[fireduck]

A couple buddies and I are planning a trip up to Quill Lake SK in the second week of Oct 2005. I have tons of questions but dont know were to start.
- Is there places to stay and do you recomend one?
- Is there plenty of places to freelance and how hard is it to get permission
- Is it hard to find your way around?
- What species and how many is in that area around that time?
- What kind of decoys and how many do we need to bring along?
- Any other equipment we might need?
- What tempature should we expect?
- Would you recomend some other place?
- Can or cant you hunt on Sundays?
We goose hunt a lot and hard in IL USA. We have everything we need just dont know how much. It will be our first trip to Canada.

Thank you in advance for any help you can give, JOE

 

[foldum]

Hi fireduck, made our first trip to Canada last year and hunted the Quill lakes area. We're from the southern part of Ill. and unfortunatly the goose hunting is'nt near as good as it was in the good old days. I'll answer your questions the best I can. As far as somewhere to stay, hotels fill up quickly (we already have our rooms booked) so you need to get on it right away. Go to http://quill-lakes.com and look for hotels/motels. There's plenty of places to freelance and getting permission is pretty easy to do. Just be nice and make sure you get a plot map which shows who owns what. Most of the farmers have copy's of them so they should'nt be hard to find. It's not hard to get around at all. Most roads run north/south east/west and in straight lines. We went up the first week of oct. last year, tons and tons of snows, lots of ducks(not a ton just lots) lots of cranes, lots of smaller darks(the big darks were just getting there when we left) and not many special bellies. We started the week running a ton of decoys and by weeks end we were only setting out 2 doz. bigfeet and 3 doz. outlaws. Just not the kind of pressure we're used to down here(never heard another group of hunters shot's the whole week we were there) Four-wheel drive trucks might be something you need depending on the weather. Also, you might want to go to a site that lists Canadian regulations so you know what you can and can't bring accrossed the border. I do know for a fact that you have to declare your guns, the form you need to download and print is called JUS 909, or you can call them and they will send them to you. Must be filled out in triplicate. The weather when we went up last year was very warm for that time of year. On the third day of our hunt it got up to 84 degrees. We were told that at that time of the year up there it could be sunny and warm one day then cold and snowy the next so make sure you bring all of your hunting clothes. We did have some cold days and they had already had three freezes before we got there. Can't really recomend anywhere else beings we've only made one trip up there but we're gonna have more guys and more trucks this year so i'm sure we'll move around a lot more. And last but not least, you can't hunt on sundays. We got up there on a saturday afternoon and spent all day sunday scouting and asking permission. Would recomend you do the same if your freelancing. Hope this helps

 

[fireduck]

Foldum, Thanks for the information. I feel better about our trip now. This was kinda weird though. I also am from the south western IL, near St. Louis. This will be out first trip to Canada also.
-Are you going again this year?
-What dates?
-Where you staying? (Looking for recomendations)

-How good did you do last year?
-How did you get rid of some of your birds?
-Approx much money you spend?
-How long it take you to get there?

Not for sure but we are probably leaving IL on sat the 8th, arrive Sun the 9th, hunt Mon-Fri(10-14),Leave Sat the 15th, get home Sun the 16th.
We plan on driving straight through. There is three of us going for sure and trying to get a fourth. Going to get together with the guys this week to finalize.

 

[foldum]

Fireduck, sent you a PM, I'm new to this so if you have a problem post back on here. If not, fire me a PM

 

[fireduck]

Foldum, I sent you PM. Not sure if I did it correctly. Let me know.

 

[firegoose]

HEY FIREDUCK
i tooam from ill and we are going to sask about the same time you and your buddies. by your username i imagine you are a fireman also. i am a volunteer from a small town in central ill. i have never been to canada and any tips you can give will be graetly appreciated. we are staying at the arrowhead motor lodge. i don't remember what town it is in though.

 

[fireduck]

WOW, that is such a coincendence. Maybe we will see eachother.

 

[ponass]

I just got off the phone with the farmer that owns the farm house we stay in north of the Quills. We are on for the second week of October as well. He said, next week he is going to start combining his barley. He says that they are having a bumper crop and also having the weather to get it up good and early. Last year the crops were still green around Wadena the first of October. He said that all of the sloughs and lakes are filled with water.

He didn't have all good news though. He said that the local Canadas got their nests froze out again this year and they were going to be tough to come by. By the time we come up there should be plenty of migrating birds so I'm not too concerned.

Good luck guys. Maybe we'll run into each other when we are up there. :beer:

 

[fireduck]

Sounds good, thanks for the info. Keep me informed if you hear any more.

 

[ponass]

Fireduck,

I've sent some PMs to your compadres Goose and Lawn. Get them to come clean with the info and let me know if there's any more info you need.

 

[PSLAWN]

im getting worried about the price of gas, i heard its $4 a gallon in sask. right now, not sure if that was canadian or US currancy. shoot, thats still over $3 a gallon at best , i figure well be doing a majority of our driving in canada, i figure %35 to %40 of our driving well be in the states, at $2.50 +,- a few cents, if it was 3 of us paying for the gas we would have been better off giving you the .40 cents a mile you requested fireduck. that 5th guy will take the hurt out of the gas bill well have, i did some rough estimates and im figuring best case we'll be paying a little over $1000 for gas, thats best case. im really thinking about buying that new 3/4 ton Powerstroke Ford and offering to drive so we can split the gas 5 ways. my buddies diesel gets 16-19 highway pulling a 30 foot camper. thats the kind of mialage we need, for this trip. i doubt the wife will let me get that new truck this year though!

 

[fireduck]

How about quit the jabs over the computer at me and just say it to me when you call once a day. :lol: