Latest / Ducks Unlimited Podcast / Mid-Season Meteorology: What Duck Hunters Need to Know (Ep. 722)

Transcript

Mid-Season Meteorology: What Duck Hunters Need to Know (Ep. 722) · Ducks Unlimited Podcast

• 0:01
  VO: The following episode of the DU podcast features a video component. For the full experience, 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 your host, doctor Mike Brasher. I'm your host, Katie Burke. I'm your host, doctor Jared Henson And I'm your host, Matt Harrison.
• 0:29
  VO: Welcome to the Ducks Unlimited podcast, the only podcast about all things waterfowl. From hunting insights to science based discussions about ducks, geese, and issues affecting waterfowl and wetlands conservation in North America. The DU podcast, sponsored by Purina Pro Plan, the official performance dog food of Ducks Unlimited. Purina Pro Plan, always advancing. Also proudly sponsored by Bird Dog Whiskey and Cocktails. Whether you're winding down with your best friend or celebrating with your favorite crew, Birddog brings award winning flavor to every moment. Enjoy responsibly.
• 1:16
  Mike Brasher: Hey, everyone. Welcome to Waterfowl Weather Live from the Ducks Unlimited studio here at 1 Waterfowl Way in Memphis, Tennessee. I am doctor Mike Brazier. I'm happy to be joined by doctor Jared Henson. It's great to have you on one of these episodes here.
• 1:29
  Jerad Henson: Mike, happy to be here.
• 1:30
  We did a few of these last year where we check-in with some experts in the meteorological field to kind of give you an update on how things may have unfolded over the past little while and and then more importantly to look ahead at what may be coming and how that might affect us as duck hunters in the field And to kind of amplify the value of the information that we get from our guests, we have duck hunter meteorologists with us. They're they're joining us again. I got two guys from sort of the Mid South. First, we've got Scott Covert, who is the chief meteorologist with five news, Fayetteville, Fort Smith, Arkansas. Scott, great to have you joining us again.
• 2:07
  Mike Brasher: Also joining from Missouri, Chance Gott, she's returning, to help us out again this year. He is a meteorologist with First Alert four k m o v out of Saint Louis, a new destination for for for Chance this year. But, Chance, thank you for coming back and joining us here on the on this this little event. It is Halloween, so I will say happy Halloween, October 31 to everyone. We had a few costumes going around here in the workplace earlier today, and but here, we're gonna talk about weather and ducks and kinda look out a little bit and see what we can get excited about.
• 2:42
  Jared, I know you've been you've been doing your own sort of research on on various web platforms, and you're getting excited about or hoping to get excited about what may be to come.
• 2:51
  Jerad Henson: Hoping. You look out there in that, like, fourteen day window, and things kinda get a little exciting. So, you know, I don't wanna get my hopes up too much, but so I'd love to hear what the experts have to say. And we also did just get a really nice weather event that came through kind of at least our area, and it it brought us some rain that was really needed.
• 3:12
  Mike Brasher: Badly needed. So badly needed. Had about, like, five consecutive days of rain. It was some heavy, but some kinda light and consistent, and and that was that was good. So but enough about our unprofessional chitchat about about what's happening with the weather.
• 3:27
  I think we're gonna go to Chance first, and we wanted to talk about sort of these prevailing conditions that we've been experiencing really across, I think, much of North America for the first month, two months of the hunting season. So, Chance, tell us what we've been dealing with. A lot of folks will wanna know what has been causing that. Chance, do you have any graphics associated with drought or anything of that nature? We were gonna bring some of those for people to see here if you're if you're listening to this or yeah.
• 3:57
  Hopefully, you were able to watch 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.
• 4:04
  Chance Gotsch: Let me go ahead and fire this up here for you guys. But, yeah, just threw this together. So, really wanna focus on what you're seeing here from this is going to be looks back off from, this is this past spring. So, you know, a lot of times we're thinking of breeding waterfowl during that time of the year. And the main thing I want you to pay attention to in a sec here, we're gonna go into the latest update, which just came out yesterday morning at 09:30, so it's pretty much hot off the press here.
• 4:30
  But the whole Western Half of The United States has just been extremely dry this past spring. A lot of relief that we saw across much of the Midwest all the way back off to the East towards the Atlantic. So that was really good news for us, and I know they're experiencing a lot of issues the last several years up towards the Dakotas and that area there. But when we look at the latest update, there's a couple things that really stick out. So I'm going to go ahead and kind of scroll down here, and we're going to go through this.
• 4:56
  I mean, you look at that massive chunk that was basically over Colorado and the Dakotas, and we were in d three, which is just extreme drought across a lot of that area, and it's carved out a lot the last several months, which is really good. But you look back towards kind of our neck of the woods here, little bit into the northern and southern part of the region here, Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, The last several months have been very dry. We've seen a little bit of this erase, kind of like what you guys were seeing, a couple of long standing rate events that we've had. And a lot of times when we're looking at drought, you don't want you know, you could have a three inch rainfall within a day, but that's not gonna solve drought. The thing that solves drought is smaller amounts over a longer period of time because a lot of that will just run right off the surface, and they really can't seep into the ground.
• 5:45
  So we've seen a lot of a chunk of that eliminated. Still off to the West, you're still seeing a lot of drought. So that's something that's gonna be definitely something that's gonna be a little bit harder to face when you start to look back towards the Pacific Flyway and the western portions of the Central. But Canada is looking really dry too. That's something where I know it doesn't matter most likely as much this time of the year, but that's definitely something that we're continuing to watch.
• 6:09
  But there is a little bit of good news as we head further out here, and I'm sure me and Scott will be touching on that here in a second for those hunters across much of Canada and even the Northwest. The South, things might be looking a little bit more bleak for you in terms of this with the rain.
• 6:25
  Mike Brasher: Yeah. Chance Chance, I'll jump in here a little bit and tell you that just a couple of weeks ago, I was up in Prairie Canada and and looking at this North American drought monitor map that you've got up there, you will see that a good chunk of the Prairie Pothole region is out of kinda meteorological or hydrological drought. That does not mean that all of those wetland basins are full of water. It had been probably seven or eight years since I had been up to that landscape this time of year. I'd been up there in the spring periodically and seen some improving conditions.
• 6:56
  But this time of year, as a comparison to what I'm familiar with, seven or eight years since I'd been there, I drove across the landscape where I was familiar with one of the that Allen Hills region Southeast of Saskatoon, and I spent an entire summer there back in the late nineties doing some research. Then the lack of water that that area is facing right now is just astounding. There are so many empty wetland basins, and it's been that way for years here over the past little stretch of time. Talked to some folks and they said, yeah, as bad as you saw it, it has it's actually improved from where it was like two or three years ago. So I know I've talked a lot about drought on podcast and everything else that I do, but to be able to see it that time of year with a point of reference late summer, early fall was just eye opening for me, and it's no wonder that particular area isn't producing ducks.
• 7:45
  It just doesn't have the habitat right now. It's astounding. So to your point, although this map may show it's out of drought, that doesn't mean those wetland basins are full. Yeah. It's working on saturating that soil so that they can run off into those basins once we get additional rainfall or snow.
• 8:03
  Chance Gotsch: 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 a lot of wetlands. And and we see that here even in Missouri still where it's it's gotten better, but, I mean, it's still nowhere near where we need to be for that long term average for a lot of the wetland areas.
• 8:21
  Jerad Henson: Yeah. I I kinda wanted to just jump in. Just looking at these, and especially since we kinda have that Mid South focus here, but we set up with a really wet spring to the Mid South. I mean, like Yeah. Had, you know, from what I understand, you know, a year's worth of precip by April.
• 8:36
  Yeah. And then it got real dry.
• 8:39
  Mike Brasher: The faucet turned off.
• 8:40
  Jerad Henson: It seems like it does that.
• 8:42
  Mike Brasher: Seems like it is just wet, wet, wet, and then boom.
• 8:44
  Jerad Henson: Shut off. I think there were some expectations early, but but then it got real dry. So I was interested kind of to hear what Chance and and Scott had to say kind of something about that. Yeah.
• 8:55
  Chance Gotsch: Well, and at this time of the year too, we look at the fall months into early winter. Just on average, these are the driest months we typically see. So the rainfall we've been getting is very beneficial. I think I was looking at a statistic. We had close to two inches of a deficit of rainfall alone in August.
• 9:11
  September was over two inches. And at the October, I mean, we were at, like, almost five inches below where we should have been. So really, it's kind of uncharacteristic to be seeing the rainfall that we've been getting recently to kind of get us back out of there. I mean, I think in Missouri alone, we're back to where we should be. But like you guys said, that's just getting the ground saturated.
• 9:31
  So that's not even gonna be a lot of runoff. I mean, a lot of that gets soaked up in this. And, yeah, definitely definitely eye opening to see that. But this is this is a typical time of year where we do see that turn off, but at least we saw some help this past spring.
• 9:44
  Skot Covert: Yeah.
• 9:44
  Mike Brasher: So, Scott, what are sorry. Chance, what else do you have for us there?
• 9:49
  Chance Gotsch: Yeah. So I was gonna let Scott here in a bit, I'll kinda go into a little bit more of the long range forecast. But Scott, I think, is gonna cover a little bit more in-depth on our expected Enzo cycle
• 10:01
  Mike Brasher: Okay.
• 10:01
  Chance Gotsch: And what that means in kinda historic data on that.
• 10:04
  Mike Brasher: Okay. That sounds that sounds good. You know, in addition to what I will say to jump in here, are we how is our screen sharing here first chance so we can get it over to Scott whenever we're ready there? But yeah. The other thing that we have been experiencing here the first couple of months has been above average temperatures.
• 10:23
  That was one of the themes that I've heard from a lot of people. Yeah. When it was up in Saskatchewan, what was it? Yeah. Two weeks ago, or was it last week?
• 10:32
  Yeah. It was last week, and had 60 degree temperatures. It was pleasant. It was great.
• 10:36
  Jerad Henson: I I have pink tomatoes ripening on the vine in my backyard. Yeah.
• 10:40
  Mike Brasher: That's right. One of them was telling me that their their tomatoes are still
• 10:44
  Jerad Henson: Yeah.
• 10:44
  Mike Brasher: And I think it was Frank Baldwin out of Winnipeg. Yep. Yep. So it has been above average normal temperatures throughout I mean, all the way up, and I think pretty much across the board. The other thing that has happened recently is had a couple of weather systems move in.
• 10:59
  Chance, you you mentioned one of those that had affected us here in the in the Mid South, but the folks in the Northeast certainly welcomed that as well because they had been also enduring extreme drought. So I know they were happy to receive all that rain as well. If you're a duck hunter, it means you can get more more water for
• 11:17
  Jerad Henson: Yeah.
• 11:17
  Mike Brasher: For for your habit for duck habitat, more places to hunt as well. So we're happy about that. So, with that, Scott, I think, yeah, we're going to jump over to you now and we'll talk about sort of more winter forecasts, predictions, prognostications based on some of these larger climatological cycles. So take us through that.
• 11:39
  Skot Covert: Yeah. So I think it's first really beneficial to start the conversation with the difference between a deterministic forecast and a probabilistic. So deterministic is gonna be just the same thing you see on a ten day forecast on a 10:00 news. It's gonna be what you see on on your phone apps. It's gonna be specific numbers, whether that's temperatures or or rain chances.
• 12:01
  And we're really not gonna be able to talk those numbers today. At this range, we can only look at probabilistic information. That gives us an idea. 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 to these long range forecast.
• 12:17
  So just keep that in mind as we kinda dive into some of this data. You know, we're we're having a very similar conversation that we did last year. Last year, we were pretty dry area wide. Certainly down in the Mid South, the Mississippi flyaway, other areas pretty dry out there as well. And also last year, I'm I'm recalling we were talking about La Nina.
• 12:38
  There was a likelihood that La Nina would emerge, and, there would be some benefits. There would be some some negatives to La Nina kinda depending on where you're at across the continent. And we're having the same conversation again this year. I would say the difference though, last year, we were anticipating La Nina. A lot of the weather models suggested a weak La Nina would emerge, and it really didn't until late late late in the season.
• 13:02
  Oh, I think it might have been the like the week season went out. So like late January. Difference this year is La Nina's emerged. It's here and it's it's weak, but it's here. And it's expected to be a short duration La Nina, meaning it probably runs through December, January, February before dissipating at that point.
• 13:21
  So with with the table set, we got La Nina. What is it? Just coming up as a refresher. We're talking about some trade winds pushing back off towards the west on the Equatorial Pacific Ocean. Why in the heck does that matter to duck hunters across North America?
• 13:35
  Well, all of weather is dictated by ocean circulations. Those ocean circulations are gonna be dictated by how cool or how warm the temperatures of the ocean are, and that really displaces or moves the jet stream. The jet stream is the moneymaker. Right? It's the one that brings these weather systems through the area.
• 13:52
  And when that jet stream or I'll often think of it as kind of like a railroad track for storm systems. When that gets moved, weather patterns of course are gonna get moved there as well. Typical La Nina, and a big big giant asterisk on the word typical. A typical La Nina kinda looks like this. Pacific Northwest gets pretty wet.
• 14:10
  Some of those wet conditions do extend into parts of Canada as well. Upper Midwest, generally speaking, is probably gonna be pretty cold. You get into the Deep South and you're looking at drier than normal patterns, oftentimes warm as well. And there is a part of the Great Lakes that can see some above average precipitation. Now, to be clear, you look at this map and you're thinking, okay, I'm in purple, I'm in dry.
• 14:31
  That's not necessarily gonna mean you don't get any rain at all. Right? Again, this is probabilistic. All this means is at the end of the season, when you tally it up and and you run the average, you're gonna be probably looking at less rain than you typically pick up. Or when it comes to temperatures, if you're in a warm zone in a typical La Nina, it means the odds are stacked in a direction that would lead to some above average temperatures.
• 14:56
  I think the key takeaway though is there's no such thing as a typical La Nina. They're all different in their own right. Some of them are stronger, some of them are weaker. This one's weaker. From what we can tell right now in some of the the model data.
• 15:10
  So you can take a look at the seasonal forecast that NOAA puts out. They released this on October 16, so just a couple of weeks ago. They are gonna update it once a month. So we do anticipate it'll be probably about the November. November.
• 15:26
  It's always on a Thursday. They'll update this, but this is kinda what they put out with regards to temperatures for December, January, February. It kind of resembles typical La Nina in some fashion when it comes to temperatures, when it comes to precipitation. It also has a pretty good semblance of of a typical La Nina. Now, let me just go abundantly clear here.
• 15:48
  The experts at NOAA, the climate prediction center, are the best of the best. They're really really really really good, and I'm not gonna criticize their work. They have a lot more degrees hanging on the wall than I could ever even imagine. With that said, you can look at some of the historical forecasts that they've produced. I know there's a lot of crazy colors on your screen right now.
• 16:06
  I'll walk you through it and make some sense of this. When you look at some of their historical forecasts, which is gonna be on the left side of
• 16:16
  Mike Brasher: Well, we I guess Noah didn't like what Scott was about to say.
• 16:22
  Jerad Henson: Kidding. I lost Scott's
• 16:23
  Mike Brasher: on first page. So we still have his video. Maybe we don't have his audio. We will we'll try to get that back. Got you.
• 16:32
  Yep. We got your video. And so what do I wanna what I had a lot of thoughts running through my head there. I really appreciated the graphic that we were about to get to there. It was pretty cool because it does get to this issue of typical and average, and you can't one year, even if you've got the same kind of strength of a La Nina or an El Nino, it's not gonna it mean that you're gonna experience the same conditions that you did in a previous
• 16:59
  Jerad Henson: year Yeah. Regardless of where you
• 17:02
  Mike Brasher: one good thing that I was a little bit excited about was there were some predictions of a tendency for well, I shouldn't say predictions. There was a tendency for there to be a bit more moisture up there in those northern latitudes, breeding areas, the prairies, so forth during these years.
• 17:17
  Jerad Henson: We need that fall moisture going into a freeze.
• 17:20
  Mike Brasher: Fall moisture, we need spring moisture, and then we need it to continue into the summer. Right. Yeah. That's what we need. And so, hopefully, he's gonna be able to deliver that for us whenever he he comes back.
• 17:30
  Chance, do we still have you?
• 17:32
  Chance Gotsch: Yeah. Yeah. I'm still here. Can you guys hear me okay?
• 17:34
  Mike Brasher: We can hear you. Yep. You got anything to offer here? I'm sure you do.
• 17:38
  Chance Gotsch: Yeah. Yeah. I'll kinda let Scott come back once he gets his audio right on exactly the point he was getting to. But I can honestly, if you guys are cool with it, go to the a little bit more now future forecast if you guys are alright with that. Been going to the eight to fourteen day away.
• 17:55
  Mike Brasher: 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.
• 18:04
  Chance Gotsch: Okay. Yeah. So here's kind of what we're looking at right now. There's two different things. We always typically when we look at temperature and we look at precipitation, and Scott kind of alluded to this earlier, there's three means that we typically look at it.
• 18:18
  We look at above, near, and below average. That's kind of the general consensus when we go so far out with these things. You guys mentioned it's been a little bit on the warmer side, and a lot of our trends right now, I mean, even
• 18:33
  Jerad Henson: here in Missouri, typically our average afternoon highs around 63, 62 degrees. That'll continue to fall to
• 18:38
  Chance Gotsch: the upper fifties until late next week. We're gonna be looking at Wednesday of next week close to 70 degrees, and most of the country is gonna be kind of all in this realm. So that's not saying we can't have one or two little cold systems, but as an average for that extended period of time, eight to fourteen days away, most of the country, I
• 18:56
  Jerad Henson: know Missouri actually opens up a lot
• 18:58
  Chance Gotsch: 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 gonna be a pattern here that's going to hold above average for those temperatures. On top of that, we're going be looking a little bit drier across much of the Mid Continent area. Good news is to the Northwest, and you're going to hear this reoccurring theme here in the future when we look again at the extended outlooks for winter. The Northwest, the Northeast, and the Southeast are gonna be looking wetter than average.
• 19:27
  And that's a lot of times has to do with these high pressure systems. So there's two different things we look at whenever we look at these maps. So you can kind of see here, and you saw when we were looking at ScottsMap just earlier, we're looking at pressure systems a lot of times to give us these forecasts on, hey, is it going to be drier, or is it going to be wetter? And when we're looking at it, that polar jet stream that you saw there, a lot of times, whenever it's gonna be basic weather, not much change, a lot of times that can be associated with, near or drier than average conditions. We see those jet streams what we call zonal flow.
• 20:02
  So it basically goes straight from east to west. Right? So there's not much of a wave in it. But when we start seeing the jet streams become wavy and dandy, that's when we start to see a more active system. So we have a high pressure system across much of the Midwest and the Central Plains and even the Deep South, South Central area there where we're gonna see high pressure.
• 20:22
  It's not gonna move too much, within the next two weeks here, and that that's gonna lead to most likely seeing those below average trends. So not as much rainfall, particularly, most likely not snow. With that being said, I know a lot of Midwest this weekend is gonna be looking cool. So that's a good good thing for any Missouri hunters and, any areas nearby here, in the Mississippi Flyway and even the Eastern central portions of the region. So that's the good news there.
• 20:48
  But the warmer temperatures, kinda like Scott was mentioning, I'm gonna go ahead and
• 20:52
  Jerad Henson: shift kind of into those maps that you've
• 20:53
  Chance Gotsch: shown here. It's a little squishy here. Let's see. So this was the three month average. So Scott was showing you December, January, and February.
• 21:01
  That's our typical winter season. Here's what we're looking at from November, December, to January. So we're kind of easing into what could seem like more of a La Nina condition. So what that means is a lot of the South, you kind of split The United States in half and you focus that South, most likely going to see warmer than average temperatures. Now that's an average, so that doesn't mean that we're necessarily going to be looking at you know, we could have a couple cold events that still spur in there, but overall, you're most likely going to be hunting warmer temperatures than what we typically see this time of the year.
• 21:33
  The good news is if you're up north right now where a lot of the migration still is, it's gonna be near where it should be. And then we start to follow that pattern a little bit deeper into the actual extent of the forecast, and you kinda start to see the cooler temperatures creep south with the extended outlook. And what Scott was also showing with La Nina, this is the forecast from NOAA and the National Weather Service. This is very very much a traditional average La Nina system setup. And there is some support to that with what we call the QBO, which is quasi binennial bine bimeonial oscillation, basically.
• 22:13
  And what that shows is it's basically two patterns, and this one is pretty on top of it, in terms of these two patterns, where we have fourteen months usually where we're gonna be seeing easterly trade winds and then fourteen months of westerly trade winds. And what that means basically and how that affects you is whenever we start to see the easterly in on typical years of La Nina, that gives us more than likely this pattern. It gives us better chances of this. And a lot of times what that could mean too is that polar jet stream that Scott was alluding to and showing, it it becomes a little bit more wavy. And what that means is you can buy in the cooler air with wetter air for much of the Mississippi Flyway off to the north, and you can see it here come into play.
• 22:56
  That typically means that you're gonna get wetter and cooler conditions, which oftentimes, when you have cold air and wetter conditions, you have you have a little bit more snow. So 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 active weather patterns across much of the Northern United States. Off to the south, this doesn't mean you have bad hunting. Right? Let's let's make that clear.
• 23:20
  You gotta think it's cooler up north. Yes. It's warmer down here, but when it's cooler up north, ducks gotta go south. Mhmm. So that's that's definitely gonna be something good.
• 23:29
  And I foresee this being a year where, because of the QBO and the La Nina, that interaction, where we're gonna have some pretty impressive events, in terms of, like, some pretty good cold snaps, and we're gonna go back and forth a lot, which a lot of times it gets the ducks moving, so that's a good thing.
• 23:54
  VO: Stay tuned to the Ducks Unlimited podcast, sponsored by Purina Pro Plan and Bird Dog Whiskey after these messages.
• 24:11
  Mike Brasher: 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 to obviously what what you're talking about these larger cycles or climatological patterns. You know, we we'll hear a lot about polar vortex disruptions, that super cold air that's sort of circulating at the at the pole. So also kinda as we're going through this, talk about what we know on the relative likelihood of more frequent or less frequent, you know, the incident instances of those types of of developments occurring?
• 24:46
  Skot Covert: You know, I think that's a a really good question, and I I it ties perfectly into the same conversation we had last year. You look at these typical La Nina patterns, you would think, oh my goodness. We're not gonna get a single cold front, or it's not gonna rain. It's gonna be dry the whole thing. No.
• 25:00
  Not necessarily. That was the the broad picture we painted last year, knowing still we would probably see a a a polar vortex spin off a time or two, and that happened. I mean, I, gosh, I lost a couple of days at least last season because everything was locked up. They got so cold this far south. I would suspect that happens again.
• 25:19
  I I think, just because we're in a weak La Nina and and there's a lot of orange and red on the maps, that doesn't necessarily mean we're not gonna have some big cold snaps. I think that's a real likelihood for many of us. It's just a matter of how long do they last. And still in the end, when you have several above normal days, which still is gonna be cold. Right?
• 25:41
  If the normal high is 40 and, you hit 43 and still counts as above normal, not gonna make much of a difference more than likely to your hunting success or not. It's just in the end, we look at those averages. I think the polar vortex spin off is is likely at least once. I wouldn't even roll out twice or even three times. Okay.
• 26:00
  Chance Gotsch: 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 really wavy in the atmosphere. And like Scott's saying, that typically means we will see a few of those active events.
• 26:13
  Yeah.
• 26:15
  Skot Covert: And, you know, you look at some of these historical winter forecasts, and I was not going to say anything negative about NOAA because let me tell you, I love him. I love him to death. And right now, they're not getting paid. So I I so I'm really not gonna knock somebody that's not getting a paycheck Yeah. And they're still showing up to work.
• 26:33
  You'll look at some of this versus on the left versus what actually happened those winters on the right.
• 26:40
  Mike Brasher: Hey. Hey, Scott. Let me clear. Scott, let me jump in here. Yeah.
• 26:43
  I'm not seeing your screen right now. We saw it a minute ago, but we lost that share feed. So before you Okay. Yep. Now we So got the comparisons that you're trying to make, so go for it.
• 26:55
  Skot Covert: 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 on average than what actually ends up happening. Now there are certainly some years where they nailed it, and then there are other analog years such as 2020 through 2021. You can see, wow. That actually didn't happen even remotely close to what was predicted.
• 27:22
  So you might be looking at this map and thinking, oh my goodness. It's another really bone dry, winter, and we're not gonna have any cool weather. I wouldn't I wouldn't believe that for a second. I I think we're gonna have plenty of of fronts to come through. And so I just wanted to point that out to say these seasonal forecasts are not the gospel, and they're not perfect by any stretch of the imagination.
• 27:44
  Jerad Henson: Yeah. Yeah. There were two things on there on those maps that got me excited as a duck hunter. Number one, I'm a Mid South duck hunter, so that that puts moisture and some weather up north. Right?
• 27:53
  So that's that's exciting. But that also means ducks are gonna move up and down the flyway. The other thing I saw at some of the later maps you always told in the preset, there seems to be some moisture in Canada throughout the winter. And so
• 28:05
  Mike Brasher: Long range forecast?
• 28:06
  Jerad Henson: Yeah. Long range Predictions. But but there's potential there.
• 28:09
  Mike Brasher: And so rather see the green than the red.
• 28:12
  Jerad Henson: That's it. Right? Right. And so, you know, I'm a duck hunter, eternal optimist eternal optimist here. So but so seeing
• 28:19
  Skot Covert: that, that's something I want
• 28:20
  Jerad Henson: to talk about.
• 28:20
  Skot Covert: More green. K. Yeah. I'll I'll show you a little bit more green. I I don't know if, our producer can pull that up.
• 28:26
  Yeah. Perfect. So, you know, you can look at these models, and you can see what the normal La Nina and the normal El Nino. I I don't really care a lot about that. I wanna know what recent well, I call them analogs.
• 28:36
  What are some recent winters that had similar conditions that are are weak La Nina? So I pulled that composite together. So this is gonna be from several winters that had similar characteristics at this point in the year, '96 to '97, 2001. Many years, you can see those dates listed up at the top of the screen. This is the temperature anomaly.
• 28:57
  How did La Nina affect temperature compared to average versus normal? And and for the northern part of the country, there's there's a lot of blue up there. It was a little bit colder than normal, and that extended even into the mid latitudes as well. Now you do get in the Eastern flyaway, the Deep South, and and you're trending a little bit above average by a degree to two when it's all said and done. You look at these maps and you're thinking, what are those lines?
• 29:23
  And those are climate districts. They're not counties. They're climate districts, and most the average person has no clue what they are, but that's what those weird shapes are. When you look at precipitation in the same lens, well, Liquella Nino often leads to around normal or above average to the north. There's a lot of light on there, which would indicate some normal precipitation patterns.
• 29:43
  Meanwhile, you get into the Deep South, a good chunk of Texas, Oklahoma, the East Coast. Yeah. Yeah. There's some climate districts that that generally suffer a little bit less precipitation. Not always.
• 29:54
  Right? But this is using all of the analogs dating back to the nineties of years that might give us some clues as to what we might be embarking on, going into the next little bit. You like blue. I heard you like blue, so I got a little bit more blue for you where it matters the most. So this is taking, the European model.
• 30:14
  It's it's one of the major global models that James and I rely on a lot. It's just one model. It's one of many that are gonna have a little bit different idea of kind of how things shake out. This is historically what we see in terms of snowfall as we're transitioning into a weak La Nina winter, just snowfall. Right?
• 30:32
  So you look up in the Dakotas, and, of course, you don't see Canada on the screen, but I think you can extrapolate out that certainly in the the southern portion of the Prairies at least, you're probably looking at above average snow conditions when it's all said and done. Now you get into the Deep South, we don't get a lot of snow to begin with, but those odds are probably gonna be a little bit lower where those brown numbers are at.
• 30:55
  Mike Brasher: Now that was pretty cool. And so I found myself sort of looking at that first map, the composite sort of temperature anomaly, and look cold up down right there. Cold up in the Northern Tier states and Pacific Northwest, and then it's above average down here in the Southeastern all across the Atlantic Flyway. And I found myself thinking, okay, how will that affect me as a duck hunter if I'm hunting the Mid South, South Atlantic, and even into Texas? I mean, it may be a good thing in terms of getting some movement of birds out of the prairies, out of those northern latitudes, but then it might mean that when we get down here, if we don't have a lot of I mean, if overall our temperatures are above average, that means we're gonna have ducks that aren't gonna have a whole lot of reason to move, find a lot of food, you know, for Right.
• 31:41
  Regulatory demands, that type of stuff. So it leads to this idea of stale ducks kinda more times than not, if that be the case. So that made me wonder, well, what's the precipitation gonna do? It might be a situation where you would be looking to hunt on those not not hunting so much based on the temperature changes, but availability of new of new rainfall
• 32:02
  Jerad Henson: Right.
• 32:02
  Mike Brasher: And and new habitat. So
• 32:04
  Jerad Henson: And when you get stale ducks, it's one the things we talk about a lot. The only way to make a stale duck, a smart duck move is change the landscape.
• 32:11
  Mike Brasher: Yeah.
• 32:11
  Jerad Henson: You have to change the game. They find that safe pattern. They stay on it
• 32:14
  Skot Covert: Yep.
• 32:15
  Jerad Henson: Until water on the landscape changes, whether it's it shows up new or it freezes solid. Yeah. Hard water helps too, but doesn't look like that's gonna
• 32:23
  Skot Covert: be the case
• 32:23
  Jerad Henson: too much down there.
• 32:25
  Skot Covert: You just described my season last year perfectly in
• 32:28
  Chance Gotsch: two sentences.
• 32:30
  Mike Brasher: Yeah. Chance, any anything to add to that that wonderful set of graphics and sort of descriptions we were thinking about there?
• 32:38
  Chance Gotsch: Yeah. No. Scott I think Scott nailed it right on the head. It it's a lot of good stuff. I I feel like this season compared to, you know, the last several seasons that we've seen outlook wise, I feel like it's a good thing that we're seeing, at least across much of the area.
• 32:51
  I mean, we'd love to see more rain across the South, but you look across much of the North and those breeding grounds. And, you know, we're always thinking about, hey, let's get to next breeding season. So getting that area from Canada, the Prairie Pothole Region reloaded on rain and snow earlier can only help us in that long term extent. So I think this is a good thing for much of the waterfowl or water that we're going to be seeing across the north, which is going to be beneficial. And, know, you a lot of times you think about it, a lot of the river basins are going to be flowing from north to south.
• 33:20
  So, yes, it's going be drier to the south, but, you know, the Mississippi, when you get off towards Boothill in Missouri and down towards Louisiana and all that, that's a very important thing to have filled up. And so the fact that we're gonna be seeing better chances of rain to the north, I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing, and I think it's a good thing. And like you guys said, when we have the cooler temperatures to the north, ducks gotta push eventually down south.
• 33:42
  Jerad Henson: Yeah. Yeah. I might emphasize too for those that are in those areas that are predicted to be slightly drier and slightly warmer, getting water when you can get it is gonna be important. Yeah. Mhmm.
• 33:52
  And and finding those permanent water sources, those are ducks you're gonna key in on.
• 33:56
  Mike Brasher: 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, fourteen day forecast. You might have covered something even in the more immediate immediate future, but I was trying to pay attention to a few other things. It might have been a little bit distracted.
• 34:13
  So for those like, we're here in the South. Right? Our duck hunting season is still and for a lot of states, their their hunting season doesn't open until later on this month. So we've still got some time to be optimistic about some magical combination of weather events that's gonna really change everything and make just a grand occurrence of ducks show up. Now the one thing I will say is even when those ducks do show up down here, they're gonna be well educated because we don't anticipate there have been a lot of production this year, and then those ducks will have been educated by all the states that get to hunt at them and get to shoot at them before us.
• 34:45
  So some additional challenges for us down here regardless of how far you go. But yeah. So anything for those those people that are in the middle of their hunting season up in the Midwest a matter of fact, I'm gonna be hunting up around the Great Lakes next week. I'm kind of anticipating anticipating maybe doing more fishing than hunting, kind of but but I hope I'm wrong on that, But they got good fishing prospects even if that's the case. So anything in the very near term that we can get excited about or, you know, across some of those areas that are currently open?
• 35:19
  Skot Covert: Short answer is no.
• 35:20
  Mike Brasher: No. Nothing there. I I that's I disappointing. Yeah.
• 35:24
  Skot Covert: I it kinda depends on where you're at. Look. If you're you're in the Pacific Flyway and you're in Northern California and points towards the the border, yeah, you're gonna have a decent amount of rain, probably some active weather patterns that are gonna pull some fronts through the area, but, a good chunk of the country is gonna be dominated by some high pressure through at least the November. And, you know, at that point, high pressure is gonna suppress a lot of meaningful rain chances. I would say a good chunk of the country is gonna see below average rain chances between now and, let's say, November 13 or so.
• 35:58
  Jerad Henson: Yeah. Yeah. One of the so one of the weather apps I use, because that's how you could tell a duck hunter really quick is how many weather apps are on your phone. Because
• 36:05
  Mike Brasher: I'm I'm interested to see where you go
• 36:07
  Jerad Henson: Because
• 36:08
  Mike Brasher: because I've been looking at some things because
• 36:09
  Jerad Henson: I looked at one of mine that it will predict out fourteen days or so, fifteen days, and it'll make it to November 14 on that timeline. And both the global model and the European model both predicted a little bit of a front coming through on November 14. You heard it from no
• 36:25
  Mike Brasher: chance. Jared Hinson.
• 36:26
  Jerad Henson: Both of them had it in the predictions. I'm not saying anything. I'm not a meteorologist. I'm just looking at one of one of these apps that's giving me an optimistic viewpoint. But Yeah.
• 36:39
  Mike Brasher: I I looked at a few forecast as well.
• 36:41
  Jerad Henson: Both the models talked about that. So That
• 36:43
  Mike Brasher: that's good. And so I I have several places that that I that I save in the different apps, and I look at the north of us, one of them is is Saskatoon Mhmm. Saskatchewan. And you look at the temperatures over the next four fourteen ten, fourteen days, and they just it's just a steady drop. You know, it's not there are no forecast major fronts that come through during that time.
• 37:07
  It's just like the temperatures, the highs, and the lows are just following those seasonal declines, but they're still running about six to eight degrees above average for both the lows and the highs, but it's there's nothing significant in the immediate future that is gonna drop those substantially except maybe something right out there. That's one of the reasons why we wanted to push this episode as late as we could during this week, is because hopefully, you know, we would have seen something develop out two weeks off, but Yeah. Yep. Got something to maybe give some optimism.
• 37:40
  Chance Gotsch: Yeah. I haven't seen
• 37:41
  Skot Covert: things change.
• 37:41
  Jerad Henson: Mean, this is gonna
• 37:42
  Skot Covert: be an active weather pattern. It's there's gonna be some rapid changes. Yeah. The next two weeks probably not looking the best overall, 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, you know, planting millet, taking care of all kinds of stuff, and and then it was just bone dry. The second half of the summer into the fall, you know, everything I'd planted dead.
• 38:08
  I got nothing going for me. And then a week before season starts, we get 10 inches of rain, and then that hole was filled up, more so than I was prepared for. So I I think they're gonna change. It just may not be early enough to put some early water on the landscape. Right.
• 38:25
  Yep. Yeah.
• 38:26
  Chance Gotsch: I think what we got just recently was probably the best we're going get for quite a bit of time. Even looking, I think I was looking out here next Friday, and, you know, stuff gets a
• 38:34
  Jerad Henson: lot more limited. We do a ten day forecast here, but
• 38:36
  Chance Gotsch: when you get out there, a lot could change. I mean, I think we have 20% chance here in Missouri for next Friday. That's the next system that we really see, across Midwest. And even then, it's it's just not a big rain event. So it's it's looking a little bit more bleak for for rain and in terms of, overall trends.
• 38:52
  It's very similar, very steady. We talked about that high pressure system, which basically paints a perfect picture right here in that precip outlook Scott Scott pointed up. And it's basically just going to cover much of the Central United States, and not much change happens across much of the area. But if you're off to the Northwest and the Northeast where Northeast, Atlantic Northeast, they've seen a decent amount of rain, even the system that they have currently. So you're probably looking great right now into the early season going into about mid season just by what you have there.
• 39:19
  But much of the Central United States, it's it's looking a little bit more bleak in terms of rainfall.
• 39:24
  Jerad Henson: Yeah. And I will I will
• 39:25
  Skot Covert: There's also one other wildcard. Ahead, doctor Jared.
• 39:28
  Jerad Henson: No. I was I was just gonna say quickly, I'll preface that front I was talking about was in Canada and the, like, Dakotas.
• 39:35
  Mike Brasher: That's where it has that's where it starts.
• 39:37
  Jerad Henson: That's that's
• 39:38
  Skot Covert: where it
• 39:38
  Jerad Henson: start. So it wasn't down here. It was up there. It was it was some a cooler cooler system.
• 39:44
  Mike Brasher: So Don't crawl fish now. Don't backtrack on your on
• 39:46
  Jerad Henson: your I didn't backtrack. It's I mean, I get excited when a weather front comes through. It's it's probably gonna push some white geese
• 39:52
  Skot Covert: this way,
• 39:52
  Jerad Henson: for sure, because it's gonna be
• 39:54
  Chance Gotsch: timely for that.
• 39:56
  Skot Covert: You know, there's there's one other wildcard that, you know, it's really tough to predict this at this range, but we still have a a full month, literally a month from today of hurricane season. No one likes a hurricane making landfall. No one wants the devastation or destruction. That aside, at times, it can bring some meaningful rainfall along the Gulf States, even far inland, and, of course, on the East Coast as well. You know, at this point, that window's closing, but I I wouldn't rule out some tropical moisture, which could be a significant game changer if that were to happen for at least parts of the area.
• 40:33
  Yeah.
• 40:34
  Jerad Henson: Did you have I was just gonna say, yeah, I can remember some of those events where, 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.
• 40:47
  Mike Brasher: We don't ever wanna we don't ever wanna necessarily hope for one of those. Certainly, we've seen. Right. Seeing what folks down in Jamaica are going through, and that is just devastating situation there.
• 40:57
  Jerad Henson: Worst case scenario.
• 40:57
  Mike Brasher: Absolutely horrible to see some of those images coming out of there. Just amazing. I know you guys have been glued to the TV and all of your forecast and all the different applications that you have. Just an absolutely I mean, just a a force of nature. I mean, that was we're kinda getting off track here, but I know that we were all if you're interested in meteorology or any kind of weather, those were just some unbelievable, an unbelievable storm, unbelievable impact, and, yeah, our thoughts and hearts go out and prayers go out to all the folks down there.
• 41:26
  But, I mean, you guys must have just had some incredible discussions about about what was unfolding there.
• 41:35
  Skot Covert: Yeah. The the science is is remarkable and amazing, but it's really tough to appreciate the science and the tools that we have knowing the 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 of awe inspiring to see the power of Mother Nature.
• 41:53
  Mike Brasher: Yeah. Well, we are going to wrap this up. Jared, do you have anything else to contribute here right now?
• 41:59
  Jerad Henson: I think that's it right now.
• 42:00
  Mike Brasher: We're getting excited. We wanted to get something out to folks who let people know we're gonna continue to do these periodically throughout the year. Think they were well received. We had some good engagement and some good comments and feedback, and hopefully we'll have some significant events weather wise that can influence hunting success across the country that we'll be able to talk about this year. We'll bring those to you as they develop.
• 42:23
  We've got a couple of other meteorologists that we're trying to connect with. Mandy with us last year, and I think she's gonna try to rejoin us on a subsequent episode of this. I believe she was out hunting or just getting back from hunting. Mandy, if you are
• 42:37
  Chance Gotsch: An elk hunting.
• 42:38
  Mike Brasher: Elk hunting. So Mandy, if you happen to be watching this, we miss you. Hope you had success on that hunt, and we are gonna be connecting with you here in the future. So, Chance Gotch, meteorologist with First Alert for KMOV out of Saint Louis. Thank you so much for sharing your time and expertise with us here again.
• 42:56
  Chance Gotsch: Yeah. Thanks for having me. Always a pleasure, and hopefully everybody has a good safe season. I mean, I know that some of the early outlooks are a little bit bleak, but like Scott said, there's a lot that can come, and one event is all it takes to completely change your luck.
• 43:07
  Mike Brasher: That's right. And then Scott Covert, chief meteorologist with five news out of Fayetteville, Fort Smith, Arkansas. Scott, thank you as well, and and good luck to you as you get out and get hunting in the next several weeks.
• 43:19
  Skot Covert: Sure do. Appreciate it.
• 43:21
  Mike Brasher: Also thanks to my guest host here, Doctor. Jared Henson. Thanks to our producer, Chris Isaac. Thanks our assistance over here, Casey Messerly. Thanks to everybody for tuning in.
• 43:31
  Happy hunting. Happy Halloween. Stay safe out there. And life is short. You better hunt.
• 43:40
  VO: Thank you for listening to the DU podcast, sponsored by Purina Pro Plan, the official performance dog food of Ducks Unlimited. Purina Pro Plan, always advancing. Also proudly sponsored by Bird Dog Whiskey and Cocktails. Whether you're winding down with your best friend or celebrating with your favorite crew, Bird Dog brings award winning flavor to every moment. Enjoy responsibly.
• 44:02
  Be sure to rate, review, and subscribe to the show and visit ducks.org/dupodcast. Opinions expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect those of Ducks Unlimited. Until next time, stay tuned to the Ducks.