GRAYS HARBOR & WILLAPA BAY
You can hunt without a permit on Grays Harbor and Willapa Bay during the September goose season, but if you want a Christmas goose, you will need to pass the goose identification test. If you haven't taken it by now, the only places that still offer testing are the Region 4 office in Mill Creek (by appointment only) and the Region 5 offices in Vancouver and Wahkiakum County. Hunting dates had not been determined at press time, but during 2004, hunting was restricted to four days in December and four days in January, with a daily bag of four geese. As in all of the permit areas, dusky geese are off-limits, and you are required to submit all geese at the nearest check station.

Grays Harbor is pretty much a boat hunting show when it comes to Canada geese. The WDFW's Johns River WA, on SR 105 near Markham, encompasses 1,500 acres, and its boat ramp at the mouth of Johns River provides access to the southeast corner of the harbor, especially Markham Island. On the north side of the bay, the Oyhut WA provides beach access and a boat ramp that gives access to the North Bay. Hunters who work the harbor's islands can also launch at Westport.

Big, shallow and separated from the ocean only by the low sand spit of the Long Beach Peninsula, Willapa Bay is even larger than Grays Harbor. Goose hunters approach it in more or less the same way -- that is, with big boats and large strings of magnum decoys.

On the southeast corner of the bay, the Willapa NWR is the largest public holding open to goose hunting. Waterfowlers without boats can hunt from permanent blinds at the refuge's Reikkola Unit for a small fee, from the shore along the Lewis Unit and at Leadbetter Point. (Brant are seen here, although they are only open on designated days, and hunters must have a permit.) Boat hunters can also launch at the inside of the Long Beach Peninsula north of Nahcotta, on the refuge, at the Palix Portion of the Johns River WA near Bay Center, on the lower Willapa River near Bay Center, at the mouth of the North River and at Tokeland.

NORTH COAST BEAVER STATE GOOSE DESTINATIONS
The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife divides the state into six goose hunting zones, four of which touch the coast at some point. The Northwest Coast Permit Zone contains Clatsop and Columbia counties on the Columbia River estuary and Clatsop County's coastline. Only hunters who have passed the goose identification test can hunt in this zone.

Tillamook County is within a separate Northwest Oregon Permit Zone closure area and has been off-limits to all goose hunting in recent years.

The Northwest Oregon General Zone, where the special goose permits are not required, includes the Lane and Lincoln county shorelines.

The Southwest Zone contains coastal areas of Douglas, Coos and Curry counties, where there are no current permit requirements.

When Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski signed legislation that removed the Aleutian goose from Oregon's endangered species list, many coastal hunters thought that they would once again be allowed to hunt geese in Tillamook County. Originally nesting all along the Aleutian Island chain, Aleutian geese were reduced to dangerously low levels after foxes were introduced. Numbers have recovered to 64,000 since hunting restrictions, fox control and other measures were implemented. However, biologists say that the sub-population that winters in Tillamook County has not recovered as well as other stocks, and hunting will most likely remain closed in Tillamook Bay. This will displease farmers as much as hunters, because local Tillamook geese (not Aleutians) have responded to the hunting closure by lingering in the area longer and, consequently, doing more crop damage. Coos and Curry county farmers have also experienced goose depredations.