Well, after a long summer, and an even longer last week (it felt that way!!) its finally that time of year again. Saturday marked the opening day of duck season for us in AR, but when I started hearing about all the people who were already camping out at the local WMAs the night before, we discussed it and then decided it would be best to get some sleep and start our season a little later.
This morning we decided to head up to Big Lake WMA in NE Arkansas. We got into the blind about 10-15 minutes after shooting time, missing some early wood duck action. It wasn't that big of a deal. As we got ready to roll, clouds started to roll in with a southern wind, which is not a very good equation for success. After watching hundreds and hundreds of birds flying in from there feeding grounds up in Missouri back to the Big Lake National Wildlife Refuge. These guys had no intentions of coming down and hanging out with us. The only birds that we could get to commit to the spread were birds that were coming from the refuge out into the management area.
After about an hour or so, we had to young hen gadwalls work the hole. They circled two or three times, dropped their feet and came over the decoys. We dropped both of those birds, Canvas made a perfect retrieve on both of them, making her 2 for 2 for the season. Good start! As Canvas got back on her stand and I put the birds on the stringer, a drake gadwall dropped in and hit the water. Jason shot him, and Canvas jumped up to 3 for 3. I stood there in the water with Can for another hour - hour and a half. She dried herself off, and looked at me like "I swear, Alex, if you shoot one more bird and I get in that water, I will rip your throat out and you will be at the bottom of this hole". SOoooo, I picked her up and carried her to the blind with the other 3 guys (My dad, my cousin Chase, and fellow Diver Destroyer member Jason Turner).
As we were there, we had quite a few groups look at us, and work and work, but just never could commit. It completely baffled me...I had no idea how to fix the problem. They weren't seeing us, there was motion on the water, and there was nothing else to flare them. They are just really hole shy for us.
At about 11:00, we had decided to call it off. As we did, we looked up to see a drake and a hen mallard come cruising over the trees, flip upside down (seriously) and fall in. We dropped them. Another gadwall came in and we took him too.
It was a really good day to get back at it. A little warm, 70 some odd degrees, but its duck hunting none the less. Thursday we have a monstrous front pushing through (well, tomorrow night)....but I'm going to be stuck at Macks Prarie Wings working at the Wings Over the Prarie Festival for Avery. If any of you guys are around, stop in and say hey!
For some reason, the photo uploader is being retarded. I can't upload them, so here is the links to the photos.
http://s2.photobucket.com/albums/y39/greenheadslayer/?action=view¤t=PB200071.jpg
http://s2.photobucket.com/albums/y39/greenheadslayer/?action=view¤t=PB200073.jpg
http://s2.photobucket.com/albums/y39/greenheadslayer/?action=view¤t=PB200074.jpg
http://s2.photobucket.com/albums/y39/greenheadslayer/?action=view¤t=PB200076.jpg
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
Thursday, November 15, 2007
November 2, 2007 - Another Blue Bird Day in an Eastern Nebraska Marsh
Today started off a little rough. It was one of those days that you debate getting out of bed for. According to the weather forecast the night before, there was suppose to be a little to no breeze out of the south meaning my decoys wouldn't be moving much if at all in the water and there probably wouldn't be a big push of ducks coming through. The good news was that they wind was suppose to swing around and come out of the north and just keep picking up all morning. After laying in bed and having the debate in my head, I finally decided on giving it a shot and seeing what happened. I hit a marsh fairly close to home that I hunted during the early teal season and noticed a lot of activity in certain areas that didn't look like they would get hunted much. I decided to give one of these spots a shot. I left Remington home since I knew that I would have to be standing in waist deep water the whole time with nowhere to keep him up and out of it. Needless to say he was not a very happy camper when I was getting ready to leave!
After walking in and flushing up a couple of ducks from the spot I wanted to set up in, I got everything laid out. The spread was set up in a rough "U" with the opening facing north, but with a lot of looseness to enable the ducks to pick a direction since there wasn't any wind. I hid in a small stand of reeds and cattails right next to the spread, just about 5 yards from the landing zone. Some guys who were hunting about 400 yards or so to the northwest of me started off the shooting by dropping a flock of what looked like teal (and happened to be after I talked to them later on). Then I got in on the action nabbing my first drake mallard of the season from a flock that worked into my dekes. We were put on hold for awhile while a few flocks danced around the marsh, but wouldn't commit to the particular spots that we were in.
I had another flock of mallards swing through, but they wouldn't commit all the way, so I took a shot as they swung back through the spread and missed. After standing there for another hour or so and watching the number of flocks drop off little by little, I was able to get another group of 5 mallards to drop into the decoys. From this one I ended up taking a hen mallard after missing the first shot on a drake. Once this little barrage was over, so was the day. There wasn't a flock to be seen, so I decided to pack it in, being extremely happy to have bagged my first drake mallard of the year. There is no real significance of a drake mallard, I just happen to be one of the guys who really enjoys a good mallard shoot as opposed to other types of ducks, so I was glad to see the mallards finally starting to make their way into Nebraska after seeing mostly teal, gadwalls, and widgeon so far this season. It is sure shaping up to be a good one.
C. Dill
After walking in and flushing up a couple of ducks from the spot I wanted to set up in, I got everything laid out. The spread was set up in a rough "U" with the opening facing north, but with a lot of looseness to enable the ducks to pick a direction since there wasn't any wind. I hid in a small stand of reeds and cattails right next to the spread, just about 5 yards from the landing zone. Some guys who were hunting about 400 yards or so to the northwest of me started off the shooting by dropping a flock of what looked like teal (and happened to be after I talked to them later on). Then I got in on the action nabbing my first drake mallard of the season from a flock that worked into my dekes. We were put on hold for awhile while a few flocks danced around the marsh, but wouldn't commit to the particular spots that we were in.
I had another flock of mallards swing through, but they wouldn't commit all the way, so I took a shot as they swung back through the spread and missed. After standing there for another hour or so and watching the number of flocks drop off little by little, I was able to get another group of 5 mallards to drop into the decoys. From this one I ended up taking a hen mallard after missing the first shot on a drake. Once this little barrage was over, so was the day. There wasn't a flock to be seen, so I decided to pack it in, being extremely happy to have bagged my first drake mallard of the year. There is no real significance of a drake mallard, I just happen to be one of the guys who really enjoys a good mallard shoot as opposed to other types of ducks, so I was glad to see the mallards finally starting to make their way into Nebraska after seeing mostly teal, gadwalls, and widgeon so far this season. It is sure shaping up to be a good one.
C. Dill
October 19, 2007 - Blue Bird Day in the Rainwater Basin
The day started off just like all of my duck hunting excursions. Got out of bed early and loaded up all of the gear and the dog and headed out to the marsh. I did not scout this marsh as I had already hunted it once this season, just on a different section, and I have never been there when it didn't have birds, so I figured that I would at least see a few flocks around. Well, this was a costly mistake because the last time I hunted it, was about 6 inches rain ago. There was plenty of cover around the edges of the marsh when I first hunted it, however after 6+ inches of rain within the two days prior to my next hunt, the water level had risen about 3 or 4 feet considering nearly every piece of land that is close drains into this marsh. This left me trying to find cover for myself and the dog in grass that was about 3 inches tall. For those of you who duck hunt, you know this is not the ideal place to be trying to hide from the wary eyes of ducks.
After looking around the whole marsh, I saw it wasn't any better anywhere else, so I decided I would just set up and lay still and see what happened. I figured out that this wasn't too bad of a plan when shooting time rolled around and I had teal screaming by me within a few feet. Within the first few minutes, I had one blue-wing teal down and had Remington turned loose on the retrieve. Once he got back, we didn't have anything close for the next 2 hours. As this is a fairly large marsh, the ducks were loving the now completely flooded weeds about 200 yards out in the middle of the marsh. I determined that my luck wasn't going to get much better, so I started picking up decoys.
It never ceases to fail that once you start picking up the decoys, the birds just have to check out what is going on. I started to get a few flocks closer and closer and they ducks started responding to the calls after all morning of ignoring them. I had 3 flocks of pintails lined up one after another come close and decided that they didn't want to commit, but then a small flock of teal swooped in under them right at me. I dropped my second blue-wing teal of the day and turned Rem loose. After a few hours of watching ducks fly all over the place and not get close to us, he was more than happy to take after a downed teal.
I decided that since they were starting to work a little better, we would give it a little longer and see what happened. Well, not much did. I whiffed on a green-wing teal drake and hen that gave me a perfect shot for a double, except I forgot you have to actually shoot the ducks, not the air! After that, I started picking up the rest of the decoys and had a pair of drake gadwalls swing in just outside of the decoys and I was able to drop one. It wasn't a clean kill and he started to swim towards the weeds and cover out in the middle, but Rem was able to swim him down before he made it, so we added him to the bag for the day and finished picking up. All in all, it wasn't a bad day in less than ideal conditions. Besides, one can't complain too much because a day in the marsh is always better than a day at work.
Pictures soon to come!!
C. Dill
After looking around the whole marsh, I saw it wasn't any better anywhere else, so I decided I would just set up and lay still and see what happened. I figured out that this wasn't too bad of a plan when shooting time rolled around and I had teal screaming by me within a few feet. Within the first few minutes, I had one blue-wing teal down and had Remington turned loose on the retrieve. Once he got back, we didn't have anything close for the next 2 hours. As this is a fairly large marsh, the ducks were loving the now completely flooded weeds about 200 yards out in the middle of the marsh. I determined that my luck wasn't going to get much better, so I started picking up decoys.
It never ceases to fail that once you start picking up the decoys, the birds just have to check out what is going on. I started to get a few flocks closer and closer and they ducks started responding to the calls after all morning of ignoring them. I had 3 flocks of pintails lined up one after another come close and decided that they didn't want to commit, but then a small flock of teal swooped in under them right at me. I dropped my second blue-wing teal of the day and turned Rem loose. After a few hours of watching ducks fly all over the place and not get close to us, he was more than happy to take after a downed teal.
I decided that since they were starting to work a little better, we would give it a little longer and see what happened. Well, not much did. I whiffed on a green-wing teal drake and hen that gave me a perfect shot for a double, except I forgot you have to actually shoot the ducks, not the air! After that, I started picking up the rest of the decoys and had a pair of drake gadwalls swing in just outside of the decoys and I was able to drop one. It wasn't a clean kill and he started to swim towards the weeds and cover out in the middle, but Rem was able to swim him down before he made it, so we added him to the bag for the day and finished picking up. All in all, it wasn't a bad day in less than ideal conditions. Besides, one can't complain too much because a day in the marsh is always better than a day at work.
Pictures soon to come!!
C. Dill
Friday, November 2, 2007
Saskatchewan Smackdown
Now that everything has calmed down from my Canada trip I have finally got a chance to sit down and give everyone the results. Being that this was my first trip to hunt north of the border I was pretty much at the mercy of my buddies direction as to how the trip would be planned out and how the hunts would take place. And he was dead on. I was skeptical that we were headed 2600 miles away from home to a part of the world we were unfimilar with to hunt birds for a week with out a guide nor land to hunt them on. He assured me this would not be a problem.
After my flight from Baltimore to Kansas to meet up with the rest of the crew on Sept 27 we slept at a buddies house and headed out to Saskatchewan the next day. 24 hours of living in a Suburban on a road trip is not as fun as it may sound. We were all extatic to be making the journey and for the first 16 hours it was a piece of cake! We hit the Canadian border around 8am on Saturday morning. Our thoughts at this point was "alright, we are in Canada, almost there". Well 8 hours later we finally arrived at our location.
You can not hunt on Sundays in Canada, which worked out well for us. After a good nights sleep that didnt consist of a backseat bed and a seatbelt shoved in your back, we headed out at 7 am to scout the area for waterfowl. After finding tons of spots to hunt and speaking with 20+ farmers we recieved permission to hunt from all of them. We joked that we practically owned the entire area.
The rest of the week came and we hunted for 5 days straight and ended with a total of 240 birds. We harvested snows, blues, specks, canadas, mallards, gadwalls, teal (bw and gw), redheads, canvasbacks, shovlers, pintails, and widgeon. It absolutley was the best waterfowl hunting I have ever experienced.
The temps were very cool, and a few mornings even freezing (keep in mind this was the first week of October). There was plenty of water in the area and the birds were plentiful. The amount of Snow Geese in the area was overwhelming. And the duck hunting was world class. I highly recomend a trip to the area and if you go, trust me, you dont need a guide. The people are the nicest I have met and none of the locals hunt waterfowl. Everyone will allow you to hunt.
Cory Dukehart
After my flight from Baltimore to Kansas to meet up with the rest of the crew on Sept 27 we slept at a buddies house and headed out to Saskatchewan the next day. 24 hours of living in a Suburban on a road trip is not as fun as it may sound. We were all extatic to be making the journey and for the first 16 hours it was a piece of cake! We hit the Canadian border around 8am on Saturday morning. Our thoughts at this point was "alright, we are in Canada, almost there". Well 8 hours later we finally arrived at our location.
You can not hunt on Sundays in Canada, which worked out well for us. After a good nights sleep that didnt consist of a backseat bed and a seatbelt shoved in your back, we headed out at 7 am to scout the area for waterfowl. After finding tons of spots to hunt and speaking with 20+ farmers we recieved permission to hunt from all of them. We joked that we practically owned the entire area.
The rest of the week came and we hunted for 5 days straight and ended with a total of 240 birds. We harvested snows, blues, specks, canadas, mallards, gadwalls, teal (bw and gw), redheads, canvasbacks, shovlers, pintails, and widgeon. It absolutley was the best waterfowl hunting I have ever experienced.
The temps were very cool, and a few mornings even freezing (keep in mind this was the first week of October). There was plenty of water in the area and the birds were plentiful. The amount of Snow Geese in the area was overwhelming. And the duck hunting was world class. I highly recomend a trip to the area and if you go, trust me, you dont need a guide. The people are the nicest I have met and none of the locals hunt waterfowl. Everyone will allow you to hunt.
Cory Dukehart
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