that's it right now.
Mike Brasher (45:22):
We're getting excited. We wanted to get
something out to folks who letpeople know we're gonna continue
to do these periodicallythroughout the year. Think they
were well received. We had somegood engagement and some good
comments and feedback, andhopefully we'll have some
significant events weather wisethat can influence hunting
success across the country thatwe'll be able to talk about this
(45:42):
year. We'll bring those to youas they develop.
We've got a couple of othermeteorologists that we're trying
to connect with. Mandy with uslast year, and I think she's
gonna try to rejoin us on asubsequent episode of this. I
believe she was out hunting orjust getting back from hunting.
Mandy, if you are
Chance Gotsch (45:58):
An elk hunting.
Mike Brasher (45:59):
Elk hunting. So Mandy, if you happen to be
watching this, we miss you. Hopeyou had success on that hunt,
and we are gonna be connectingwith you here in the future. So,
Chance Gotch, meteorologist withFirst Alert for KMOV out of
Saint Louis. Thank you so muchfor sharing your time and
expertise with us here again.
Chance Gotsch (46:18):
Yeah. Thanks for having me. Always a pleasure,
and hopefully everybody has agood safe season. I mean, I know
that some of the early outlooksare a little bit bleak, but like
Scott said, there's a lot thatcan come, and one event is all
it takes to completely changeyour luck.
Mike Brasher (46:29):
That's right. And then Scott Covert, chief
meteorologist with five news outof Fayetteville, Fort Smith,
Arkansas. Scott, thank you aswell, and and good luck to you
as you get out and get huntingin the next several weeks.
Skot Covert (46:41):
Sure do. Appreciate it.
Mike Brasher (46:43):
Also thanks to my guest host here, Doctor. Jared
Henson. Thanks to our producer,Chris Isaac. Thanks our
assistance over here, CaseyMesserly. Thanks to everybody
for tuning in.
Happy hunting. Happy Halloween.Stay safe out there. And life is
short. You better hunt.
VO (47:02):
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(02:10):
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Mike Brasher (02:57):
Hey, everyone. Welcome to Waterfowl Weather
Live from the Ducks Unlimitedstudio here at 1 Waterfowl Way
in Memphis, Tennessee. I amdoctor Mike Brazier. I'm happy
to be joined by doctor JaredHenson. It's great to have you
on one of these episodes here.
Jerad Henson (03:10):
Mike, happy to be here.
We did a few of these last yearwhere we check-in with some
experts in the meteorologicalfield to kind of give you an
update on how things may haveunfolded over the past little
while and and then moreimportantly to look ahead at
what may be coming and how thatmight affect us as duck hunters
in the field And to kind ofamplify the value of the
(03:30):
information that we get from ourguests, we have duck hunter
meteorologists with us. They'rethey're joining us again. I got
two guys from sort of the MidSouth. First, we've got Scott
Covert, who is the chiefmeteorologist with five news,
Fayetteville, Fort Smith,Arkansas. Scott, great to have
you joining us again.
Mike Brasher (03:48):
Also joining from Missouri, Chance Gott, she's
returning, to help us out againthis year. He is a meteorologist
with First Alert four k m o vout of Saint Louis, a new
destination for for for Chancethis year. But, Chance, thank
you for coming back and joiningus here on the on this this
little event. It is Halloween,so I will say happy Halloween,
(04:10):
October 31 to everyone. We had afew costumes going around here
in the workplace earlier today,and but here, we're gonna talk
about weather and ducks andkinda look out a little bit and
see what we can get excitedabout.
Jared, I know you've been you'vebeen doing your own sort of
research on on various webplatforms, and you're getting
excited about or hoping to getexcited about what may be to
(04:32):
come.
Jerad Henson (04:32):
Hoping. You look out there in that, like,
fourteen day window, and thingskinda get a little exciting. So,
you know, I don't wanna get myhopes up too much, but so I'd
love to hear what the expertshave to say. And we also did
just get a really nice weatherevent that came through kind of
at least our area, and it itbrought us some rain that was
really needed.
Mike Brasher (04:53):
Badly needed. So badly needed. Had about, like,
five consecutive days of rain.It was some heavy, but some
kinda light and consistent, andand that was that was good. So
but enough about ourunprofessional chitchat about
about what's happening with theweather.
I think we're gonna go to Chancefirst, and we wanted to talk
about sort of these prevailingconditions that we've been
(05:14):
experiencing really across, Ithink, much of North America for
the first month, two months ofthe hunting season. So, Chance,
tell us what we've been dealingwith. A lot of folks will wanna
know what has been causing that.Chance, do you have any graphics
associated with drought oranything of that nature? We were
gonna bring some of those forpeople to see here if you're if
(05:36):
you're listening to this oryeah.
Hopefully, you were able towatch and see some of the
graphics we'll be able to share.So feel free to share your
screen there whenever you want.I think we got Yeah.
Chance Gotsch (05:45):
Let me go ahead and fire this up here for you
guys. But, yeah, just threw thistogether. So, really wanna focus
on what you're seeing here fromthis is going to be looks back
off from, this is this pastspring. So, you know, a lot of
times we're thinking of breedingwaterfowl during that time of
the year. And the main thing Iwant you to pay attention to in
a sec here, we're gonna go intothe latest update, which just
(06:07):
came out yesterday morning at09:30, so it's pretty much hot
off the press here.
But the whole Western Half ofThe United States has just been
extremely dry this past spring.A lot of relief that we saw
across much of the Midwest allthe way back off to the East
towards the Atlantic. So thatwas really good news for us, and
I know they're experiencing alot of issues the last several
years up towards the Dakotas andthat area there. But when we
(06:31):
look at the latest update,there's a couple things that
really stick out. So I'm goingto go ahead and kind of scroll
down here, and we're going to gothrough this.
I mean, you look at that massivechunk that was basically over
Colorado and the Dakotas, and wewere in d three, which is just
extreme drought across a lot ofthat area, and it's carved out a
lot the last several months,which is really good. But you
(06:51):
look back towards kind of ourneck of the woods here, little
bit into the northern andsouthern part of the region
here, Missouri, Arkansas,Tennessee, Kentucky, The last
several months have been verydry. We've seen a little bit of
this erase, kind of like whatyou guys were seeing, a couple
of long standing rate eventsthat we've had. And a lot of
times when we're looking atdrought, you don't want you
(07:11):
know, you could have a threeinch rainfall within a day, but
that's not gonna solve drought.The thing that solves drought is
smaller amounts over a longerperiod of time because a lot of
that will just run right off thesurface, and they really can't
seep into the ground.
So we've seen a lot of a chunkof that eliminated. Still off to
the West, you're still seeing alot of drought. So that's
(07:33):
something that's gonna bedefinitely something that's
gonna be a little bit harder toface when you start to look back
towards the Pacific Flyway andthe western portions of the
Central. But Canada is lookingreally dry too. That's something
where I know it doesn't mattermost likely as much this time of
the year, but that's definitelysomething that we're continuing
to watch.
But there is a little bit ofgood news as we head further out
(07:53):
here, and I'm sure me and Scottwill be touching on that here in
a second for those huntersacross much of Canada and even
the Northwest. The South, thingsmight be looking a little bit
more bleak for you in terms ofthis with the rain.
Mike Brasher (08:06):
Yeah. Chance Chance, I'll jump in here a
little bit and tell you thatjust a couple of weeks ago, I
was up in Prairie Canada and andlooking at this North American
drought monitor map that you'vegot up there, you will see that
a good chunk of the PrairiePothole region is out of kinda
meteorological or hydrologicaldrought. That does not mean that
all of those wetland basins arefull of water. It had been
(08:28):
probably seven or eight yearssince I had been up to that
landscape this time of year. I'dbeen up there in the spring
periodically and seen someimproving conditions.
But this time of year, as acomparison to what I'm familiar
with, seven or eight years sinceI'd been there, I drove across
the landscape where I wasfamiliar with one of the that
Allen Hills region Southeast ofSaskatoon, and I spent an entire
(08:49):
summer there back in the latenineties doing some research.
Then the lack of water that thatarea is facing right now is just
astounding. There are so manyempty wetland basins, and it's
been that way for years hereover the past little stretch of
time. Talked to some folks andthey said, yeah, as bad as you
saw it, it has it's actuallyimproved from where it was like
(09:10):
two or three years ago. So Iknow I've talked a lot about
drought on podcast andeverything else that I do, but
to be able to see it that timeof year with a point of
reference late summer, earlyfall was just eye opening for
me, and it's no wonder thatparticular area isn't producing
ducks.
It just doesn't have the habitatright now. It's astounding. So
to your point, although this mapmay show it's out of drought,
(09:35):
that doesn't mean those wetlandbasins are full. Yeah. It's
working on saturating that soilso that they can run off into
those basins once we getadditional rainfall or snow.
Chance Gotsch (09:44):
Yeah. I feel like you said, like, I mean, you
know, three or four years ago,and that two or three year
stretch really set us back for alot of wetlands. And and we see
that here even in Missouri stillwhere it's it's gotten better,
but, I mean, it's still nowherenear where we need to be for
that long term average for a lotof the wetland areas.
Jerad Henson (10:02):
Yeah. I I kinda wanted to just jump in. Just
looking at these, and especiallysince we kinda have that Mid
South focus here, but we set upwith a really wet spring to the
Mid South. I mean, like Yeah.Had, you know, from what I
understand, you know, a year'sworth of precip by April.
Yeah. And then it got real dry.
Mike Brasher (10:20):
The faucet turned off.
Jerad Henson (10:21):
It seems like it does that.
Mike Brasher (10:23):
Seems like it is just wet, wet, wet, and then
boom.
Jerad Henson (10:25):
Shut off. I think there were some expectations
early, but but then it got realdry. So I was interested kind of
to hear what Chance and andScott had to say kind of
something about that. Yeah.
Chance Gotsch (10:36):
Well, and at this time of the year too, we look at
the fall months into earlywinter. Just on average, these
are the driest months wetypically see. So the rainfall
we've been getting is verybeneficial. I think I was
looking at a statistic. We hadclose to two inches of a deficit
of rainfall alone in August.
September was over two inches.And at the October, I mean, we
(10:57):
were at, like, almost fiveinches below where we should
have been. So really, it's kindof uncharacteristic to be seeing
the rainfall that we've beengetting recently to kind of get
us back out of there. I mean, Ithink in Missouri alone, we're
back to where we should be. Butlike you guys said, that's just
getting the ground saturated.
So that's not even gonna be alot of runoff. I mean, a lot of
that gets soaked up in this.And, yeah, definitely definitely
(11:17):
eye opening to see that. Butthis is this is a typical time
of year where we do see thatturn off, but at least we saw
some help this past spring.
Skot Covert (11:25):
Yeah.
Mike Brasher (11:25):
So, Scott, what are sorry. Chance, what else do
you have for us there?
Chance Gotsch (11:30):
Yeah. So I was gonna let Scott here in a bit,
I'll kinda go into a little bitmore of the long range forecast.
But Scott, I think, is gonnacover a little bit more in-depth
on our expected Enzo cycle
Mike Brasher (11:42):
Okay.
Chance Gotsch (11:42):
And what that means in kinda historic data on
that.
Mike Brasher (11:44):
Okay. That sounds that sounds good. You know, in
addition to what I will say tojump in here, are we how is our
screen sharing here first chanceso we can get it over to Scott
whenever we're ready there? Butyeah. The other thing that we
have been experiencing here thefirst couple of months has been
above average temperatures.
That was one of the themes thatI've heard from a lot of people.
(12:07):
Yeah. When it was up inSaskatchewan, what was it? Yeah.
Two weeks ago, or was it lastweek?
Yeah. It was last week, and had60 degree temperatures. It was
pleasant. It was great.
Jerad Henson (12:17):
I I have pink tomatoes ripening on the vine in
my backyard. Yeah.
Mike Brasher (12:21):
That's right. One of them was telling me that
their their tomatoes are still
Jerad Henson (12:25):
Yeah.
Mike Brasher (12:25):
And I think it was Frank Baldwin out of Winnipeg.
Yep. Yep. So it has been aboveaverage normal temperatures
throughout I mean, all the wayup, and I think pretty much
across the board. The otherthing that has happened recently
is had a couple of weathersystems move in.
Chance, you you mentioned one ofthose that had affected us here
in the in the Mid South, but thefolks in the Northeast certainly
(12:47):
welcomed that as well becausethey had been also enduring
extreme drought. So I know theywere happy to receive all that
rain as well. If you're a duckhunter, it means you can get
more more water for
Jerad Henson (12:58):
Yeah.
Mike Brasher (12:58):
For for your habit for duck habitat, more places to
hunt as well. So we're happyabout that. So, with that,
Scott, I think, yeah, we'regoing to jump over to you now
and we'll talk about sort ofmore winter forecasts,
predictions, prognosticationsbased on some of these larger
climatological cycles. So takeus through that.
Skot Covert (13:20):
Yeah. So I think it's first really beneficial to
start the conversation with thedifference between a
deterministic forecast and aprobabilistic. So deterministic
is gonna be just the same thingyou see on a ten day forecast on
a 10:00 news. It's gonna be whatyou see on on your phone apps.
It's gonna be specific numbers,whether that's temperatures or
(13:40):
or rain chances.
And we're really not gonna beable to talk those numbers
today. At this range, we canonly look at probabilistic
information. That gives us anidea. We're gonna be reading the
tea leaves in layman's terms.That's about the good the best
we can get when it comes tothese long range forecast.
So just keep that in mind as wekinda dive into some of this
(14:01):
data. You know, we're we'rehaving a very similar
conversation that we did lastyear. Last year, we were pretty
dry area wide. Certainly down inthe Mid South, the Mississippi
flyaway, other areas pretty dryout there as well. And also last
year, I'm I'm recalling we weretalking about La Nina.
There was a likelihood that LaNina would emerge, and, there
(14:23):
would be some benefits. Therewould be some some negatives to
La Nina kinda depending on whereyou're at across the continent.
And we're having the sameconversation again this year. I
would say the difference though,last year, we were anticipating
La Nina. A lot of the weathermodels suggested a weak La Nina
would emerge, and it reallydidn't until late late late in
the season.
(14:43):
Oh, I think it might have beenthe like the week season went
out. So like late January.Difference this year is La
Nina's emerged. It's here andit's it's weak, but it's here.
And it's expected to be a shortduration La Nina, meaning it
probably runs through December,January, February before
dissipating at that point.
So with with the table set, wegot La Nina. What is it? Just
(15:05):
coming up as a refresher. We'retalking about some trade winds
pushing back off towards thewest on the Equatorial Pacific
Ocean. Why in the heck does thatmatter to duck hunters across
North America?
Well, all of weather is dictatedby ocean circulations. Those
ocean circulations are gonna bedictated by how cool or how warm
the temperatures of the oceanare, and that really displaces
(15:27):
or moves the jet stream. The jetstream is the moneymaker. Right?
It's the one that brings theseweather systems through the
area.
And when that jet stream or I'lloften think of it as kind of
like a railroad track for stormsystems. When that gets moved,
weather patterns of course aregonna get moved there as well.
Typical La Nina, and a big biggiant asterisk on the word
typical. A typical La Nina kindalooks like this. Pacific
(15:49):
Northwest gets pretty wet.
Some of those wet conditions doextend into parts of Canada as
well. Upper Midwest, generallyspeaking, is probably gonna be
pretty cold. You get into theDeep South and you're looking at
drier than normal patterns,oftentimes warm as well. And
there is a part of the GreatLakes that can see some above
average precipitation. Now, tobe clear, you look at this map
(16:10):
and you're thinking, okay, I'min purple, I'm in dry.
That's not necessarily gonnamean you don't get any rain at
all. Right? Again, this isprobabilistic. All this means is
at the end of the season, whenyou tally it up and and you run
the average, you're gonna beprobably looking at less rain
than you typically pick up. Orwhen it comes to temperatures,
if you're in a warm zone in atypical La Nina, it means the
(16:32):
odds are stacked in a directionthat would lead to some above
average temperatures.
I think the key takeaway thoughis there's no such thing as a
typical La Nina. They're alldifferent in their own right.
Some of them are stronger, someof them are weaker. This one's
weaker. From what we can tellright now in some of the the
model data.
So you can take a look at theseasonal forecast that NOAA puts
(16:55):
out. They released this onOctober 16, so just a couple of
weeks ago. They are gonna updateit once a month. So we do
anticipate it'll be probablyabout the November. November.
It's always on a Thursday.They'll update this, but this is
kinda what they put out withregards to temperatures for
December, January, February. Itkind of resembles typical La
(17:17):
Nina in some fashion when itcomes to temperatures, when it
comes to precipitation. It alsohas a pretty good semblance of
of a typical La Nina. Now, letme just go abundantly clear
here.
The experts at NOAA, the climateprediction center, are the best
of the best. They're reallyreally really really good, and
I'm not gonna criticize theirwork. They have a lot more
(17:37):
degrees hanging on the wall thanI could ever even imagine. With
that said, you can look at someof the historical forecasts that
they've produced. I know there'sa lot of crazy colors on your
screen right now.
I'll walk you through it andmake some sense of this. When
you look at some of theirhistorical forecasts, which is
gonna be on the left side of
Mike Brasher (17:57):
Well, we I guess Noah didn't like what Scott was
about to say.
Jerad Henson (18:03):
Kidding. I lost Scott's
Mike Brasher (18:04):
on first page. So we still have his video. Maybe
we don't have his audio. We willwe'll try to get that back. Got
you.
Yep. We got your video. And sowhat do I wanna what I had a lot
of thoughts running through myhead there. I really appreciated
the graphic that we were aboutto get to there. It was pretty
(18:25):
cool because it does get to thisissue of typical and average,
and you can't one year, even ifyou've got the same kind of
strength of a La Nina or an ElNino, it's not gonna it mean
that you're gonna experience thesame conditions that you did in
a previous
Jerad Henson (18:40):
year Yeah. Regardless of where you
Mike Brasher (18:43):
one good thing that I was a little bit excited
about was there were somepredictions of a tendency for
well, I shouldn't saypredictions. There was a
tendency for there to be a bitmore moisture up there in those
northern latitudes, breedingareas, the prairies, so forth
during these years.
Jerad Henson (18:58):
We need that fall moisture going into a freeze.
Mike Brasher (19:00):
Fall moisture, we need spring moisture, and then
we need it to continue into thesummer. Right. Yeah. That's what
we need. And so, hopefully, he'sgonna be able to deliver that
for us whenever he he comesback.
Chance, do we still have you?
Chance Gotsch (19:13):
Yeah. Yeah. I'm still here. Can you guys hear me
okay?
Mike Brasher (19:15):
We can hear you. Yep. You got anything to offer
here? I'm sure you do.
Chance Gotsch (19:19):
Yeah. Yeah. I'll kinda let Scott come back once
he gets his audio right onexactly the point he was getting
to. But I can honestly, if youguys are cool with it, go to the
a little bit more now futureforecast if you guys are alright
with that. Been going to theeight to fourteen day away.
Mike Brasher (19:36):
Yeah. Let's do that. Let's do that. Let's go
ahead and eight to fourteen day,and then we'll come back when we
get Scott's Scott's audio fixed.
Chance Gotsch (19:45):
Okay. Yeah. So here's kind of what we're
looking at right now. There'stwo different things. We always
typically when we look attemperature and we look at
precipitation, and Scott kind ofalluded to this earlier, there's
three means that we typicallylook at it.
We look at above, near, andbelow average. That's kind of
the general consensus when we goso far out with these things.
(20:07):
You guys mentioned it's been alittle bit on the warmer side,
and a lot of our trends rightnow, I mean, even
Jerad Henson (20:14):
here in Missouri, typically our average afternoon
highs around 63, 62 degrees.That'll continue to fall to
Chance Gotsch (20:19):
the upper fifties until late next week. We're
gonna be looking at Wednesday ofnext week close to 70 degrees,
and most of the country is gonnabe kind of all in this realm. So
that's not saying we can't haveone or two little cold systems,
but as an average for thatextended period of time, eight
to fourteen days away, most ofthe country, I
Jerad Henson (20:37):
know Missouri actually opens up a lot
Chance Gotsch (20:39):
of their season tomorrow, is gonna be looking at
a warmer kickoff here,especially if that's when you're
starting out now. So it's gonnabe a pattern here that's going
to hold above average for thosetemperatures. On top of that,
we're going be looking a littlebit drier across much of the Mid
Continent area. Good news is tothe Northwest, and you're going
to hear this reoccurring themehere in the future when we look
(21:00):
again at the extended outlooksfor winter. The Northwest, the
Northeast, and the Southeast aregonna be looking wetter than
average.
And that's a lot of times has todo with these high pressure
systems. So there's twodifferent things we look at
whenever we look at these maps.So you can kind of see here, and
you saw when we were looking atScottsMap just earlier, we're
(21:20):
looking at pressure systems alot of times to give us these
forecasts on, hey, is it goingto be drier, or is it going to
be wetter? And when we'relooking at it, that polar jet
stream that you saw there, a lotof times, whenever it's gonna be
basic weather, not much change,a lot of times that can be
associated with, near or drierthan average conditions. We see
those jet streams what we callzonal flow.
(21:43):
So it basically goes straightfrom east to west. Right? So
there's not much of a wave init. But when we start seeing the
jet streams become wavy anddandy, that's when we start to
see a more active system. So wehave a high pressure system
across much of the Midwest andthe Central Plains and even the
Deep South, South Central areathere where we're gonna see high
pressure.
It's not gonna move too much,within the next two weeks here,
(22:06):
and that that's gonna lead tomost likely seeing those below
average trends. So not as muchrainfall, particularly, most
likely not snow. With that beingsaid, I know a lot of Midwest
this weekend is gonna be lookingcool. So that's a good good
thing for any Missouri huntersand, any areas nearby here, in
the Mississippi Flyway and eventhe Eastern central portions of
(22:27):
the region. So that's the goodnews there.
But the warmer temperatures,kinda like Scott was mentioning,
I'm gonna go ahead and
Jerad Henson (22:33):
shift kind of into those maps that you've
Chance Gotsch (22:34):
shown here. It's a little squishy here. Let's
see. So this was the three monthaverage. So Scott was showing
you December, January, andFebruary.
That's our typical winterseason. Here's what we're
looking at from November,December, to January. So we're
kind of easing into what couldseem like more of a La Nina
condition. So what that means isa lot of the South, you kind of
split The United States in halfand you focus that South, most
(22:58):
likely going to see warmer thanaverage temperatures. Now that's
an average, so that doesn't meanthat we're necessarily going to
be looking at you know, we couldhave a couple cold events that
still spur in there, butoverall, you're most likely
going to be hunting warmertemperatures than what we
typically see this time of theyear.
The good news is if you're upnorth right now where a lot of
the migration still is, it'sgonna be near where it should
(23:20):
be. And then we start to followthat pattern a little bit deeper
into the actual extent of theforecast, and you kinda start to
see the cooler temperaturescreep south with the extended
outlook. And what Scott was alsoshowing with La Nina, this is
the forecast from NOAA and theNational Weather Service. This
(23:40):
is very very much a traditionalaverage La Nina system setup.
And there is some support tothat with what we call the QBO,
which is quasi binennial binebimeonial oscillation,
basically.
And what that shows is it'sbasically two patterns, and this
one is pretty on top of it, interms of these two patterns,
(24:02):
where we have fourteen monthsusually where we're gonna be
seeing easterly trade winds andthen fourteen months of westerly
trade winds. And what that meansbasically and how that affects
you is whenever we start to seethe easterly in on typical years
of La Nina, that gives us morethan likely this pattern. It
gives us better chances of this.And a lot of times what that
could mean too is that polar jetstream that Scott was alluding
(24:24):
to and showing, it it becomes alittle bit more wavy. And what
that means is you can buy in thecooler air with wetter air for
much of the Mississippi Flywayoff to the north, and you can
see it here come into play.
That typically means that you'regonna get wetter and cooler
conditions, which oftentimes,when you have cold air and
wetter conditions, you have youhave a little bit more snow. So
(24:47):
things are looking, I would say,a little bit later on into the
season, December, January,February, things are looking a
lot better in terms of activeweather patterns across much of
the Northern United States. Offto the south, this doesn't mean
you have bad hunting. Right?Let's let's make that clear.
You gotta think it's cooler upnorth. Yes. It's warmer down
here, but when it's cooler upnorth, ducks gotta go south.
(25:07):
Mhmm. So that's that'sdefinitely gonna be something
good.
And I foresee this being a yearwhere, because of the QBO and
the La Nina, that interaction,where we're gonna have some
pretty impressive events, interms of, like, some pretty good
cold snaps, and we're gonna goback and forth a lot, which a
lot of times it gets the ducksmoving, so that's a good thing.
VO (25:35):
Stay tuned to the Ducks Unlimited podcast, sponsored by
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Mike Brasher (27:33):
So one of the questions that I wanna ask here
sort of in response to chance,what he was showing and talking
about, Scott, it also relates toobviously what what you're
talking about these largercycles or climatological
patterns. You know, we we'llhear a lot about polar vortex
disruptions, that super cold airthat's sort of circulating at
(27:53):
the at the pole. So also kindaas we're going through this,
talk about what we know on therelative likelihood of more
frequent or less frequent, youknow, the incident instances of
those types of of developmentsoccurring?
Skot Covert (28:08):
You know, I think that's a a really good question,
and I I it ties perfectly intothe same conversation we had
last year. You look at thesetypical La Nina patterns, you
would think, oh my goodness.We're not gonna get a single
cold front, or it's not gonnarain. It's gonna be dry the
whole thing. No.
Not necessarily. That was thethe broad picture we painted
last year, knowing still wewould probably see a a a polar
(28:30):
vortex spin off a time or two,and that happened. I mean, I,
gosh, I lost a couple of days atleast last season because
everything was locked up. Theygot so cold this far south. I
would suspect that happensagain.
I I think, just because we're ina weak La Nina and and there's a
lot of orange and red on themaps, that doesn't necessarily
mean we're not gonna have somebig cold snaps. I think that's a
(28:51):
real likelihood for many of us.It's just a matter of how long
do they last. And still in theend, when you have several above
normal days, which still isgonna be cold. Right?
If the normal high is 40 and,you hit 43 and still counts as
above normal, not gonna makemuch of a difference more than
likely to your hunting successor not. It's just in the end, we
(29:14):
look at those averages. I thinkthe polar vortex spin off is is
likely at least once. I wouldn'teven roll out twice or even
three times. Okay.
Chance Gotsch (29:22):
Yeah. And I think that lines up pretty well with
even the QBO. A lot of times,that's what we see. You know,
you just you see it get reallywavy in the atmosphere. And like
Scott's saying, that typicallymeans we will see a few of those
active events.
Yeah.
Skot Covert (29:37):
And, you know, you look at some of these historical
winter forecasts, and I was notgoing to say anything negative
about NOAA because let me tellyou, I love him. I love him to
death. And right now, they'renot getting paid. So I I so I'm
really not gonna knock somebodythat's not getting a paycheck
Yeah. And they're still showingup to work.
You'll look at some of thisversus on the left versus what
(29:59):
actually happened those winterson the right.
Mike Brasher (30:02):
Hey. Hey, Scott. Let me clear. Scott, let me jump
in here. Yeah.
I'm not seeing your screen rightnow. We saw it a minute ago, but
we lost that share feed. Sobefore you Okay. Yep. Now we So
got the comparisons that you'retrying to make, so go for it.
Skot Covert (30:17):
Yeah. So what what was forecast on the left, what
actually happened on the right,there's a bit of a warm bias in
these seasonal forecasts,meaning their forecasts are
generally a little bit warmer onaverage than what actually ends
up happening. Now there arecertainly some years where they
nailed it, and then there areother analog years such as 2020
through 2021. You can see, wow.That actually didn't happen even
(30:41):
remotely close to what waspredicted.
So you might be looking at thismap and thinking, oh my
goodness. It's another reallybone dry, winter, and we're not
gonna have any cool weather. Iwouldn't I wouldn't believe that
for a second. I I think we'regonna have plenty of of fronts
to come through. And so I justwanted to point that out to say
these seasonal forecasts are notthe gospel, and they're not
(31:03):
perfect by any stretch of theimagination.
Jerad Henson (31:06):
Yeah. Yeah. There were two things on there on
those maps that got me excitedas a duck hunter. Number one,
I'm a Mid South duck hunter, sothat that puts moisture and some
weather up north. Right?
So that's that's exciting. Butthat also means ducks are gonna
move up and down the flyway. Theother thing I saw at some of the
later maps you always told inthe preset, there seems to be
some moisture in Canadathroughout the winter. And so
Mike Brasher (31:27):
Long range forecast?
Jerad Henson (31:28):
Yeah. Long range Predictions. But but there's
potential there.
Mike Brasher (31:31):
And so rather see the green than the red.
Jerad Henson (31:34):
That's it. Right? Right. And so, you know, I'm a
duck hunter, eternal optimisteternal optimist here. So but so
seeing
Skot Covert (31:41):
that, that's something I want
Jerad Henson (31:42):
to talk about.
Skot Covert (31:42):
More green. K. Yeah. I'll I'll show you a
little bit more green. I I don'tknow if, our producer can pull
that up.
Yeah. Perfect. So, you know, youcan look at these models, and
you can see what the normal LaNina and the normal El Nino. I I
don't really care a lot aboutthat. I wanna know what recent
well, I call them analogs.
What are some recent wintersthat had similar conditions that
are are weak La Nina? So Ipulled that composite together.
(32:06):
So this is gonna be from severalwinters that had similar
characteristics at this point inthe year, '96 to '97, 2001. Many
years, you can see those dateslisted up at the top of the
screen. This is the temperatureanomaly.
How did La Nina affecttemperature compared to average
versus normal? And and for thenorthern part of the country,
there's there's a lot of blue upthere. It was a little bit
(32:28):
colder than normal, and thatextended even into the mid
latitudes as well. Now you doget in the Eastern flyaway, the
Deep South, and and you'retrending a little bit above
average by a degree to two whenit's all said and done. You look
at these maps and you'rethinking, what are those lines?
And those are climate districts.They're not counties. They're
climate districts, and most theaverage person has no clue what
(32:51):
they are, but that's what thoseweird shapes are. When you look
at precipitation in the samelens, well, Liquella Nino often
leads to around normal or aboveaverage to the north. There's a
lot of light on there, whichwould indicate some normal
precipitation patterns.
Meanwhile, you get into the DeepSouth, a good chunk of Texas,
Oklahoma, the East Coast. Yeah.Yeah. There's some climate
districts that that generallysuffer a little bit less
(33:14):
precipitation. Not always.
Right? But this is using all ofthe analogs dating back to the
nineties of years that mightgive us some clues as to what we
might be embarking on, goinginto the next little bit. You
like blue. I heard you likeblue, so I got a little bit more
blue for you where it mattersthe most. So this is taking, the
(33:34):
European model.
It's it's one of the majorglobal models that James and I
rely on a lot. It's just onemodel. It's one of many that are
gonna have a little bitdifferent idea of kind of how
things shake out. This ishistorically what we see in
terms of snowfall as we'retransitioning into a weak La
Nina winter, just snowfall.Right?
So you look up in the Dakotas,and, of course, you don't see
(33:57):
Canada on the screen, but Ithink you can extrapolate out
that certainly in the thesouthern portion of the Prairies
at least, you're probablylooking at above average snow
conditions when it's all saidand done. Now you get into the
Deep South, we don't get a lotof snow to begin with, but those
odds are probably gonna be alittle bit lower where those
brown numbers are at.
Mike Brasher (34:17):
Now that was pretty cool. And so I found
myself sort of looking at thatfirst map, the composite sort of
temperature anomaly, and lookcold up down right there. Cold
up in the Northern Tier statesand Pacific Northwest, and then
it's above average down here inthe Southeastern all across the
Atlantic Flyway. And I foundmyself thinking, okay, how will
(34:40):
that affect me as a duck hunterif I'm hunting the Mid South,
South Atlantic, and even intoTexas? I mean, it may be a good
thing in terms of getting somemovement of birds out of the
prairies, out of those northernlatitudes, but then it might
mean that when we get down here,if we don't have a lot of I
mean, if overall ourtemperatures are above average,
that means we're gonna haveducks that aren't gonna have a
(35:00):
whole lot of reason to move,find a lot of food, you know,
for Right.
Regulatory demands, that type ofstuff. So it leads to this idea
of stale ducks kinda more timesthan not, if that be the case.
So that made me wonder, well,what's the precipitation gonna
do? It might be a situationwhere you would be looking to
hunt on those not not hunting somuch based on the temperature
(35:20):
changes, but availability of newof new rainfall
Jerad Henson (35:24):
Right.
Mike Brasher (35:24):
And and new habitat. So
Jerad Henson (35:25):
And when you get stale ducks, it's one the things
we talk about a lot. The onlyway to make a stale duck, a
smart duck move is change thelandscape.
Mike Brasher (35:33):
Yeah.
Jerad Henson (35:33):
You have to change the game. They find that safe
pattern. They stay on it
Skot Covert (35:36):
Yep.
Jerad Henson (35:36):
Until water on the landscape changes, whether it's
it shows up new or it freezessolid. Yeah. Hard water helps
too, but doesn't look likethat's gonna
Skot Covert (35:45):
be the case
Jerad Henson (35:45):
too much down there.
Skot Covert (35:46):
You just described my season last year perfectly in
Chance Gotsch (35:50):
two sentences.
Mike Brasher (35:52):
Yeah. Chance, any anything to add to that that
wonderful set of graphics andsort of descriptions we were
thinking about there?
Chance Gotsch (35:59):
Yeah. No. Scott I think Scott nailed it right on
the head. It it's a lot of goodstuff. I I feel like this season
compared to, you know, the lastseveral seasons that we've seen
outlook wise, I feel like it's agood thing that we're seeing, at
least across much of the area.
I mean, we'd love to see morerain across the South, but you
look across much of the Northand those breeding grounds. And,
you know, we're always thinkingabout, hey, let's get to next
(36:21):
breeding season. So getting thatarea from Canada, the Prairie
Pothole Region reloaded on rainand snow earlier can only help
us in that long term extent. SoI think this is a good thing for
much of the waterfowl or waterthat we're going to be seeing
across the north, which is goingto be beneficial. And, know, you
a lot of times you think aboutit, a lot of the river basins
are going to be flowing fromnorth to south.
(36:42):
So, yes, it's going be drier tothe south, but, you know, the
Mississippi, when you get offtowards Boothill in Missouri and
down towards Louisiana and allthat, that's a very important
thing to have filled up. And sothe fact that we're gonna be
seeing better chances of rain tothe north, I don't think it's
necessarily a bad thing, and Ithink it's a good thing. And
like you guys said, when we havethe cooler temperatures to the
north, ducks gotta pusheventually down south.
Jerad Henson (37:04):
Yeah. Yeah. I might emphasize too for those
that are in those areas that arepredicted to be slightly drier
and slightly warmer, gettingwater when you can get it is
gonna be important. Yeah. Mhmm.
And and finding those permanentwater sources, those are ducks
you're gonna key in on.
Mike Brasher (37:17):
Yep. So I know we've talked a little bit about
sort of longer range forecast.Chance, I think you were
covering sort of eight, fourteenday forecast. You might have
covered something even in themore immediate immediate future,
but I was trying to payattention to a few other things.
It might have been a little bitdistracted.
So for those like, we're here inthe South. Right? Our duck
(37:38):
hunting season is still and fora lot of states, their their
hunting season doesn't openuntil later on this month. So
we've still got some time to beoptimistic about some magical
combination of weather eventsthat's gonna really change
everything and make just a grandoccurrence of ducks show up. Now
the one thing I will say is evenwhen those ducks do show up down
here, they're gonna be welleducated because we don't
(38:00):
anticipate there have been a lotof production this year, and
then those ducks will have beeneducated by all the states that
get to hunt at them and get toshoot at them before us.
So some additional challengesfor us down here regardless of
how far you go. But yeah. Soanything for those those people
that are in the middle of theirhunting season up in the Midwest
a matter of fact, I'm gonna behunting up around the Great
(38:21):
Lakes next week. I'm kind ofanticipating anticipating maybe
doing more fishing than hunting,kind of but but I hope I'm wrong
on that, But they got goodfishing prospects even if that's
the case. So anything in thevery near term that we can get
excited about or, you know,across some of those areas that
are currently open?
Skot Covert (38:41):
Short answer is no.
Mike Brasher (38:42):
No. Nothing there. I I that's I disappointing.
Yeah.
Skot Covert (38:46):
I it kinda depends on where you're at. Look. If
you're you're in the PacificFlyway and you're in Northern
California and points towardsthe the border, yeah, you're
gonna have a decent amount ofrain, probably some active
weather patterns that are gonnapull some fronts through the
area, but, a good chunk of thecountry is gonna be dominated by
some high pressure through atleast the November. And, you
(39:08):
know, at that point, highpressure is gonna suppress a lot
of meaningful rain chances. Iwould say a good chunk of the
country is gonna see belowaverage rain chances between now
and, let's say, November 13 orso.
Jerad Henson (39:20):
Yeah. Yeah. One of the so one of the weather apps I
use, because that's how youcould tell a duck hunter really
quick is how many weather appsare on your phone. Because
Mike Brasher (39:27):
I'm I'm interested to see where you go
Jerad Henson (39:29):
Because
Mike Brasher (39:29):
because I've been looking at some things because
Jerad Henson (39:31):
I looked at one of mine that it will predict out
fourteen days or so, fifteendays, and it'll make it to
November 14 on that timeline.And both the global model and
the European model bothpredicted a little bit of a
front coming through on November14. You heard it from no
Mike Brasher (39:47):
chance. Jared Hinson.
Jerad Henson (39:48):
Both of them had it in the predictions. I'm not
saying anything. I'm not ameteorologist. I'm just looking
at one of one of these appsthat's giving me an optimistic
viewpoint. But Yeah.
Mike Brasher (40:01):
I I looked at a few forecast as well.
Jerad Henson (40:03):
Both the models talked about that. So That
Mike Brasher (40:05):
that's good. And so I I have several places that
that I that I save in thedifferent apps, and I look at
the north of us, one of them isis Saskatoon Mhmm. Saskatchewan.
And you look at the temperaturesover the next four fourteen ten,
fourteen days, and they justit's just a steady drop. You
know, it's not there are noforecast major fronts that come
(40:28):
through during that time.
It's just like the temperatures,the highs, and the lows are just
following those seasonaldeclines, but they're still
running about six to eightdegrees above average for both
the lows and the highs, but it'sthere's nothing significant in
the immediate future that isgonna drop those substantially
except maybe something right outthere. That's one of the reasons
(40:49):
why we wanted to push thisepisode as late as we could
during this week, is becausehopefully, you know, we would
have seen something develop outtwo weeks off, but Yeah. Yep.
Got something to maybe give someoptimism.
Chance Gotsch (41:01):
Yeah. I haven't seen
Skot Covert (41:02):
things change.
Jerad Henson (41:03):
Mean, this is gonna
Skot Covert (41:04):
be an active weather pattern. It's there's
gonna be some rapid changes.Yeah. The next two weeks
probably not looking the bestoverall, but I I I know it's
anecdotal, but gosh, last year,I'd spent all summer working on
on the the the family farm, youknow, planting millet, taking
care of all kinds of stuff, andand then it was just bone dry.
(41:26):
The second half of the summerinto the fall, you know,
everything I'd planted dead.
I got nothing going for me. Andthen a week before season
starts, we get 10 inches ofrain, and then that hole was
filled up, more so than I wasprepared for. So I I think
they're gonna change. It justmay not be early enough to put
some early water on thelandscape. Right.
(41:47):
Yep. Yeah.
Chance Gotsch (41:48):
I think what we got just recently was probably
the best we're going get forquite a bit of time. Even
looking, I think I was lookingout here next Friday, and, you
know, stuff gets a
Jerad Henson (41:56):
lot more limited. We do a ten day forecast here,
but
Chance Gotsch (41:58):
when you get out there, a lot could change. I
mean, I think we have 20% chancehere in Missouri for next
Friday. That's the next systemthat we really see, across
Midwest. And even then, it'sit's just not a big rain event.
So it's it's looking a littlebit more bleak for for rain and
in terms of, overall trends.
It's very similar, very steady.We talked about that high
pressure system, which basicallypaints a perfect picture right
(42:20):
here in that precip outlookScott Scott pointed up. And it's
basically just going to covermuch of the Central United
States, and not much changehappens across much of the area.
But if you're off to theNorthwest and the Northeast
where Northeast, AtlanticNortheast, they've seen a decent
amount of rain, even the systemthat they have currently. So
you're probably looking greatright now into the early season
going into about mid season justby what you have there.
(42:40):
But much of the Central UnitedStates, it's it's looking a
little bit more bleak in termsof rainfall.
Jerad Henson (42:46):
Yeah. And I will I will
Skot Covert (42:47):
There's also one other wildcard. Ahead, doctor
Jared.
Jerad Henson (42:50):
No. I was I was just gonna say quickly, I'll
preface that front I was talkingabout was in Canada and the,
like, Dakotas.
Mike Brasher (42:57):
That's where it has that's where it starts.
Jerad Henson (42:59):
That's that's
Skot Covert (43:00):
where it
Jerad Henson (43:00):
start. So it wasn't down here. It was up
there. It was it was some acooler cooler system.
Mike Brasher (43:06):
So Don't crawl fish now. Don't backtrack on
your on
Jerad Henson (43:08):
your I didn't backtrack. It's I mean, I get
excited when a weather frontcomes through. It's it's
probably gonna push some whitegeese
Skot Covert (43:14):
this way,
Jerad Henson (43:14):
for sure, because it's gonna be
Chance Gotsch (43:15):
timely for that.
Skot Covert (43:18):
You know, there's there's one other wildcard that,
you know, it's really tough topredict this at this range, but
we still have a a full month,literally a month from today of
hurricane season. No one likes ahurricane making landfall. No
one wants the devastation ordestruction. That aside, at
times, it can bring somemeaningful rainfall along the
(43:40):
Gulf States, even far inland,and, of course, on the East
Coast as well. You know, at thispoint, that window's closing,
but I I wouldn't rule out sometropical moisture, which could
be a significant game changer ifthat were to happen for at least
parts of the area.
Yeah.
Jerad Henson (43:56):
Did you have I was just gonna say, yeah, I can
remember some of those eventswhere, you know, hurricane hit
the Gulf Coast in September,October, and it put an awful lot
of water Yeah. All the way up,even up into to the Boothill,
Missouri.
Mike Brasher (44:09):
We don't ever wanna we don't ever wanna
necessarily hope for one ofthose. Certainly, we've seen.
Right. Seeing what folks down inJamaica are going through, and
that is just devastatingsituation there.
Jerad Henson (44:18):
Worst case scenario.
Mike Brasher (44:19):
Absolutely horrible to see some of those
images coming out of there. Justamazing. I know you guys have
been glued to the TV and all ofyour forecast and all the
different applications that youhave. Just an absolutely I mean,
just a a force of nature. Imean, that was we're kinda
getting off track here, but Iknow that we were all if you're
interested in meteorology or anykind of weather, those were just
some unbelievable, anunbelievable storm, unbelievable
(44:43):
impact, and, yeah, our thoughtsand hearts go out and prayers go
out to all the folks down there.
But, I mean, you guys must havejust had some incredible
discussions about about what wasunfolding there.
Skot Covert (44:57):
Yeah. The the science is is remarkable and
amazing, but it's really toughto appreciate the science and
the tools that we have knowingthe impact it's actually having
on places like Jamaica. Yeah.You you hate to see it, but at
the same time, it it is kind ofawe inspiring to see the power
of Mother Nature.
Mike Brasher (45:15):
Yeah. Well, we are going to wrap this up. Jared, do
you have anything else tocontribute here right now?
Jerad Henson (45:21):
I think that's it right now.
Mike Brasher (45:22):
We're getting excited. We wanted to get
something out to folks who letpeople know we're gonna continue
to do these periodicallythroughout the year. Think they
were well received. We had somegood engagement and some good
comments and feedback, andhopefully we'll have some
significant events weather wisethat can influence hunting
success across the country thatwe'll be able to talk about this
(45:42):
year. We'll bring those to youas they develop.
We've got a couple of othermeteorologists that we're trying
to connect with. Mandy with uslast year, and I think she's
gonna try to rejoin us on asubsequent episode of this. I
believe she was out hunting orjust getting back from hunting.
Mandy, if you are
Chance Gotsch (45:58):
An elk hunting.
Mike Brasher (45:59):
Elk hunting. So Mandy, if you happen to be
watching this, we miss you. Hopeyou had success on that hunt,
and we are gonna be connectingwith you here in the future. So,
Chance Gotch, meteorologist withFirst Alert for KMOV out of
Saint Louis. Thank you so muchfor sharing your time and
expertise with us here again.
Chance Gotsch (46:18):
Yeah. Thanks for having me. Always a pleasure,
and hopefully everybody has agood safe season. I mean, I know
that some of the early outlooksare a little bit bleak, but like
Scott said, there's a lot thatcan come, and one event is all
it takes to completely changeyour luck.
Mike Brasher (46:29):
That's right. And then Scott Covert, chief
meteorologist with five news outof Fayetteville, Fort Smith,
Arkansas. Scott, thank you aswell, and and good luck to you
as you get out and get huntingin the next several weeks.
Skot Covert (46:41):
Sure do. Appreciate it.
Mike Brasher (46:43):
Also thanks to my guest host here, Doctor. Jared
Henson. Thanks to our producer,Chris Isaac. Thanks our
assistance over here, CaseyMesserly. Thanks to everybody
for tuning in.
Happy hunting. Happy Halloween.Stay safe out there. And life is
short. You better hunt.
VO (47:02):
Thank you for listening to the DU podcast, sponsored by
Purina Pro Plan, the officialperformance dog food of Ducks
Unlimited. Purina Pro Plan,always advancing. Also proudly
sponsored by Bird Dog Whiskeyand Cocktails. Whether you're
winding down with your bestfriend or celebrating with your
favorite crew, Bird Dog bringsaward winning flavor to every
moment. Enjoy responsibly.
(47:24):
Be sure to rate, review, andsubscribe to the show and visit
ducks.org/dupodcast. Opinionsexpressed by guests do not
necessarily reflect those ofDucks Unlimited. Until next
time, stay tuned to the Ducks.
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