Best Duck Hunting States by Ducks per Hunter: California Leads at 27

California leads the 49 states in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service harvest survey at 27 ducks per hunter a season, followed by Louisiana at 25 and Arkansas at 22. Ranked by the number of duck hunters instead, Louisiana comes first with 73,800 and California sixth, and some states with big hunter counts average fewer ducks than the leaders. The bird at the top of the bag changes by state as well, from green-winged teal in California to gadwall in Louisiana to mallard in Arkansas.

A California duck hunter harvests an average of 27 ducks a season. Louisiana follows at 25, then Arkansas at 22, Mississippi at 21, Oregon at 20 and Washington at 19. Across the states the median is 11 ducks per hunter and 6 days afield, so California's figure is roughly two and a half times that of the typical state.

The numbers come from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service harvest survey, which presents its state waterfowl figures as roughly 10-year averages. They are rounded to whole ducks, so states one duck apart are close to tied. Oklahoma and Tennessee both average 18, and five states (Florida, Idaho, Kentucky, North Dakota and Utah) share 14 at the foot of our table.

Days afield add context. California hunters average 9 days, the most in the table, and North Dakota hunters 5, the fewest. Kentucky hunters put in 8 days for 14 ducks, and North Dakota hunters put in 5 days for the same 14.

Louisiana fields the most duck hunters, 73,800, ahead of Texas (71,600), Minnesota (65,700), Arkansas (54,100), Wisconsin (53,800) and California (50,600). Three states sit in the top six on both lists. Louisiana ranks first for hunters and second per hunter, Arkansas fourth and third, and California sixth and first.

The other three states in the top six by hunters tell a different story. Texas has 71,600 hunters who average 16 ducks each, which puts it ninth per hunter. Minnesota's 65,700 hunters average 9, below the median of 11, and Wisconsin's 53,800 average 8. Of the ten states with the most duck hunters, seven average above the median. Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan (35,800 hunters, 9 ducks) fall below it. Meanwhile Mississippi (14,100 hunters), Oregon (19,400) and Washington (20,900) all rank in the top six per hunter with far smaller crowds.

Two columns explain why the rankings part company. The agency says it estimates the ducks shot in a state by multiplying the average number of ducks shot, as reported on the survey, by the number of duck hunters. A state with a large hunter count can therefore rank high on total harvest with a middling bag. Our earlier paper on duck and goose country ranks states by that total. This paper keeps the two ingredients apart to show what one hunter's season looks like.

Every state's harvest has a leading species, and it varies. Mallard leads in 11 of the 15 states in the table. It makes up 65% of the harvest in Idaho, 52% in Kentucky, 51% in Missouri and 48% in both Arkansas and Washington. California's leader is the green-winged teal at 26%, Louisiana's and Texas's is the gadwall at 22% and 19%, and Florida's is the ring-necked duck at 32%.

The share matters as much as the name. Louisiana and Texas have the two largest hunter counts and the two smallest lead shares in the table. A top duck at 19% of the harvest, as in Texas, means more than four of every five ducks taken there are some other species. A state like Idaho, at 65%, has a bag that is mostly one species. Among the mallard-led states, Mississippi (29%) and Utah (30%) have the smallest shares, so their bags are more mixed than the label "mallard state" suggests.

The figures are estimates from the Fish and Wildlife Service's Harvest Information Program, taken from its state file for 49 states. Because the agency presents them as roughly 10-year averages, a state's number smooths over strong and weak years and over any rule changes made during that window. It describes a typical season in the recent past and does not forecast the next one.

Ducks per hunter reflects bag limits, season length and hunter skill as well as birds. A state averaging 27 ducks may have more birds, longer seasons, more generous limits, more skilled hunters or some mix of these, and the survey cannot separate them. Harvest is also not population, so a high bag does not show that a state holds more ducks. We did not compute margins of error, and rounding to whole ducks hides gaps smaller than one. The table lists only the top 15 states by bag, so a state that is missing from it, Minnesota for example, is not necessarily last. Its 9 ducks per hunter sits under the median of 11.

We believe a hunter comparing states should screen by ducks per hunter first, because it describes what a typical season yields, and use hunter counts second, because they show how many people share a state's birds and say nothing about the crowd at your marsh. Start with the six states that average 19 or more.

Then read days afield beside the bag. Fourteen ducks over 5 days in North Dakota is a different trip from 14 over 8 days in Kentucky. Check the lead-duck share too: a state where one species is 65% of the harvest calls for a different plan than one where the leader is 19%. Treat one-duck gaps as ties. The survey speaks for whole states and cannot rank one marsh against another, so use it to choose a state and turn to local information for the water.