Non-"traditional" goose hunting

[Morel]

I am thinking of getting into duck and goose hunting and have been doing a lot of reading on HBC and other websites about approaches to hunting. From what I have read is that the basic setup for goose hunting is to find a field (corn or beans) set up a spread of decoys, wait and call. For now this is not really an option for me. Do any of you use other approaches to hunting geese? I was thinking that paddling around marshes and jump shooting geese or ducks might be an option and would work with the equipment currently available and would be possible for public land. I have not found much on the internet where people have used this strategy for geese - it seems popular for ducks. Is this a reasonable approach or a total wast of time? Do any of you use other tactics than hunting agricultural land?

Thanks for the help.

Cheers,:-D

[gameslayer]

The best advice I can give being a relatively new waterfowler myself is to spend some time in the field observing the birds where they're feeding and then where they're spending the night they tend to fly from where they're feeding to their night roosting area. Once you've observed these flyways because they will use them over and over again determine if there's land you can legally hunt in between the two areas in that area set up a blind and/or just hide behind bushes and once they're coming stay low standup and hammer them I've been having success myself doing this. in February March it is especially good because the geese will tend to spend the night where they're going to build their nests, and feed else where during the day and return during the evening. Wingshooting is a lot more challenging you get less birds but I think it's rewarding. Not sure I would do it without a dog because when you hit a bird doing 40 km an hour in the air they can go a long ways and drop in some thick bush, always good to have a dog to find them for you. Jump shooting them by sneaking up to them in the water always works too.
Good luck

[BiG Boar]

People do sneak up on geese and whack em. But they don't live in the tiny streams and ponds that ducks can. Geese don't fly straight up very often (like puddle ducks do) so usually they have long open areas around them, so they can run and take off. This means the sneak up is very tricky. But it is possible. Start and focus on ducks. And if you find geese to stalk, all the better.

Best option is to ask a veteran to take you out.

[gameslayer]

I agree with bigbore, it is unlikely you will walk up on the geese it will be jump shooting ducks only in most cases.

[Morel]

Thanks for the advice guys!

Cheers,

[shotgunjohn]

You can stalk geese if they are not too far from cover. You want to approach from the downwind side and get as close as the cover will allow. Then jump up and run toward them yelling at the top of your lungs. The trick is to stop and shoot just before the geese start flying faster than you can run.