Columnist Barb Henderson: Drawing for opening-day slots starts rush to waterfowl season

Barb Henderson

Friday, Oct. 29, 2004 | 10:05 a.m.

Barb Henderson is an outdoors enthusiast, freelance writer and producer/host of outdoors radio television programming. Her column appears Friday in the Sun.

With the current weather conditions, I am sure there are waterfowlers all geared up and excited for this weekend to arrive.

Especially those lucky hunters who stood in line on Monday morning at the Nevada Department of Wildlife's office hoping to be one of the hunters to draw a reservation for opening morning at the Overton Wildlife Management Area.

The OWMA encompasses 17,657 acres and provides an environment for bird hunters to hunt waterfowl during a specific season.

The OWMA offers a variety of habitat from desert to green or fallow fields, good upland habitat, and deep and shallow water with cattails and other aquatic vegetation.

Drawings are for the 60 hunters who will be hunting on opening day and will share one of the 15 blinds that are provided, allowing a total of four hunters to a blind.

NDOW officials said the OWMA is holding birds and an adequate supply of water. There have been as many of 350 to 450 Canada geese recently in or near the area.

If you were unlucky in the draw, or you are now interested in hunting waterfowl after opening day Saturday, you will need to reserve a blind in advance.

This can be accomplished by visiting the NDOW office at 4747 Vegas Drive in Las Vegas.

Once there, you will find a waterfowl OWMA reservation book. Hunters can have only one reservation on the book at a time. Once your reservation has been used, you can make another reservation for another date.

"When making their reservations, hunters indicate what type of blind they want -- bullrush check, field or pond," said Geoff Schneider, conservation education for NDOW. "The morning of their hunt, they check in at Overton and there is a drawing for specific blinds.

"Those folks who are unfamiliar with the area will be given directions to their blind by NDOW staff at the area the morning of the hunt.

"However, I would suggest that hunters familiarize themselves with the area in advance of their hunt. They should go to the area on non-hunt days and look it over to determine where they may want to hunt."

Along with your current Nevada hunting license, you are required to have a federal stamp, a state stamp and a HIP number on your hunting license.

For complete regulations and license information on waterfowl hunting at the OWMA or within of Nevada, go to www.ndow.org

For more information or banquet tickets please call 407-6801.

For information on Ducks Unlimited go to www.ducks.org

The committee will then review the proposals and pass them along with recommendations to the Clark County Commission for possible funding. The proposals should be directed toward programs that promote boating education and safety in the county.

For more information on these programs visit the Alan Bible Visitor Center or call 293-8990.