by Darren » Sat Sep 30, 2017 8:00 am
Since teal closed for me yesterday, figured I'd get my wrap up out of the way while fresh in my mind.
This season turned out to be a good one for us, well above what's long been our par of a few birds here or there. This was the first season of multiple hunts with limits (and/or very close to it) since what was our best teal season ever, 2011. Best of all, these strong hunts came on multiple public land tracts following diligent scouting efforts, love when that pays off! Chasing them in three different areas in total added to the fun. New public ground areas we checked out have a ton of potential for additional options in regular season as well.
49 BW teal taken on 7 hunts, includes one DNS and one 2-bird outing.
All gear is in good working order and we are really enjoying the new outboard brought to the team last summer as I'm hardest on it in teal season rooting around in shallows an outboard motor isn't designed to be in. Comparatively, the regular season and our deep ponds and trenasses used to access them will be a breeze on it. I'm sure the thermostat could use another clean out in the meantime.
Harry's retrieving in typical slick water ponds is solid, and his nose is sharp when rooting around in marsh grass for crips or buried dead birds. However he needs work on setting out to hunt up blind's that may have fallen well beyond the decoys. My fault for making a routine of training in my backyard and not making time to get out to larger venues more often; going to make a point of hitting local park in coming weeks with hopes of improving on that.
Plenty of scheming and planning to do for regular season, let those games begin!