Remind me what state you are hunting in again?Duck Engr wrote:Date: 11/19/22
Time: morning
Location: river
Cloud Cover: started cloudy, clearing by 730
Wind Direction and Velocity: wsw 10-20
Temperature: 24
Moon phase: waning crescent
Special Notes: saw an incredible hen to drake ratio. At least 2 hens for every drake and probably 5 hens for every drake green winged teal. The last time I recall this many hens was 2013, which (maybe not so) ironically was the last time we had temps this cold this early with low water conditions. I know this to be the belief with bwt, but do mallards and green wings follow the same pattern of drakes migrating first and hens following?
Waterfowl Activity: good early flight; with streams of high ducks headed south until 930.
Waterfowl Responsiveness: couldn’t break mallards. Teal very good. Wood ducks decoyed without any coaxing. Gave most of them a pass.
Hunters: 3 but only 2 guns, as Jason worked his dog.
Guns: Stoeger 3500 was a single shot a couple times. M2 worked fine.
Malfunctions: buddy’s outboard wasn’t peeing. He didn’t run enough water out last time he took it out of the water and it froze internally, so we all 3 piled into my slow(er)-devil. That set us back 30 minutes, so we didn’t run as far as I’d planned.
Dog(s): Scout, who had an adventurous morning. His first time in any kind of current had him a little spooked. He kept losing sight of birds as he got closer, leading me to tell his owner that I don’t think his vision is right. Sure enough, a trip to the vet on Wednesday confirmed “corneal opacities”. He’s headed to a canine ophthalmologist next week for more info.
Special Equipment: put some full body black ducks on a sand bar I’d been itching to use since my field hunting days.
Curses: only the lack of low mallards and frozen outboard.
Kudos: nice to be back out there and with a couple of my close buddies.
Birds By Species: 8 gw teal, 3 wood ducks.
Photo Ops:
Lagniappe:
Duck Engr wrote:Not at liberty to reveal which river publicly but just about every river in the state had sand bars last weekend.
You caught the taterRicky Spanish wrote:Duck Engr wrote:Not at liberty to reveal which river publicly but just about every river in the state had sand bars last weekend.
The ditches have sand bars too.
Ok you hunted the new cache like a fool.
It's basically a ditch now. They straightened it.
Naw that's way too far north.
if u look at a map.Duck Engr wrote:You caught the taterRicky Spanish wrote:Duck Engr wrote:Not at liberty to reveal which river publicly but just about every river in the state had sand bars last weekend.
The ditches have sand bars too.
Ok you hunted the new cache like a fool.
It's basically a ditch now. They straightened it.
Naw that's way too far north.
Duck Engr wrote:Lagniappe: I had a “scotch triple” on a group of 20 teal that tried to light right in the decoys. A first for me.
There was one casualty but only took a stray BB to the noggin, so we’re still in business. Had I not been purposely dodging decoy collateral damage, I probably only would’ve ended up with one duck. Two zigged when they should’ve zagged. $10 a pop makes you think thrice before shooting.Rick wrote:Duck Engr wrote:Lagniappe: I had a “scotch triple” on a group of 20 teal that tried to light right in the decoys. A first for me.
How many decoys did you get?
Duck Engr wrote:There was one casualty but only took a stray BB to the noggin, so we’re still in business. Had I not been purposely dodging decoy collateral damage, I probably only would’ve ended up with one duck. Two zigged when they should’ve zagged. $10 a pop makes you think thrice before shooting.Rick wrote:Duck Engr wrote:Lagniappe: I had a “scotch triple” on a group of 20 teal that tried to light right in the decoys. A first for me.
How many decoys did you get?
Duck Engr wrote:Date: 11/21/22
Time: morning
Location: river oxbow
Cloud Cover: clear
Wind Direction and Velocity: light shifting back and forth between south and east.
Temperature: 23
Moon phase:
Special Notes:
Waterfowl Activity: best I’ve seen in a long time as far as low and looking ducks
Waterfowl Responsiveness: they didn’t want much calling at all. Had to go real light
Hunters: had the full knucklehead squad together again for the first time in a long time. Plus a couple extra locals we met that we’re headed for the same hole.
Guns:
Malfunctions: had a shot call here or there we’d like to have back, but otherwise no complaints from me.
Dog(s): wore Jax to an absolute nub.
Special Equipment: two jerk chords. They needed to be longer in hindsight.
Curses: had a group set up south of us that I’m fairly certain was shooting right when we had ducks lined up to finish early on. Fortunately the wind switched and the ducks quit lining up where they could see them. I’m too old to fistfight over a duck.
Kudos: we try to get in the craziness of people and ducks at least one day per trip, and today was the day.
Birds By Species: mallards, gadwall, and a couple of incidental teal and a wood duck. We gave teal and woodies a pass for the most part. The highlight of the day and likely the season was a mallard/pintail hybrid. Still a beauty even though it was a juvenile. It came in with a drake mallard and we thought it was a hen at first glance. My buddy and I both thought something looked off and after further review he saw a glint of green on its head right as I saw the blue on the bill. Both immediately freaked out and started hollering and shooting. Not sure who connected first. No curled pin feather unfortunately.
Photo Ops:
Lagniappe: felt good to have the full gang back together. We don’t all get to hunt together much anymore due to the complexities of schedules.
That was our suspicion. It wasn’t blatantly obvious but happened enough times to where we were fairly certain. Like I said, I’m too old and have too many people counting on me at home to fight over a duck. Back in my mid to early twenties, I’d have been over there after the first time to observe the goings on and fighting after the second.Ricky Spanish wrote:Duck Engr wrote:Date: 11/21/22
Time: morning
Location: river oxbow
Cloud Cover: clear
Wind Direction and Velocity: light shifting back and forth between south and east.
Temperature: 23
Moon phase:
Special Notes:
Waterfowl Activity: best I’ve seen in a long time as far as low and looking ducks
Waterfowl Responsiveness: they didn’t want much calling at all. Had to go real light
Hunters: had the full knucklehead squad together again for the first time in a long time. Plus a couple extra locals we met that we’re headed for the same hole.
Guns:
Malfunctions: had a shot call here or there we’d like to have back, but otherwise no complaints from me.
Dog(s): wore Jax to an absolute nub.
Special Equipment: two jerk chords. They needed to be longer in hindsight.
Curses: had a group set up south of us that I’m fairly certain was shooting right when we had ducks lined up to finish early on. Fortunately the wind switched and the ducks quit lining up where they could see them. I’m too old to fistfight over a duck.
Kudos: we try to get in the craziness of people and ducks at least one day per trip, and today was the day.
Birds By Species: mallards, gadwall, and a couple of incidental teal and a wood duck. We gave teal and woodies a pass for the most part. The highlight of the day and likely the season was a mallard/pintail hybrid. Still a beauty even though it was a juvenile. It came in with a drake mallard and we thought it was a hen at first glance. My buddy and I both thought something looked off and after further review he saw a glint of green on its head right as I saw the blue on the bill. Both immediately freaked out and started hollering and shooting. Not sure who connected first. No curled pin feather unfortunately.
Photo Ops:
Lagniappe: felt good to have the full gang back together. We don’t all get to hunt together much anymore due to the complexities of schedules.
Maybe I misunderstood but I read it to say the other hunters were observing birds decoying to you and then shooting to drive them away. That would not go unpunished in my woods. I'd collect a gang and ...
Duck Engr wrote:
Curses: had a group set up south of us that I’m fairly certain was shooting right when we had ducks lined up to finish early on. Fortunately the wind switched and the ducks quit lining up where they could see them. I’m too old to fistfight over a duck.
One of our guys did yell “I hope you idiots killed that wood duck.”DComeaux wrote:WOW! One for the wall.Duck Engr wrote:
Curses: had a group set up south of us that I’m fairly certain was shooting right when we had ducks lined up to finish early on. Fortunately the wind switched and the ducks quit lining up where they could see them. I’m too old to fistfight over a duck.
We had an issue once (one morning) with a neighbor on leased rice land. After the third incident that morning I stood up on the seat of the blind and voiced my disapproval quite loudly. It didn't happen again, and they left the blind shortly after. I didn't hear any calling coming from that blind at all that morning, just the one shot every time we had birds committed. They had an unobstructed view of our working birds.
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