2015-2016 Season Log

[Ericdc]

Correction

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[Rick]

My geologically challenged self never knew there was a Nunavut until I looked it up after shooting one banded there. Became a Territory in the '90s, I think.

[Ericdc]

Killed a doodle a few years ago when the squirrel dogs flushed it. I killed the doodle and my buddy dropped 2 squirrels from the tree all at same time.

[Rick]

Welcome, CH, nice to see you're still out there, and hope your season went better than most in our area.

As for the hunting, our chance for **** was either sold out (with the Dixie land sale) or rained out. Just too much water sitting on what's normally good ground for them, so I didn't bother to log our few unproductive exploratory passes. Didn't find a splash after their season opened, much less a bird, but did start conditioning the pup to hunt close in wooded cover.

Thanks for the well wish wishes. It has been a "good" season. 1st split ducks got stale but 2nd turned on nicely and specks have been very consistent. Turned my attention to snipe a few times and attempted woodcock yesterday but came out only seeing a few flying right at dark. Had to do some reading on them. Splashes as you said are the sign to look for, i didnt know that so thanks! But time is running out not sure if I'll find any before it closes for the year. Maybe next season......

Well, crap. Somehow assumed them closed and didn't take a look during this last front. Here in the Klondike area, they come with the northern fronts but disappear when the wind changes. Might have to look today, just in case.

[Deltaman]

Welcome, CH, nice to see you're still out there, and hope your season went better than most in our area.

As for the hunting, our chance for **** was either sold out (with the Dixie land sale) or rained out. Just too much water sitting on what's normally good ground for them, so I didn't bother to log our few unproductive exploratory passes. Didn't find a splash after their season opened, much less a bird, but did start conditioning the pup to hunt close in wooded cover.

Thanks for the well wish wishes. It has been a "good" season. 1st split ducks got stale but 2nd turned on nicely and specks have been very consistent. Turned my attention to snipe a few times and attempted woodcock yesterday but came out only seeing a few flying right at dark. Had to do some reading on them. Splashes as you said are the sign to look for, i didnt know that so thanks! But time is running out not sure if I'll find any before it closes for the year. Maybe next season......

Well, crap. Somehow assumed them closed and didn't take a look during this last front. Here in the Klondike area, they come with the northern fronts but disappear when the wind changes. Might have to look today, just in case.

They migrate Rick? I've only killed two of them over the years, one at dusk, walking back to the truck after a dove hunt, and another, at daylight, hunting wood ducks, and he flew by at first light. Neat birds, and similar to our snipe, only bigger. Your mention of them showing with the fronts made me curious because I don't know much about them, and they are only seen on occasion in our neck of the woods.

[Rick]

Yes, they mostly nest in Canada and the northern Midwestern to Eastern U.S. and migrate here in late Fall, particularly as ground freezes and worms become unavailable.

Took the pup on his first so-said woodcock hunt this morning, which he must have thought akin to the popular notion of "snipe hunting". Sloshed around a mostly still flooded thicket, teaching him to "hunt close," for what he knew not. Didn't see a splash/whitewash-looking-dropping, much less a bird. But get to teach him that swampers are in the same "leave it" class as squirrels, cats and other fur, which he seemed fine with. (Hasn't snagged a pigeon in our yard since yesterday, so readily giving the big rabbits a pass was the result of past fur breaking, rather than lack of drive.)

Having just typed the above before gong to the kitchen for coffee and finding Marsh sitting staring at the elevated-well-above-his-reach puppy crate where said pigeon convalesced for torn skin last night tickles me.

[Rick]

Date: 1/30

Time: morning

Location: UDL

Cloud Cover: partly

Wind Direction and Velocity: nil to moderate southerly

Temperature: warm

Barometer:

Moon phase: about half

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity: Mostly blues were roosted to the SW with virtually everything passing dropping to that body, and everything leaving it going south - the wrong way for my purposes.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: Worked a fair number of specks but the body out drew me, with several coming very close to our hide but always in a manner that would force me to shoot toward the body. Finally found just one that preferred landing with Charlie and Agnes to the bunch.

Hunters: Ended up being Peake and I

Guns:

Malfunctions:

Dog(s): Had serious misgivings about getting separated from the deaf dog in the dark on the long walk in and went extra early to accommodate such mishap, but it didn't happen, as he did a good job of keeping in touch. What did happen, however, was that he plainly didn't like the spot in our spider hole blind where his nephew, Marsh, had stayed planted without protest the other morning. Peake kept trying to slip out and find more comfortable digs, which isn't like him and even had me thinking "fire ants". But there were none, and he apparently just wanted to stretch out on level ground.

Special Equipment: 2 decoys

Curses: Was soundly thumped by the body.

Kudos: At least got my old partner one goose in mouth and got to shoot it just a couple feet off the ground.

Birds By Species: 1 speck

Photo Ops: Our spiderhole:


The grouchy old dog's goose:


Lagniappe:

[Ericdc]

Ole peake still got it

[Rick]

Ole Peake is spoiled. Used to be he'd hide with me in briers, now he's balking at uneven ground. 'Course I'm not quite so keen on it anymore, my own self.

[Ericdc]

Last hunt for me, will take some kids next Saturday for youth.

Had crooked barrels on 2 huge groups of teal.

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[Rick]

Looks like a nice one to end it on.

[DComeaux]

Date: 1/30
Time: morning
Location: UDL
Kudos: At least got my old partner one goose in mouth and got to shoot it just a couple feet off the ground.

Glad to see you after em.

I just can't muster the courage to go sit on a levee. This season has severely dampened my enthusiasm, and I hope time off brings it back.

Post by Ericdc » Sat Jan 30, 2016 2:53 pm

Last hunt for me, will take some kids next Saturday for youth.

Nice strap, Eric Nice way to wrap things up.

[Ericdc]

Rick would have cussed me on the shooting performance we made on the 2 huge bunches of teal.

[Rick]

Dave, I'm sitting here debating whether to make a last pass at that borrowed spot or quit while I'm ahead and haven't run off the body my benefactor hopes will stick around another week. Am leaning toward the later.

Eric, if there at least was a viable "shooting performance" on those teal you were way ahead of the folks closed the season with. Giant speckle-bellied blimps floating right there front and center were safe from us. That clusterflutch haunts me still.

[Rick]

I just can't muster the courage to go sit on a levee. This season has severely dampened my enthusiasm, and I hope time off brings it back.

After reading that this morning (while beginning to transcribe my log to Word instead of hunting) I came across this from early on in the September teal season:

Good to see!

Ya know, I've said that the teal migration tells the story for the entire season, and if this continues things are looking good for big duck. For the 2011,2012 and 2012, 2013 seasons we had a strong teal season and good big duck seasons at our place. 2013, 2014 and 2014,2015 the teal seasons were really bad as were the big duck seasons.

Just my observations and a lot of wishful thinking...... No bubble popping allowed.

Seems to me that September teal fizzled for most, as did the regular season.

[DComeaux]

I just can't muster the courage to go sit on a levee. This season has severely dampened my enthusiasm, and I hope time off brings it back.

After reading that this morning (while beginning to transcribe my log to Word instead of hunting) I came across this from early on in the September teal season:

Good to see!

Ya know, I've said that the teal migration tells the story for the entire season, and if this continues things are looking good for big duck. For the 2011,2012 and 2012, 2013 seasons we had a strong teal season and good big duck seasons at our place. 2013, 2014 and 2014,2015 the teal seasons were really bad as were the big duck seasons.

Just my observations and a lot of wishful thinking...... No bubble popping allowed.

Seems to me that September teal fizzled for most, as did the regular season.

Yeah, that bubble popped early, for sure.

[Ericdc]

I don't think the 2 are at all relatable

[Darren]

I don't think the 2 are at all relatable

Ehh not that cut and dry, lots have varying observations. If teal are behind, it can signal a botched or delayed migration, and delay arrival of your big season birds. This was readily apparent for us in 2013.

That said, sometimes teal don't show on time, then weather kicks in and puts big birds here en masse for Nov 1.....weather weather weather.

I'd think plenty have had a nice Sept season only to be wondering where the birds were for their zone's opener. Ya just don't know I guess

[aunt betty]

Weather has everything to do with what happens when. The flood sort of messed things up for some while at the same time provided others with "the year to remember". Not sure...but I bet it's tru. Someone always whacks em somewhere.

[Rick]

Date: 2/1

Time: morning

Location:

Cloud Cover: dense fog

Wind Direction and Velocity: light southerly

Temperature: warm

Barometer:

Moon phase:

Special Notes: Hadn't planned to go but couldn't pass up the fog's promise.

Waterfowl Activity: Found the birds where I'd left them and just starting to stir as we walked it.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: Took a flapper I'd been fooling with the past 3(?) years, but our birds bit on something else before I got to try it.

Hunters: Just Marsh and I

Guns:

Malfunctions:

Dog(s): Marsh broke when I shot but waited until sent for the second bird of our double.

Special Equipment: Wasn't the flapper that turned the trick, was Marsh apparently imitating a coyote. Were still walking in, and he was chasing tweety birds out in the field, when I saw three specks break the fog, apparently focused on him. Hit my knees and got small as I could, then hit the call. Whereupon Marsh ran to meet me, and the geese swung and followed him until he pulled up next to my no doubt suspicious form, and they, too, pulled up. Albeit, much too late to save two thirds of their party from becoming a bip-bap double.

Curses: Suppose I could bitch about not getting to test the flapper, but I really don't like fooling with it and opted not to stick around and mess with it or the blues.

Kudos: The bug enjoyed a couple more goose retrieves, and we'd again, in the words of perhaps the most effective human predator I know, "slipped in like a coyote, did our little dirt and slipped out with living game being the wiser". Well, other than that lucky third bird that wasn't targeted.

Birds By Species: 2 specks

Photo Ops: Though it was past shooting time before we began the walk in, we finished too early for action photos:


Had better luck with a still:


But had to shoot a bit of video to capture the audio that was the best part of our morning (may have to crank the volume up):


Lagniappe: Though the ambiance was grand, our fortune good, and shooting straight, I found the hunt unsatisfying. Guess I'd just much rather work birds than shoot them.

[Ericdc]

Interesting. How you going to cook your specks?

[Rick]

We'll pot-roast some whole, so Sweet Chereaux can clean the bones of and grill some to satisfy my taste for medium rare red meat. Legs, hearts and gizzards of those filleted will end up stewed or in a sauce piquant or some such.

[Ericdc]

We'll pot-roast some whole, so Sweet Chereaux can clean the bones of and grill some to satisfy my taste for medium rare red meat. Legs, hearts and gizzards of those filleted will end up stewed or in a sauce piquant or some such.

Cool I've never tried any waterfowl in a sauce piquant. I do love pot roasting them. Medium rare on the grill is always good. You leave skin on for grilling? Like this

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[Rick]

Perhaps should but never tried it that way. Know I've had some excellent duck done thus.

Basically, if I'm going to the trouble of plucking, it's to pot roast for Cheryl's sake. What hits the grill results from taking the lazy route and skinning.

(I'm way too cheap and suspicious of commercial pluckers' handling practices to let them process our birds.)

[Ericdc]

Perhaps should but never tried it that way. Know I've had some excellent duck done thus.

Basically, if I'm going to the trouble of plucking, it's to pot roast for Cheryl's sake. What hits the grill results from taking the lazy route and skinning.

The pic I showed is duck, I assume speck could be done the same way. I like to sprinkle a little kosher salt on the skin side once it's done and call it good. Can also pan sear em skin side down till fat renders and sear the meat side in the fat.

[Rick]

Went for a boat ride this morning with a friend who manages the camp owning the north end of the marsh we hunt, and it was a duck show the likes of which I sure didn't expect - and haven't seen in many years. No way of knowing how many of the big ducks getting up way out were mallards and how many were grays or miscellaneous, but enough of what let us get closer were mallards to offer assurance that they've not all forgotten how to get here.

Why we're not seeing such concentrations of ducks in the ag lands, now that their season is over, can't help but lead to speculation over the effects of more efficient combines and crawfishing.

[Ericdc]

And probably some disturbance from late season goose hunting in fields too.

[Rick]

No doubt, but we drove past an awful lot of ag land habitat that isn't being goose hunted to get there and didn't see a fraction of the birds.

[Ericdc]

No doubt, but we drove past an awful lot of ag land habitat that isn't being goose hunted to get there and didn't see a fraction of the birds.

Yea. Marsh is probably better courting and foraging habitat now that we are in that time of year. Imagine most of the grain is gone.

We got youth hunt this Saturday and I can still shoot specks.