Conditions dashboard
Migration Center
Live weather and water conditions, with an auto-generated forecast for the area you pick.
Conditions dashboard
Live weather and water conditions, with an auto-generated forecast for the area you pick.
Conditions dashboard
Live weather and water conditions, with an auto-generated forecast for the area you pick.
Where do you want to hunt?
10 areas in North Dakota. Switching state opens its best-scoring one.
patchy fog at first light
Legal light
7:46 AM
At dawn
33°F
Wind
9 mph E
Pressure
Falling
Best-scoring areas right now, ranked by conditions and the latest survey counts.
Ranked by Hunt Score adjusted for confidence — an area backed by real survey counts outranks one scored on weather alone at the same number.
What's pushing birds south across the Mississippi flyway — freeze, fronts and north wind — with the measured counts on top. Click the map to open it full size.
North Dakota is in the Central flyway. The heatmap covers the Mississippiflyway for now, so it isn't showing your area yet — the conditions, outlook and shooting light above are for North Dakota. The other three flyways are coming.
Change since each area’s previous survey — arrow up filling, arrow down emptying, and the number is birds per day.
24 of 96 areas have only one stored survey, so they have no change to show — they appear grey.
No recent survey count for this area — the score below rests on weather and water only.
An engineering estimate that blends live weather, water, and the latest official survey count — not a validated prediction. Missing inputs lower confidence, not the number.
It's 33°F at Long Lake NWR, North Dakota with 8 mph wind from the E. No significant front in the next few days (daytime highs hold steady).
Auto-generated from live NWS/USGS data. No recent survey count for this area, so this describes conditions, not confirmed birds.
Each morning scored at first light for Long Lake NWR, North Dakota. Best looks like Fri — 10 mph ne at dawn.
Patchy Fog
33°F at dawn · 44/33°
Mostly Cloudy
37°F at dawn · 56/37°
Mostly Clear
32°F at dawn · 55/31°
Long Lake NWR, North Dakota
8 AM
33°
8E
9 AM
34°
9SE
NWS hourly forecast for the legal-light window, on the area's local clock. Wind arrows point the way the wind is blowing; the letters are the direction it comes from.
What the dashboard reads
A sharp drop in the daytime highs, a north wind pushing behind it, and water holding on the marsh — that's the mix that fills the sky. The drivers below are those exact signals, read live.
Long Lake NWR, North Dakota · as of Oct 27, 8:00 AM CT
Steady
Cold Front
No front (3-day highs steady)
8 mph
Wind
From the E
10 mph NE at dawn
35°F at dawn · 51/34°
Best morning
10 mph E at dawn
40°F at dawn · 56/40°
Chance Rain Showers
44°F at dawn · 57/44°
Scored over the dawn window (5–10am local) from the NWS hourly forecast, using the same model as the Hunt Score. Water and survey counts don't have a per-day forecast, so they are held level across the strip — the day-to-day movement here is weather.
Full moon
98% lit — birds may feed overnight and sit tight at dawn
Federal shooting hours are a half hour before sunrise to sunset; some states narrow this. Confirm with the state agency.
—
Water Levels
Nearest-gauge mapping pending
Freezing soon
Freeze & push
Freezes in ~45h · 10/100 push from the north (2 areas)
Falling
Pressure
30.04 inHg, falling over 4h — a front is working in
Waterfowl survey reporting for North Dakota.
Counts from these reports are stored and used to anchor the Hunt Score and the migration heatmap. Figures belong to the publishing agency — follow the link for the current numbers.