Divided They Fall

The continental divide cuts across the long grass prairie here in the pothole region of extreme northeast South Dakota, but not the divide you're probably thinking of. This is the continent's north/south divide, not the east/west one. Here the Coteau des Prairie (French translation of the Sioux term Hills of the Prairie) runs from northwest to southeast, separating the watersheds that run into the Red River and north on to the Hudson Bay, and those that drain into the Mississippi and south into the Gulf of Mexico.

This is the heart of the prairie pothole region in the United States, a large expanse of land that grows most of the waterfowl bred south of the Canadian border. During previous ice ages, glaciers scoured the landscape flat here. Their grinding and pressure pushed up this range of low hills and left a landscape pockmarked with tens of thousands of potholes with no drainage outlets and nonporous bedrock that doesn't allow the water to percolate very well. Winter snows and spring rains fill the potholes full most years, and ducks nest here. During the fall migration, most of the waterfowl in the Central Flyway funnel down through the pothole region of the Dakotas en route south, stopping on these same potholes and farm fields where other feathered relatives have been since early spring. This is waterfowl country.

By the time white settlers arrived here, the soils on these plains had developed into a rich, black loam that grew grass as high as your head in places. Buffalo roamed across the region, and the sky was filled with waterfowl. Plows were pulled through the ground, and these soils grew unbelievable crops during the short summers, and corn was planted to feed a growing nation. The last wild bison in the region was killed just after the turn of the 20th century, but the waterfowl numbers remained staggeringly prolific right up to today, and now even bison have been returned to many of the ranches and public lands.

More hunters might shoot mallards in Arkansas when they have all migrated south for the winter, but shooting mallards, other puddle ducks, diving ducks and geese on the long grass prairie pothole country is an experience all avid waterfowlers should live at least once.

From the crest of the Coteau des Prairie you can see north and northeast into Minnesota and North Dakota, where farm fields checkerboard the landscape. Everywhere across the checkerboard there is water. From tiny marshes and potholes to lakes spanning several hundred acres or more. Creek drainages also snake through this landscape, offering more places for waterfowl to rest, nest and feed.

At dawn and dusk in late October you can see skeins of waterfowl moving above the landscape, some migrating south, running from water and fields that were freezing further to the north in Canada--and others that were hatched and raised here--moving from roosting water to feed in harvested corn, bean, and other crop fields. This time of year, when the local flocks start to mix with the migrants, the birds dominate the landscape. You can't drive along a given road without seeing ducks and geese on ponds or feeding in farm fields. Even people who are not hunters notice.

The first morning we were hunting a harvested bean field sitting at the edge of a cattail marsh too wet to plow for planting. Sheet-water had collected in the shallow areas of the field from rains earlier in the month, and the larger bean field behind us was completely flooded. We had just a handful of full-bodied blocks and a couple of spinning-wing decoys, and the mallards came swarming in at first light. In the fifteen minutes before legal shooting light, there were several hundred birds buzzing our location, landing in the decoys and taking off again. The lightening sky featured a swarming melee of ducks, and the sound of calling birds came from every direction. The five of us were giddy.