2023-2024 preseason...

[Deltaman]

Congrats on the new puppy Rick!!!!!

[Rick]

Congrats on the new puppy Rick!!!!!

Thanks. He's resting up after a long day at the marsh with lots of new people, dogs and activities, including his first boat rides. Figure he'll be in fine voice again by bedtime.

[Darren]

Sounds like a great day for all


birds of note? Or just HEAT!?

[Rick]

birds of note?

Ruddy ducks. Not a lot, but a few here and there, which is extremely odd for this area. Lots of teal, albeit still mostly blue-winged, lots of pintails and spoons, a few grays, scads of the omnipresent squealers and big bunches of "golden-headed mallards" and some of the old-fashioned green-headed version, too. Going to be a challenging first 15 days for hunters and mottleds alike.

Didn't see or hear a goose.

Call got to play with Clark's pair of Labs, Tucker and Radar, and try to sing some jailhouse blues with them during their kennel time, but it turns out fussing him for it works a whole lot better than hoping he'll give it up on his own, even with the big dogs still hollering. Little rip not just knows but respects "no" and/or "that's bad" already, which is a real blessing. Pounding timber, of course.

[Darren]

birds of note?

Ruddy ducks. Not a lot, but a few here and there, which is extremely odd for this area. Lots of teal, albeit still mostly blue-winged, lots of pintails and spoons, a few grays, scads of the omnipresent squealers and big bunches of "golden-headed mallards" and some of the old-fashioned green-headed version, too. Going to be a challenging first 15 days for hunters and mottleds alike.

Maybe upside is I don't see a strong enough frontal passage for the foreseeable to blow out the blue wings.

[Ericdc]

Saw quite a few BW's last Saturday at our lease.


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[Rick]

Some genius started what turned into a major marsh fire four or five miles to the east that made it to what was our marsh and Cherry Ridge yesterday, so we prepped the camp area, which is, for the most part, surrounded by a significant buffer of close cropped grass and offers the Klondike VFD a ready pumped marsh water supply where it isn't and got out of the smoke and way. Haven't heard how it went, but am betting few other camps in its path will be so lucky. Suspect getting water to the nearby Oak Island camp (which Darren's FIL has a bit of skin in) could have been more problematic if the fire made it there.

Having been demoted from one camp's tool pusher (foreman/head guide) to another's worm (newest man on the rig), I was the first out of guide work when part of the owner's family party cancelled, and will be sitting out an opener for the first time since the mid '70s. Will, instead, ease that way to sight see and lend what hand I may.

Tickled me to have a trailered boat pass while Call and I were out emptying him at 2:00 this morning and a few others when back out at Marsh and my normal 3:00. Can't help but admire their gumption. Was a time when I'd be part of the race to prime spots, set up and cat napping hours before LST - far too often only to hear others banging and clanging their way there, both before and after the opening gun.

[Duck Engr]

Well dang Rick. You’re due for a win. Hate you weren’t able to participate in the opener.

[Rick]

Well dang Rick. You’re due for a win. Hate you weren’t able to participate in the opener.

Half of what would have been my pair went to treatment, so I'm counting blessings. My life could be - and has been - a lot worse.

[Duck Engr]

That’s certainly a sobering reminder about perspective

[Rick]

Are now roughly a kazillion more banded teal in Cameron parish. And a couple dozen more banded spoons. Didn't see a big duck.

[Darren]

Are now roughly a kazillion more banded teal in Cameron parish. And a couple dozen more banded spoons. Didn't see a big duck.

On the teal mix, what was the apparent blue/green ratio?

Any other items of note related to juvies, hens/drakes, etc?

[Rick]

On the teal mix, what was the apparent blue/green ratio?

The avian flu gal from GA was there for blood samples from 100 adult male blue-wings, and any concern about not having them in the mix were immediately alleviated upon reaching the net. Was still heavily weighted toward green-wings, as well it should be in that location come December, but there were scads of blue-wings, many already in their winter finery.

[Rick]

Young Call and I worked on making AW's blind look a good bit less like what it is yesterday and were treated to one heck of a teal show that I'm told was just as impressive over on the east end of the marsh. Wish I'd videoed some of it, as the open water most everywhere, to include AW's pond was blanketed with the little jewels until we put them up to join the clouds there. Dressed what looked like a dead brush pile to better match the marsh, employed most of my blind grass to help hide hunters and hole, to include making a curtain with it to conceal the boat hide door, and last, but hopefully not least, set up my modified mallard machine splasher there.

Naturally, being an extra without my own blind, per se, it will now be my "luck" to get assigned elsewhere, as AW's is closest to Clark's blind, and shooting there is the greatest annoyance to him of the three "extra blind" options. My argument being that the improvements I make will make shots there much easier and, hopefully, fewer. But "we'll see..."

(Next up, replace their spinner setup with my own, if what I've already done doesn't draw too much flack. Really, really wish I had a spot and freedom to use my own decoys, instead of camp crap, as well, but have been told that's a no go, albeit without good reason. Pretty much in "plead ignorance and beg for forgiveness" mode on what I've used of my own to date.)

[Rick]

Forgot to note that Call was playing in the boat while I set up the splasher and found himself rudely introduced to deep water. Did so close enough at hand that I snatched him out while still in the "sink" portion of his "sink or swi"m" situation and hope whatever trauma ensued won't set him back when properly introduced to swimming.

[MARSH BEAR]

Glad to see you have an almost permanent blind - good luck
The dog I had before Abby - Sassy as a pup had to learn to swim, I thought I would have to jump into the training pond to save her.

[Darren]

Forgot to note that Call was playing in the boat while I set up the splasher and found himself rudely introduced to deep water. Did so close enough at hand that I snatched him out while still in the "sink" portion of his "sink or swi"m" situation and hope whatever trauma ensued won't set him back when properly introduced to swimming.

Can't be any more traumatic than Harry's leap (forward!) off the bow of my flat boat at but a few months old while on plane under way. Thus the fixed in-boat leash was born and still in use today.

[Rick]

That would scare crap out of me. Been holding Call in my lap while underway.

[Rick]

Just a note for later reference: Call hit the 16-week mark today at a weight of just over 31 pounds (in my arms on our bathroom scale). Been my experience, to date, that the old rule of thumb of doubling a pup's 16-week weight will yield it's likely adult weight has been spooky accurate. As in within a couple or three pounds.

Will be interesting to see if Call actually tops out in the low 60s, which would be a plus in my book.

[Rick]

Forgot to note that Call was playing in the boat while I set up the splasher and found himself rudely introduced to deep water. Did so close enough at hand that I snatched him out while still in the "sink" portion of his "sink or swi"m" situation and hope whatever trauma ensued won't set him back when properly introduced to swimming.

Could turn out to be a bit of an issue, as while he's been fine around idling boats in the boat house every morning I've worked, my one attempt at getting him back in one met with resistance recently. Wasn't the time to work on it, so I cut that effort short without pushing it. We'll see...

[Rick]

From Paul Link:

Thought you’d get a kick out of a recently marked hen NOPI from 29Dec in the SE corner of unit 2. She took off from RWR around 0844 on 6Jan towards Belzoni, MS. Around 1744 she turned back south, eventually landing just north of Jeanerette after midnight for a few hours. The next morning she moved to some degraded marsh S of Delcambre for a few hours, came back to RWR for 12hrs, stopped on LPI for a couple hours, and has been just N of LLCo’s Goose Island since. That’s the kind of stuff we all know NOPI do, but never saw with harnesses.

[DComeaux]

We'll find out there is no rhyme to the reason with these fowl.

[Duck Engr]

That’s cool Rick. Thank you for sharing. I more expected a gadwall to behave that erratically.

[5 stand]

It is cool to get snidbits of info from time to time...

[Darren]

We'll find out there is no rhyme to the reason with these fowl.

Keep coming back to that time and again, the more we "know," the more we realize what all we don't.

[Rick]

Been in the marsh the past few days and not seeing much other than teal and squealers, but still kicking myself for not videoing the squealers moved along the route from Neil's blind to the northeast corner blind now called the north blind. Simply unreal, as was that I was only at the north blind long enough to replace its spinner switch and when I looked up the flotant surrounding that pond was already black with squealers again, Also seemed I moved just as many on the route back as out. Neil and I then took a load of cane and myrtle to Daniel's blind and saw just as many on the southeast end of the body as there were on the northeast. Blessed to have them given how relatively few other ducks were.

[Darren]

Take 'em all day long!