Texas waterfowlers can look forward to lengthy hunting seasons for 2015-16.

Each August for the past 20 years has brought Texas waterfowlers good news. This August makes it 21.

At its annual August meeting this past week, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission set waterfowl hunting regulations for the 2015-16 seasons. Those regulations continue, and even expand, what has been a string of more than two decades of generous seasons lengths and bag limits for ducks and geese.

For the 21st consecutive year, Texas duck hunters heading afield this autumn for the 2015-16 season will see the most liberal duck hunting regulations — a 74-day season and six-duck daily bag limit in most of the state — allowed under federal protocols based on duck populations and habitat conditions.

Texas goose hunters saw some good news, too. The addition of two weeks to the season on white-fronted geese means seasons for all goose species wintering in Texas — snow, Ross’s, Canada and white-fronted — will run concurrently for 88 days, ending a string of years in which the white-front season ended 14 days before the season on other goose species.

But that good news for goose hunters is tempered with reports from snowgoose nesting grounds in the far north that the most populous wintering geese in Texas saw poor nesting success this summer. Record number of ducks

The liberal hunting regulations come as North America’s mid-continent ducks ride an unprecedented two-decade string of above-average abundance that this spring saw estimated overall breeding population of the 10 most common ducks hit 49.5 million birds. That is the highest estimate since an annual standardized survey of ducks’ major nesting grounds in the north central United States and central/western Canada began in 1955, and comes on the heels of the 2014 estimate of 49.2 million ducks.

“This is the fourth year of record numbers of (ducks),” Dave Morrison, director of small game programs for Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, told the TPWCommission.

Overall duck numbers are 43 percent above the 1955-2014 average. Duck populations have been climbing, and hunting regulations liberalized, since the mid-1990s, when heavy rains and winter snows rains broke a drought that had begun in the mid-1980s. That drought saw the duck breeding population drop to near 25 million and resulted in the most restrictive hunting regulations —a 39-day season and three-duck bag limit — Texas waterfowlers had seen since a similar drought in the early 1960s.

Morrison added that while habitat conditions — wetland abundance, grassland cover — on nesting grounds this spring were not as good as a year ago, they continue to be conducive to good duck production.

“We’re still 21 percent above the long-term average (of wetland abundance), so things are looking pretty good for waterfowl,” he said.

With canvasback numbers 30 percent above their long-term average, federal wildlife managers, who set regulatory frameworks for migratory game bird hunting, this year approved allowing hunters to take as many as two of the big divers as part of their six-duck daily bag limit. This will be only the second season since the 1950s in which Texas hunters have been allowed to take as many as two “cans” per day. Concurrent for a change

This also will be the first season in several years to see hunting seasons for all geese in the state’s Eastern Goose Zone run concurrently from start to finish. Because white-front (specklebelly) numbers have held above a target level, federal officials offer the option of an 88-day season with a two-white-front daily limit, up from a 74day season this past year. That allows a concurrent 88-day hunting seasons for all geese in the Eastern Goose Zone.

That goose season in the Eastern Goose Zone, which covers the eastern two-thirds of the state, will run Nov. 7-Jan. 31 with a daily bag limit of 20 “light” (snow, blue, Ross’) geese and five “dark” geese, to include no more than two white-fronts.

The longer white-front season this year could be a savior for goose hunters on Texas coastal prairies. While early reports from nesting grounds indicate “specks” are seeing at least average success in producing goslings, reports from some of the main snow and Ross’s goose nesting colonies in the Arctic and sub-Arctic suggest white geese nesting efforts were an almost complete bust.

The combination of persistent cold temperatures that delayed spring “green up” resulting in mass loss of goslings to starvation on some colonies. At other colonies, peak hatching of goslings coincided with a siege of cold, rainy weather than saw most hatchlings succumb to hypothermia. At some colonies, icy conditions hung on much longer than normal, preventing geese from nesting.

Researchers banding molting geese at one colony had a single gosling among the 1,400 geese they rounded up. At another colony where researchers documented 73 percent nesting success in 2014, snow-goose nesting success this year was 6 percent. Promising potential

Duck production is expected to be at least average and could be above average thanks to improved habitat conditions created by a wet summer on portions of crucial prairie nesting regions. This points to what has the potential to be a very good duck season across Texas. And waterfowlers in the state’s South Duck Zone will be the first to find out.

TPWDthis year staggered duck season dates in the state’s North and South duck zones to take advantage of what research indicates is the best timing of seasons for hunter success, Morrison said. Because waterfowlers in the South Zone see their highest success in November and hunters in the North Zone see their best hunting success later December and January, TPWDopted to open the South Zone a week earlier than the North Zone and set the brief midseason closure (the “split”) to run concurrently in both zones, allowing the second part of the season in the North Zone to run through Jan. 31, the latest date allowed under federal frameworks. Staggering the starts

South Zone duck season dates are Oct. 31-Nov. 29 and Dec. 12-Jan. 24. North Zone dates are Nov. 7-29 and Dec. 12-Jan. 31.

“Basically, the North Zone opens a week later than last year,” Morrison said, adding that the concurrent “split” means the North Zone season will run a week longer than the South Zone season.

“By staggering the openings, in essence we’ve added two weeks to the season,” Morrison told the TPWCommission.

The daily bag limit is six ducks, to include no more than five mallards (no more than two hens), three wood ducks, three scaup, two redheads, two pintails, two canvasbacks and one “dusky” duck. The season on “dusky” ducks (mottled ducks, black ducks, Mexican-like ducks) is closed for the first five days of the duck season in each zone. shannon.tompkins@chron.com twitter.com/chronoutdoors