2014 season countdown

[Bootlipkiller]

Must have missed that, I was busy trying to catch a fish earlier.

I take it the pink meat still eludes you?

Yep, had to try despite the fact everyone told me they are still out in the salt. Did catch another good channel cat though.

[firstflight]

hopefully teal season here in MI.

They already confirmed and released the dates for the "experimental early teal season."

Personally, I would rather we didn't have an early teal season... yeah it's nice to have more days to hunt, but MI is far enough north that thousands of juvenile wood ducks are going to get shot and everywhere I know that holds teal, holds other ducks and all an early season is going to do is push local birds in to un-hunt-able areas. Its not like LA, where the majority of the ducks in early September are teal, and most of there larger ducks migrate down later.

I'm sure other ducks will be shot. But there is no way to tell how many. That's why it's an experimental season. DNR are required to report every non-teal kill to the Feds so that will determine if it continues past the 3 year trial. As far as pressure goes... ...And after the first day of regular season the ducks are all pushed to safe zones anyway. I'd rather have 7 more days and sacrifice a few birds on opening day.

That's the most short cited statement I've heard in a couple weeks

There is already early goose, so there's already guys out and about blasting at birds.

Geese use different parts of the ecosystem and fly a different times of the day than ducks. I do the early goose every year and every year is the same... ducks are out of roost ponds and on feeding areas long before geese even start to stir. I've never seen a duck land in winter wheat, geese prefer more open water, etc...

You are comparing apples to airplanes.

I have a 28 acre swamp that will bust that myth wide open ,and its full of junk .and it holds about 300 to 500 geese till frozen
also full of teal ,wood ducks ,Mallards , gadwalls , and a host of odd ball ducks .

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[firstflight]

And when we shoot teal we wait till the geese leave then set up for teal .

[Woody]

That's cool

[DeadEye_Dan]

That's not a swamp

[Eric Haynes]

That's not a swamp

Looks like a pond to me

[NuffDaddy]

Looks like a marsh to me.

[Eric Haynes]

Looks like a marsh to me.

When I think of a marsh, I think of grasses and cat tails. Like this.

[Eric Haynes]

Swamp is usually filled with trees and seech.

[NuffDaddy]

Looks like a marsh to me.

When I think of a marsh, I think of grasses and cat tails. Like this.

That's looks like a swampy marsh to me. All the marshes I hunt are pretty much sand with really defined cattail/phrag patches. All the woody swamps look closer to your pic only with more trees.

[Eric Haynes]

Hard to tell really...being from MI and all.

[NuffDaddy]

Got some diver painting to do.

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[Rick]

Got some diver painting to do.

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Painting's a task I just can't bring myself to tackle. Have even procrastinated by formulating a plan to ease into it by learning to use my fancy airbrush on coots that are hard to mess up, then ringnecks, then a few mottleds and so on until I've the experience to take on tougher subjects. But I did let the water out of the coots today, so that's something...

Also experimented some more and finally managed a second speck call toneboard I like a bit better than the shop's, just not as well as my first effort. Hope to wait and see what the specks think before proceeding on that front but may not be able to stand leaving well enough alone and booger it before hand. We'll see...

Anyway, you guys who are actually tackling your painting projects have my admiration. (I've had some Hardcore specks on hold since the mid 2000s.)

[NuffDaddy]

My diver painting consists of a black head, breast, and tail with a white body and maybe some grey if I feel like it. All with a rattle can.
I hate painting deeks too, but I hate beat up decoys even worse. And I don't have money to buy new ones all the time.

[firstflight]

That's not a swamp

Oh but it is, that's the end I clean out to shoot ducks . I get a Sat photo for ya .

[firstflight]

That's not a swamp

Even the Sat photo said swamp.

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[Bootlipkiller]

I'm your huckleberry

[DeadEye_Dan]

Never mind. You're from Ohio. You can call it a swamp if you want to...I'm surprised there aren't 15 mobile-homes parked around it. LAKEFRONT!!!

[firstflight]

I'm your huckleberry

Ha ha ha .

[firstflight]

Never mind. You're from Ohio. You can call it a swamp if you want to...I'm surprised there aren't 15 mobile-homes parked around it. LAKEFRONT!!!

Hey just because I'm from Ohio, doesn't mean we all live in them there fancy tin can .

[Rick]

Never mind. You're from Ohio. You can call it a swamp if you want to...

They also have a tomato patch they call "Great Black Swamp".

[firstflight]

Never mind. You're from Ohio. You can call it a swamp if you want to...

They also have a tomato patch they call "Great Black Swamp".

That it you guys are just so mean .
it has ,had trees,cat tails,and all the Lilly pads you wanted .but after years of cleaning it up its now open up quite a bit .I hope to open it up more now that muskrats and beavers moved in .

[Rick]

Hard to believe this thread fell off the first page at this time of year.

Though I've still not seen a bound-to-be-migratory teal flock, this is the week I'm historically most apt to, and preparation for their season has begun. Went to my mudhole blind in the marsh Friday and found what had been beautiful when we passed it egg picking in July:


is now covered in floating humus "black dirt" and true to its name:


There's no less water in the marsh now than before, it's just heated up enough for the decomposition process to kick into overdrive and the farting bacteria doing that work have pumped enough CO2 into the "bottom" to bring it to the top. That will need ground up with a prop again and again to release enough of the trapped gas to let it subside below the surface and allow a show of water for the birds.

Then, too, the flotant around the pond is encroaching on it, and nowhere more noticeably than behind the blind's floating island where it had nearly filled what's normally a wide boat lane:


That flotant, being cattails with a root system that won't support a dog's weight, creates a mean obstacle to retrieves out the back of the blind, of which there are too many. So I started opening the channel again by shredding the cats to the surface with a weed eater:


And then grinding their roots with a prop to create swimming water and offer the coyote some relief.

Got a good start on that, but apparently have a bit of trash in my Go-devil's carburetor that's resistant to spray cleaning and put my pond projects on hold.

Had a stroke of bad fortune, couldn't find the teal cut reed for the over-bored MVP I run it in, turn good when the replacement I cut for it came out able to stand my hitting the call a lot harder than I could the lost one without locking up. Seems to offer a bit more range tone wise, too, so I'm stoked to try it on the real deal and have started carrying it on the coyote and my field trips.

And speaking of the coyote, he, too, has been getting as much of a handling tune-up as our back-to-reality August weather allows us.

[Flightstopper]

Ouch, not knowing any better I assumed you'd have it easy this year when you posted the last round of pics. No birds to be seen here yet but not like they have a reason to be in our cow pastures yet. Is your MVP from a time when they were all over-bored or something you requested for volume?

[Rick]

The fellow who gave me that MVP had asked Butch to make him the loudest possible hunting call, so Butch opened it way up. Sucker is LOUD, but the rub with breaking very high or distant birds is that you usually have to stay on them to keep them coming somewhere they'd not intended to go. And the amount of wind required to keep them on the hook is too often more than I can muster at the extended ranges I can turn them with that call. No point in busting a lung to break something I can't hang onto, so I stick to a stock bored MVP that doesn't reach as far but leaves me enough wind to finish what I start.

That leaves the big-bored MVP a back-up during the regular season but the Mac Daddy of all teal calls in September.

[Flightstopper]

Good to know, always curious at the your method to your madness.

[NuffDaddy]

I'm heading out to the bay tomorrow morning to see what I'm up against for the fall. The high water is going to make things way different and open up a lot of grass/mud flats that I'm hoping will be holing some teal.

[FlintRiverFowler]

I'm heading out to the bay tomorrow morning to see what I'm up against for the fall. The high water is going to make things way different and open up a lot of grass/mud flats that I'm hoping will be holing some teal.

I'm ready to do some scouting. I'm not hunting early season so I'm not gona be gettin out there til early November. Our regular season starts November 22.

[NuffDaddy]

I'm heading out to the bay tomorrow morning to see what I'm up against for the fall. The high water is going to make things way different and open up a lot of grass/mud flats that I'm hoping will be holing some teal.

I'm ready to do some scouting. I'm not hunting early season so I'm not gona be gettin out there til early November. Our regular season starts November 22.

Early teal and goose starts in 12 days for me. Had some thunderstorms this morning so I'm going tomorrow.

[NuffDaddy]

8 more days. My finger is getting real itchy and I can't wait for the dark 30 mornings on the water.