What do you think?

[Cole Ray]

Here is the deal, I have gained axcess to a seasonal pond. There are several ducks in the area. The thing is, the pond is like 30yds by 30yds and in the bottom of a large valley. I'm thinking about planting it in corn for next season.
I just don't know if the ducks will ever find it. How strong are duck abilties to find corn. Do you think it would be worth my time to go through with the plan?

[4Cody4]

We have found ducks in allot of small out of the way places. I think that you would find some ducks using the pond, but it might take a little bit for concentrations of birds to find it. Never know though, it's sounds like a good project for the off season, and it might pay off, good luck.
Cody

[disco duck]

IF YOU BUILD IT, THEY WILL COME,

a waterfowl impoundment engenier we know built one on the eastern shore of MD, planted it with Milo or milot, the crop matured, (mind you, this is a brand new impoundment that used to be a flat corn field) he flooded it, came back the very next day, and it had 3 dozen teal on it.

with the right habitat, food, water and shelter, you will have ducks, mabey not huge numbers but enough to hunt them.

remember, if you do plant it, dont over hunt it, never two days in a row. its not a big river or resivoir where the ducks can go around the corner and find more grass and be safe, if you educate them about your pond they will never comeback.

is the pond in a large farming area, because if it is, plant corn, but if its in an undelopled valley, with wild natural grasses in the valley, plant natural, warm season grasses, and make it a early season spot, (unless its your only spot to hunt, then i suggest jap millit in the center around your blind and corn around that, that way as the pond fills up, the birds will have a steady source of food all year, and when it gets colder, they will still have the corn to eat.

[Cole Ray]

This is not a very duck rich area here in middle TN. Does anyone know how acute a ducks senses are to finding food?

[disco duck]

there are pretty good at it, what you can do is put out a corn pile this week and watch from afar, we had a similar pond (almost the exact thing you decribed, a small pond in a large valley with trees atound it) we hunt, we have a 2 week long break for deer season here in MD, so we put out 200 pounds of corn and came back and few day later and there were 60 or so ducks on it and there were goose feathers all around.

[Walt McCord]

Cole, I agree with Disco IF YOU BUILD IT THEY WILL COME. I live on a Farm where 62,000 acres are farmed. Most of it is Cotton. We have 80 acre sections that are either corn or rice. Those fields are out best duck holes!! Try planting Roundup Ready Corn, and you can spray roundup on it and it wont hurt your corn. Also try mixing some milo, or soybeans in with it. In our Soybean fields we plan about 10 rows of corn across our field and when it comes to harvest season, we take our combine and throw the corn out the back and dont harvest it. We also cut the corn high and not off at the ground. This way when we flood our fields we have a spot where we can put our ground blinds. Our fields are most 80+ acre fields so we may have 300 acres and in the middle of it have a 80 acre field of corn.I hope this helps.

[Jason Mears]

Cole Ray,
Im pretty sure you'll be ok with the pond. I had a pond that is roughly the same size as the one you are talking about and I consistently take ducks off of it and I dont have a rich food source such as the one you are talking about planting. If you give them a food source they will be there. You might not see them in large numbers but you should be able to harvest a few from it.

[Parker Sharpe]

IF YOU BUILD IT, THEY WILL COME,

a waterfowl impoundment engenier we know built one on the eastern shore of MD, planted it with Milo or milot, the crop matured, (mind you, this is a brand new impoundment that used to be a flat corn field) he flooded it, came back the very next day, and it had 3 dozen teal on it.
Its unusual that you said this, becuase we have had the same thing happen to us. We hunt a small pothole in the middle of a cornfield, that relys on rain water to fill. During the summer and fall, all sorts of differant things grow up from the bottom of the pond. Never, in the 20 or so years that my family has been hunting there, had we seen ducks in october. However, this year we got enough rain at the right time to fill 1/2 of the pothole. Make a long story short, there were a bunch of teal up there eating the weeds and what not. These were the only teal we shot all year, and the only ducks we shot on that pothole.