GOOSE HUNTERS WELCOMING CLOUDS AND COOLER WEATHER

OLIVE BRANCH, Ill. -- Wanted: Winter weather...cloudy and cold.

The geese are here and hunting clubs are open, but until Sunday the weather had not cooperated to provide better hunting conditions.

"We need some clouds and cooler temperatures," said Terry Simmons, manager of Sunset Hunting Club, located alongside Route 3 south of Olive Branch. "The geese don't fly in warm sunshine weather."

Goose hunters may get their wish for both cold and cloudy weather over the next few days. The National Weather Service is calling for rain with a chance of snow in Southern Illinois and Southeast Missouri starting Tuesday, with temperatures ranging from a low in the upper teens to a high of about 32.

The Sunshine Club, like most around the Horseshoe Lake Wildlife Refuge, didn't open until the first weekend in December. The season in the four-county -- Alexander, Union, Williamson and Jackson -- quota zone opened in early November and runs through Jan. 31, or until a harvest quota of 36,600 geese is reached.

"We're fortunate to have an 85-day season, a quota of 36,600 birds and a limit of two Canada geese per day per hunter," said Rich Whitten, waterfowl biologist for the Illinois Department of Conservation.

The figures are based on U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service forecasts for 1996. The F&W Service is predicting a fall flight of about a million birds for the Mississippi Flyway, which covers many Midwest states, including Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee.

The lion's share of the geese usually wind up in Southern Illinois.

"We didn't have many geese when the season opened," said Simmons, who has managed the Sunshine club the past four years. "We have a good number here now, and we've had some good shooting during cloudy days."

The latest goose count, conducted by the Illinois Department of Conservation, reveals more than 22,000 geese in the Horseshoe Lake and Alexander County.

"Actually, that count was taken Dec. 9," said Simmons. "We've had a few more geese coming in every day."

The report is about the same at Worthington Hunting Club, located just west of Olive Branch on the Miller City Road.

Icy, severe weather is needed to get the geese going, said a spokesperson from the club, which is operated by C.J. Worthington.

The Worthington club opened Nov. 30.

The club, said Worthington, has had some success, but with the sunshine last week, the geese were not flying.

Many hunters, club operations and others were elsewhere Saturday, attending the annual Goose Festival sponsored by the Alexander-Pulaski Sportsman's Club near Horseshoe Lake.

Good entertainment, clay shooting, and calling contests were conducted throughout the day at the clubhouse.

Goose hunting has been better in the northern area of the quota zone, where hunting clubs have been open since the weekend of Nov. 9-10.

Clubs between the Horseshoe and Crab Orchard lakes areas are also open now.

The Davis Hunting Club, owned by brothers Tom and Bill Davis along Route 3 near the Union County Wildlife Refuge, opened late.

Goose hunting in Union County has been slow due to warm weather conditions.

During the first month of the season, more than 2,500 geese have been harvested, with almost 2,000 of them in the area around Crab Orchard Lake in Williamson and Jackson counties. The latest goose count showed about 26,000 geese in the two counties.

Fewer than 350 geese were killed in the Horseshoe Lake area, and the harvest in Union County has been less than 200 during the first month.

The latest goose canvas revealed about 17,000 in Union County, 11,000 in the Rend Lake area and 4,500 around the Ballard County Refuge in Western Kentucky, for a total of about 90,000 geese in the Southern Illinois/West Kentucky area.