Big Kansas Outdoors: Waterfowl Hunting

Amongst some of the best waterfowl hunting action in the country, Big Kansas Outdoors calls the heart of the central flyway home. With over a decade of duck and goose hunting knowledge, Ben Webster's main goal is to ensure that whether his clients prefer to hunt ducks, snow geese, Canada geese, or the specklebelly goose, he and his team of hunting guides go above and beyond the clients expectations to ensure a waterfowl hunting trip takes place that won't soon be forgotten.

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A History of Bringing Down Birds

Ben Webster has been in the waterfowl outfitting business for nearly a decade. After getting his start scouting and guiding with another outfitter, he and a partner started their own successful outfitting business and ran it for five seasons. After parting ways with his former business partner, Webster started Big Kansas Outdoors in the spring of 2016. Webster said, “I just wanted to get back to having fun and putting smiles on clients faces. That’s what it’s all about for us, everybody having fun and everybody shooting birds. That’s the way we do business.”

Hunt Where the Birds Are

Big Kansas Outdoors’ home base is located in Hutchinson, Kansas, smack dab in the middle of the central flyway. Hunts take place within an hour-and-a-half radius of Hutchinson based on the birds’ behavior at the time of the hunt. Big Kansas Outdoors differs from some waterfowl hunting outfitters in the way they obtain access to prime hunting areas. Instead of leasing waterways or fields, most of their hunting is done through day leases. This “run and gun” style of hunting helps keep Big Kansas Outdoors’ clients on the birds. Webster said, “We’re not going to hunt a field where the birds were not in there last night or the morning before. We try to let them have two feedings before we hunt. That just gives us the best possible scenario to kill birds. It’s not uncommon to come across a field with 10,000-25,000 geese in it. That’s pretty normal for us.”

Putting in the Work

Finding the hot field at any given time takes effort and the guys at Big Kansas Outdoors are willing to put in the time to help their clients shoot their limits. Webster said, “I have about seven guides that work for me and everyone scouts every day, whether it be in the morning session or the evening session. It just depends on who’s guiding. I send them in every direction anywhere I know where there’s a roost pond and try to find where [the birds] are feeding and we go from there.”

Staying Mobile is the Key to Success

While hunting with Big Kansas Outfitters, hunters stay in hotels on which they can receive a discount for dropping the Big Kansas Outdoors name. Webster said that this helps his hunters stay closer to their hunting location and cut down on travel time. Some hunters even rent houses in the area for a few days. This option allows more room and a full kitchen so you can prepare your own meals. Webster typically meets with clients the evening before the hunt and a guide meets them in the morning. When they arrive at their hunting location, decoys and blinds are in place and ready to go. About 75% of Big Kansas Outfitters’ hunts take place over dry crop fields of corn, milo, or wheat.

This setup has worked out nicely with clients typically shooting their limits of birds at least two days of a three-day hunt. Webster said, “Last year, in the second duck season, I told my guides, ‘I want to kill ducks nine days in a row.’ And we killed ducks nine days in a row. At the end of the year last year, I told my guys, ‘I want to put up some big numbers.’ We put down four 75-plus bird days, three of them were 100 bird days, and the last day of the year we put down 131 birds.”

What to Bring

If you book a hunt with Big Kansas Outdoors, all you’ll need to bring is your shotgun and shells (Big Kansas Outdoors sells shells if you forget,) your camo, and a pair of knee high boots. Big Kansas Outdoors provides concealment in Dakota layout blinds and a spread of Dakota decoys helps bring the birds in close. Since most shots are taken at birds from 10-20 yards, Webster recommends a 3-inch load of #2 steel shot and an improved cylinder or modified choke. Most of Big Kansas Outdoors’ hunts are three days and run $1,000 per hunter.

A Day in the Life

Webster said that a guide’s hunting day typically starts anywhere between three to five a.m. Work begins with setting up decoys, up to 120 dozen in some cases. The hunters show up, and hopefully shoot their limit of birds, then it’s time to tear down that huge spread and head back for a nap. By three or four in the afternoon, Big Kansas Outdoors’ guides are back on the road and scouting fields for the following day’s hunt. Big Kansas Outdoors boasts an all-star lineup of guides coming from places like Minnesota, Colorado, and Oklahoma as well as some Kansas locals. Webster said, “Without my guides, there isn’t a Big Kansas Outdoors. One guy can’t do it by himself. All in all, I don’t know that I could find a better group of guys. They’re fantastic.”

National Exposure

Over the years, Webster has filmed with a number of national TV shows including “American Birdhunter,” “The Breakdown,” and “The Grind.” Big Kansas Outdoors will also be featured on upcoming episodes of “Heartland Waterfowl” and the new season of “The Grind.”

For the Love of the Hunt

Running an outfitting business is hard work, but for those who love to hunt, it’s worth it. Webster said, “Without guiding, I wouldn’t be able to hunt waterfowl every day. This will be my fifteenth season coming up hunting waterfowl. I went hunting as a little kid when my uncle took me to Cheyenne Bottoms for a teal hunt and I’ve been hooked ever since. There’s more to it than actually killing birds. There’s no other hunting besides upland game where you can actually talk and interact while you’re hunting. There’s a lot of hard work involved. But when all the hard work pays off, it makes everything worth it. There’s nothing like it.”

If putting down limits of waterfowl in the heart of the Kansas’ central flyway sounds like something you would like to try, contact Big Kansas Outdoors and book a hunt today with an expert waterfowl guide service at www.guidefitter.com/bigkansasoutdoors.

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