Killer Tommy

Tommy and Stu went on the Youth Waterfowl
Hunt at TMG WMA today. We had a lot
of opportunities, but it was a weird weather
day. Stu knocked down three ducks, but
we were in the reservoir and 30 mph winds
sent the ducks sailing. One bird that he
shot died with its wing up. It zipped
through the spatterdock like a sailboat.
We were looking into the sun and lost
it and his other birds.

Tommy managed a coot (which refused
to drift away) and a nice drake blue wing
teal which we found deep in the next
impoundment over. It was his first duck
(and first coot).

Last Hunt for the Big Boys

Today was the last duck hunt of the 09-10
season for Jim and me. We were invited by
Mike T and John G to join on John's draw
at TMG.

This had all the omens of a disaster hunt.
I had originally planned on having Jenny
join us for her final hunt as a youth. I
wanted her to get her first duck for her
16th birthday. It didn't occur to me until
yesterday that she wouldn't be a legal
hunter because she didn't have a
license since being 16 for even a day
means you need one. Good thing we
didn't try to bluff our way through -
the game warden was at the check
station.

Last night, I went to bed nice an
early so I would have a good night's
sleep. After two hours, multiple
sirens started blaring on I95 and
woke me up. When I finally got
sleepy again, some idiot got a
number wrong and kept trying
to text message our land line.
I ended up with only three hours
sleep. Jim said he got even less.

Still, both the trailer and boat
lights were working. that was
a change from recent hunts.
Something was going right.

At the check station in the AM
we were 16th and last pick, but
were hoping for a spot in the reservoir.
None of us really fancied hunting lower
Goodwin and having long slogs and
wades. When our names were called,
only two other parties had chosen the
reservoir. I got some good G2 and
we headed out to the spot I had hunted
early teal.

We putzed around a bit until Mike found
a spot and Jim and I found another. The
hydrilla wasn't thick, but we had a pretty
good hole. Unfortunately, we were looking
into the sun. The wind was light from the
southwest. I put ringer and coot decoys
out along with four woodducks. My hope
was that the predicted heavy cloud cover
would stick around and that the wind would
pick up. Well, the wind did eventually pick
up, but it was a warm wind as the day crept
up to 80 degrees.

We didn't get a lot of early shots. I was
afraid it was going to be dead. We didn't
even hear anyone shoot out in the rough
blocks until exactly at shooting time.

During the lulls, we could hear big,
bull gators thrumming the water.
They were all around us and they
were loud.

Eventually, we got some singleton ducks
come in. Jim got the first one that we thought
was a nice wood duck. Turned out it was
a beautiful drake ringer (our only ringer).



I got on the board with a hen green wing. We
also got four drake bluewings. One for Jim
and three for me.



By the end of the day, Jim had three ducks
down and I had six. But, one of his and two
of mine had dropped a long way away and
one of those wasn't hit too hard. We never
found any of those three. I'm pretty confident
that the marsh monsters got to them. Where
Jim's duck landed there were three small
gators and a big cottonmouth.

It must have been cottonmouth day. RedFishRob
told us at the ramp that they had run into
one and we saw another on the levee that
some one had run over.

As days go, it wasn't the best. We shot
behind and badly, didn't have great
opportunities, but didn't get skunked either.
I really needed the afternoon nap.


Next week, Youth Waterfowl Hunt.

ofs

Like Riding a Bicycle

Whew! I haven't forgotten how to
kill ducks. We had an awesome hunt
Saturday.

My friend, Mike T. had two open
spots to hunt Broadmoor WMA and
invited Jim and I to join him. He
was pick 11 out of 14, but with the
way things have been going lately,
sure to move higher with no shows.

The forecast was for dense fog. I've
had good hunts in fog and some
really bad hunts. I was nervous
as we drove out in fog so thick
that we were under 30 mph
for quite a bit of the drive. But,
no fog at the check in station and
no fog on the marsh. Very strange.

We did move up a few slots and
my buddy, Duckmanjr, gave us some
good G2 when our pick came and we
were off. I've had some really good
hunts in 2 North before and this
one was no exception. Mike has
bad hips and can't wade too far
so he hunted near the levee, but
Jim and I decided to head about
4 tenths of a mile away from
him where we had heard large
numbers of black bellied
whistling ducks. It wasn't a
hard wade by any stretch and
we found a spot where a lot
of ducks took off in the
dark. (That's a noise that
will make you stop for a
second). We each put out
decoys at opposite ends of
a long row of reeds. For
once, the hidden, lateral
ditch was in the middle
of the clump of reeds and
not much of a threat.

No sooner did I have my
dekes out than I talked
myself into moving to the
opposite side of the reeds.
That way Jim would be looking
south and I north and we'd have
a good view of where the ducks
were flying.

In the wait until shooting time,
I've never had so many bb whistling
ducks around me. About
8 minutes before legal light,
I group of 8 or 9 came across
on my left all of them singing
and wide open. It took every
ounce of ethical energy not
to get my limit right there.

Later in the morning, we were
also serenaded by fulvous
whistling ducks. Their
notes are a little easier to imitate,
but both birds can be talked
into your spot if you have
enough guys with whistles
to offset their social
gatherings. Jim and I
did our best.

When shooting time did come,
it was all blue wing teal in
shooting range. I dropped one
that fell hard in some reeds.
I had to search the spot three
times over the morning to find
my bird. Behind me, Jim got
a teal. He moved south a bit
to where some birds were working,
but I was doing pretty well
where I was. I added three
more teal (including a true
double) and then got a double
on a group of black bellies
that came through. One of
them landed in the next cell
up and was still swimming.
I was able to reach him and
put an anchor shot on it.

Jim wasn't having as much luck.
I had him move to my spot and
then move north a cell. I
saw him drop one teal stone
dead in some low weeds. It
should have been an easy
retrieve. Where it went
we'll never know. Maybe
a mudfish that survived the
freezes got it.

I was sitting back at our
original spot. Even though
I had limited, not a duck
had decoyed all morning.
It was all passing shots.
Suddenly, there was a whir
in front of me and a splash.
Four or five blue wings flew
through, but a nice drake
and hen landed 30 feet in
front of me. I sat stone
still for about 10 minutes.
Neither duck seemed to
notice me in the reeds.
I was able to learn that
they would actually land
in a hyacinth patch. As
far as I know that's not
a food source. They
eventually took off and
I moved up with Jim.

A little later four fulvous came
over. Jim had switched
to my Baikal 12ga because
his little Remington 20ga
wasn't cycling right. I
yelled at him to shoot one
of the fulvous and he popped
up and hit one. Unfortunately,
it wasn't hit hard and sailed
on the wind a couple hundred
yards behind us. I saw where
it went down and went off
on the retrieve. After
crossing two laterals, I
saw the bird making for a
large patch of fairly low
stuff. I got there and
spent 20 minutes stomping
around (part of which in
a third lateral) before I
gave up. I really wanted
Jim to get his first fulvous.
When I got back to him,
he had gotten three more
blue wings and we called it
a day. It was warm and we
had drunk all our water and
had a healthy wade back to
the levee. By then the wind
had freshened and was at
my back. I let the decoy
sled float back to shore
with only the occasional
nudge from me. There were
still so many teal flying
that I could easily have
shot another limit on my
way back in. At the check
station, we found that Mike
had limited on teal too. A
great day for all of us.

After that, we went to
picking. Teal are
easy this time in the
season, but the black bellies
are next to impossible.



A really fun day.

ofs

Sleet Hunt

It was cold, windy, and sleeting, but the sleet
was better than rain since it just bounced off.
The day was slow since we were the only guys at
our boat ramp, there were few other hunters
on the marsh shooting, and there were
precious few ducks in the air. Still, I hit
four hen quacks on my call and four mottles
came over the reeds and dropped their feet
for a landing. We had three guns in the boat,
made three splashes, and sent the fourth duck
off a widow - she kept circling us all morning.
The only tricky bit was that one mottle got
caught in the river current and was headed
to Jacksonville. I had to run after it and
jump into waist deep water on the retrieve.



ofs

Reminders to Self

Three things:

1) After you have crossed the hidden
ditch several times, you should remember
that it is there and not trip in it.

2) Water over the waders on a cold, windy
morning is unpleasant.

3) It was worth it for a couple bwts.

ofs

Hmm, That Looks Odd

Our duck hunting was horrible Saturday.
Only one teal came across the spread in
a #4 station high house shot. I whiffed
badly. I even skybusted three blackbellies
that were breathing oxygen they were so
high. Nothing.

We decided to snipe hunt and scout.
The snipe are all gone too. At one point,
we were crunching through some heavy
broom grass and smart weed. I saw
Craig jump back and point his gun at
the ground. I figured it was a snake
and yelled, "Shoot it!" He said that
it was already gone. I told him to
go around it the other direction.

Later we went up to Teal Whackin'
and saw some birds jump up. We
decided to grab a handful of decoys
and hide in the reeds in case they
came piling back in the way they did
for Craig and I several years back. I
put Jim on a point, Craig to his left,
and me to his right. Of course, that
was the end of the ducks.

I did see movement off to the right and
watched an otter come bobbing along. I
yelled to Jim to alert him. At that
moment, I heard a muffled boom from
Craig. Jim thought he had taken a
shot at the otter; I thought maybe a
stray duck had come it.

Instead, it seems that Craig said
the most dangerous thing you can
say on the marsh. He was squatting
in the reeds and happened to look
down at his foot. He saw a weird
pattern in the weeds and mud and
thought, "Hmm, that looks odd."
His next thought was, "that's a snake.
It's head is sticking out and it's a
venomous snake." He quickly jumped
out, spun around, and shot the
snake. At first he thought it was
a pygmy rattlesnake (from having
stepped barefoot on one in the
back yard) but later we determined
it was a baby cottonmouth.



Not that I think Craig has messianic
delusions, but it was interesting that
we read Gen. 3:15 in the liturgy this
morning.

I will put enmity between you and the
woman, and between your offspring and
her offspring; he shall bruise your head,
and you shall bruise his heel.

Craig definitely had enmity. And that snake's head
was "crushed".



As we say, "Some people have fun on the weekends.
We have adventures."

ofs

Diver Elimination

I have not had the best luck on the
online lottery for draws at the local
WMA, but I was on it once. For this
week I was first pick for Goodwin
Reservoir. I had my ideas of which
spot to choose, but I needed to confirm
it with the Mayor of Goodwin, Duckmanjr.
He and Jason put me on the hot spot.

Since I can only hunt three guns in the
boat, I still had an opening for one
more hunter. The only requrement
was that he have his own boat. I
picked up a guy with a canoe. We
towed him out and set him up well
east of us.

I found a spot where we would blind
up that had obviously been used by
others. I got the decoys all out and
then realized that I had -once again-
set the decoys up downwind instead
of upwind. We had to pull them all back
in the boat and switch them around.
Bonehead!

That done, we got the boat in place
camoed up and sat down. Shooting
time was only 15 minutes away. Nice
timing. It was a cool morning (upper
40s): cloudy and breezy. Very nice.

It didn't take long after the 6:39AM
shooting time before we and the
rest of the marsh warriors were
blasting away. It was a little dark
to see at first and the temptation
is to blaze away and miss behind
the birds. But, we had them
decoying and were able to jump
them out of the dekes and splash
them there.

By sunrise, we could see pretty well
and the day looked like it would
be awesome. That's when I heard
someone shouting in the distance.
Unfortunately, he was shouting my
name. I hoped it was merely something
like, "I'm limited out and am paddling in" or
"I got the duck of ducks." Instead, it
was, "HELP! I need HELP!" I told
Jim and Craig to get out of our boat and hunt
from the reeds. I pulled the camo
netting in, fired up the Go-devil, and
headed out to find him.

Having flipped a canoe on my first
duck hunt, I knew what to expect.
The guy was soaking wet in three
feet of water. The canoe was back
upright and had his stuff back in
it, but it was also full of tea colored
marsh water. I pulled all of his
sodden gear into my boat, we dumped
and righted the canoe, and then
got him and his gear back in.
By then it was warm enough
that hypothermia wasn't going
to be an issue. I left him to
continue hunting and headed
back to our spot. I picked up
what ducks I saw, picked up
the boys, got back in our spot,
pulled the palmettos that hadn't
got caught in the prop back around,
set up the camo nets, and got
back to hunting. We weren't even
an hour into shooting by then.

The rest of the morning was
a duck here and a duck there,
but they added up. The fun
was in turning ringers with
the call. A mallard hail call
really works on them. We
also had a group of six mottles
really give us a hard look. I
was using the Duck Commander
Drake Mallard call and a
live hen in the group was
doing her best to get me to
join her. Sadly, they've been
so shot up that we couldn't
quite overcome their trepidation

We ended up with one mottle duck
more by accident. We got one
that someone else must have shot.

Our final take was 15 ringers and
1 pulverized blue wing teal. A real
Wheel O'Ducks.


The best surprise was when one of
Craig's drake ringers had a band.



That was one beautiful sight to see.
And, it shows how good our set up was.
This was a mature drake that had been
banded in Ottawa back in '07 and was
making at least his third migration.



I also managed the most beautiful
drake ringer I've ever gotten. We're
still deciding if it gets mounted.


You can just see the chestnut ring on
the bird's neck.






We had them buzzing us just about like this.



ofs

New Species

The big storms of Friday never completely
materialized, but the threat was enough
to keep us off the marsh. So, we rescheduled
for Saturday morning.

The day was quite windy which was perfect
and a little more water was on the marsh.
We made it to the spot I had identified as
a hot spot the week before. It was perfect
depth, but an inconveniently placed island
of para grass in the middle limited the area
to put decoys, plus the hole did not lend
itself to a north west wind. Still, we got
set up and hunkered down.

Ten minutes before shooting time, we could
here folks in the distance blasting away. I
had high hopes for the day particularly because
I had a first time hunter with me. Things
eventually got going when Jim dropped a gwt
that came in from our left - the direction I
had hoped they wouldn't fly from. I got a
gwt that Jim thought was too long a shot.
Later, a pair of mottled ducks came from
off my right shoulder. They were a little
behind us. I had to stand up and turn
completely around to get a shot at the
bird on the right, But, it dropped like
a rock. When I did the retrieve, I found
out that it wasn't a mottle, but my
first ever gadwall. Woo Hoo. We
sat idle for a long time until three
more gwts came in. My friend and
I each took one and that was our
day.




I've sure had many worse days, but
I had hoped this one would be more
exciting for my friend (who prefers
anonymity).



ofs

Back on Track

Couldn't scout during the break and - to be
honest - the lack of birds, water, and weather
had left me less than enthusiastic. Still, the
two little boys wanted to hunt. I couldn't
think of any of my usual spots that were
appealing. So, I Googled Earthed until
I found a pond right off the river that
should still be holding water. The
recent rains gave me some extra hope.

The trip down river was uneventful.
I took a quick look in Fog Hunt, but
there was no water to float the boat
and what little pond there was was
too small for three guns. The new
area was just a small step away
and we were soon there.

I was surprised that the water was actually
deeper than I had hoped. I got the
boat up on the bank with our backs
to the coming sunrise and told the
boys to get the palmettos out while
I put out the decoys. No coots today
(there aren't any on the marsh). I
put out blue wing teal and green wing
teal in the classic J hook pattern.
I put a Mojo Teal pretty much in the
center. All of these were upwind to
our right but only about 10 to 20 yards
out. In a real shallow area off
the stern of the boat, I put some pinners -
a few of them on the bank. To the left of
the boat I put two mottled (black)
duck decoys. One of which was
had a Holy Hand Grenade.





I then came back to the boat got the
camo and the palmetto fans up and
settled down for the wait - and it was a
long one. We heard some blackbellies,
but they were long gone by daylight.
I didn't hear any other ducks. Things
didn't look good.




When shooting time came, nothing
was happening. We waited patiently
until actual sunrise and still nothing.
Finally, a small teal came zooming
straight in and over the dekes. Boom
boom and the day wasn't a total bust.
I relaxed then. A bit later a small
group of teal came in and landed
smack in the landing spot. I doubled
on a pair of gwts and Stuey hit a bwt.
We had one duck zing through that
we didn't pick up until it was long
gone. Suddenly, a big dark bird
came loafing in. There were
cormorants around, so I wanted
to be careful. But it was a big,
drake mottle that landed also in
the landing spot. Stu shot and
missed and I caught it on the
rise. The final group was teal.
They buzzed us and I gave them
a mallard hail call. Turning on
a dime the 8-10 birds came back
and landed in the dekes. Again,
I doubled but this time on bwts
and Stu dropped one.

This was Tommy's first hunt and
he wasn't comfortable with a pump
and I didn't give him more than one
shell. Since he's shooting lefty now,
he had trouble working the safety
on the Remington. I switched him
later to the Mossburg, but the birds
were done by then.

If fact, the birds started flaring off.
I now think it was the Mojo and I
shoulda pulled it in, but it's hard to
give up on something that worked
early on.

We finally gave up and packed up.
The boys hid the palmettos so we
wouldn't be advertising a good
spot.


We had watched ducks all morning pile
into a hole about 300-400 yards away.
We went up and scouted it. It was duck
central. They didn't want to fly away when
we motored in and they kept wanting to
come back while we were there. The
snipe there were thicker than fleas too.
I only managed one, but I was using #4
shot.


We decided to head home, but we know
where we're going next week.





ofs

Low Water

The duck hunting stinks. There are
few birds around mostly because it hasn't
been cold enough and the drought has
dried up all the water and killed
the food. Here are some pictures
from last week that show how our
boat blind works.

First, a view across the pond. This
is the way we would have been shooting
had we been shooting. Note someone
elses old blind on the left of the photo.
They had left the water full of hulls and
wads. At least some time in the recent
past it was a hot hole.


This is the view of our blind.

Closer view:

This is from the back. The breeze
flipped one of the palmetto fans
over.

After we take the fans down, we
take off the camo netting.

From the bow of the boat, you can
see that we string long bungee cords
from stern forward and then drape
military camo netting over it all.

The netting is propped up by pvc conduit.
The bungee cords are threaded through tees
that remove from the pvc for storage.


Good look from the side:


Closer look at the bungees, pvc, and tees.


We store the nets in black plastic bags
that can be used to cover anything shiny
in the boat. We'll dry the nets in the
yard when we get home.


Then we pick up decoys. The decoy bags
are camo and used to cover the boat's gas
tanks.



ofs

Opening Day 2009

Well, the day turned out better
than I had imagined, but barely
better. There were few ducks and
few people hunting them. We heard
some distant shooting, but even that
wasn't very much. It was an eleven
mile trip up stream. For some reason,
I had mis-figured it at eight miles
and about a two hour journey. By the
time we got off all the sandbars we
rammed and got to our spot
(code named Deep South), we had
little time to set up. But,
set up we did. The last decoy
was out and the final bit of
camo on the boat exactly at
shooting time. We had
pretty high hopes early because
the dark was full of the sound
of black bellied whistling
ducks and mottles. The bbwds
were gone before shooting time
and never came back. The
mottles hung around, but that's
for later in the story.

The sun was at our backs. I had
coot decoys as blockers at the
upwind side of the spread off my
right shoulder. The teal and
mottle decoys were just inside
of the coots. For good measure,
I put 4 pintail dekes in the
shallows off of Jim's left shoulder.
Before us, was a nice, open landing
area.

Now, we don't actually intend to
shoot coots. The coot decoys are
there as confidence decoys. They
are wary, skittish birds that
won't ever hang around hunters.
Ducks see that and think they
are home free. So, first thing
in the AM, the only real coot
on the marsh lands in our spread
and spends almost the rest of the
day swimming amongst the decoys
trying to feel a little less
lonely. I got out of the boat
several times and we fired at
ducks once or twice. Our coot
friend was entirely unfazed.
Jenny named him Charlie. I
hope someday he finds true
happiness.

Anyway, the twilight turned
to daylight and shorebirds
by the thousands came out.
Maybe an hour into shooting
time, Jim said a duck was
flying just over out heads
and away from the spread.
I hit it a lick with the
mallard paralyzer call, it
turned on a dime, zoomed
back, and landed. I told
Jenny to shoot it since
she's never gotten a duck.
We stood up and yelled at
the hen ringer to fly but
it decided to swim for it.
Jenny fired and missed, the
duck took off, and I knocked
it down with my second shot.
At least we weren't getting
skunked.

A couple hours later, Jim
decided to go on walkabout
and see if he could scare
up some snipe. Jenny and
I stayed with the boat. Jim
was gone a long time and
never got a shot off. I
was surprised to suddenly
see a greenwing teal hen
fly up and land right in
front of Jenny. Again,
she got the first shot off.
The duck flew and we both
unloaded on it. The duck
is still flying.

When Jim finally got back,
we had to load him up with
water, it had gotten hot and
he was wearing his chest
waders and a jacket. Once
he was cooled down and irrigated
we got back to our semi-futile
hunt. Across the pond, three
mottled ducks landed. We
binoced them and waited. When
nothing happened, I got the
call back out and did a feed
chuckle and a few lonely hen
quacks. Low and behold, it
worked and all three picked
up and flew straight at us.
At about 20 yards out and
20 feet up we rose as one,
and fired. Nine shots and
all three ducks flew away.
It was pathetic.

We finally picked up and
did some snipe hunting
back down the river. I
got four and some sore
feet. Jenny and Jim
got sunburned.

ofs

Winner, Winner, Winner

I doesn't happen often in life,
but sometimes you're a winner.
This time it happened to me.

ofs

Phys Ed

One of the great things about homeschooling
is the creativity one can have. For instance
in our school, duck hunting is PE.

Stuey went out for Early Teal with me
this morning after I decided to take a
vacation day and try a walk on at the
WMA.

Things didn't look too good when we got
there. Six cars were in front of us.
But, when it came time to pass out
the walk on numbers, we were the second
pick. Even better, only two people with
draws at Goodwin bothered to show up. I
got the spot I wanted and got some good
G2 from Ken.

Launching was easy. The boat ride out
was easy. We found our spot easy. Got
the decoys out. Got camoed up. Fired up
the Thermacell (you NEED one of these).
And sat back for an hour wait. We took
turns shining the Q-Beam at bullfrogs and
waited. Finally, shooting time came. We
didn't hear any woodies squeeking and
I was a little afraid they might have
cleared out after the pounding they took
last Saturday. We were pushed up in a
cat tail island with the sun at our backs.
The palmettos we had jammed in around us
didn't give us a good look to our rear. As
always, ducks came from the way we weren't
looking. Two big groups of blue wing
teal came zooming out of the sun over
our heads. I couldn't think fast enough
to recognize them, jump up, and take a
tail shot.

Still, wood ducks started showing up in
ones and twos. We actually had a few
try and land in front of us unlike
Saturday's pass shooting only extrava-
ganza. Stu and I each got two to take
home. He got a beautiful drake. We
had a blast.













ofs