2022-2023 Regular Season

[Ricky Spanish]

Glad to see that you still have some wild birds to play with, and watching a good dog work is a beautiful thing

More please.
The places I'd go pheasant hunting are so thick I'd have to drive my truck thru a few times to make a path.
When I had my bronco I'd do it in October to prep some spots. Rabbits would use my wheel ruts and I'd get easy shots. Pheasant hunting got nearly impossible here.
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[jrock75]

I don't like riding horses, but I would certainly make an exception for a traditional quail hunt like that. Watching a good dog at work must be quite a thrill. I did a kick and shoot once and that was enough of that for me.

[Duck Engr]

Date: 12/7/22

Time: morning

Location: local public draw hunt

Cloud Cover: heavy with fog in and out

Wind Direction and Velocity: none. Stale.

Temperature: hot. 68 was the low.

Moon phase: waxing big

Special Notes: my boss at the office was drawn for this hunt. I have all decoys and gear, so i got to go.

Waterfowl Activity: didn’t have high expectations with the stale weather. Was about standard for what that place has become. Mostly ring necks. As recently as 10 years ago, before hogs moved in, they planted and flooded crops and we had good puddle duck numbers. Those days are gone. Saw 3 teal, a handful of gadwall early, and a lone drake mallard that flew over our lifeless spread while the jerk chord guy (me) was taking a leak.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: most ducks we shot decoyed well

Hunters: 3

Guns: boss’s friend was shooting 3.5” shells out of a 10 gauge, and it sounded like a howitzer.

Malfunctions: just stale, hot, nasty weather. Boss fell in the water after second volley of gunfire, but didn’t seem to mind seeing how warm it was.

Dog(s):

Special Equipment: jerk cord. Turned big spinner off after watching gadwall bump off of it early. Left mojo dove running for ringers and teal that never came.

Curses:

Kudos: bossman and his buddy, who are only occasional duck hunters, had a big time.

Birds By Species: 1 hen canvasback, 1 wood duck, 12 ringnecks.

Photo Ops:

Lagniappe: Was too warm for dogs in gator territory anyway, but I hope this season is the only one for a while that I’m retrieving my own ducks. Getting a female German wire hair pointer not this weekend but the next.

[Deltaman]

Considering the weather, y'all did well!!!

[Darren]

Considering the weather, y'all did well!!!

Sure enough, this weather is junk but at least made a strap of it.

[Duck Engr]

Had plenty of opportunities to fill but one of us was suffering from a severely bent barrel.

[DComeaux]

Had plenty of opportunities to fill but one of us was suffering from a severely bent barrel.

Apparently I've started yelling at Blake or whomever when all I can do is watch birds fly away and can't safety shoot, so I'm told. ...... I may get my hunting partners to start wearing ear muffs......

[Duck Engr]

Hahahaha I give some form of the following speech before I take someone new and remind my buddies of it each year.

“I take no responsibility for what I say in the heat of the moment. Take your feelings and check them before you get in my boat.”

[Deltaman]

Frustrations can't always be quiet

[Ricky Spanish]

Reminds me of that time I shafted ten guys on a group of mallards so I could miss a Hollywood.
I think they were lying about the mallards I didnt see or hear them.
I shaft the best...

[Duck Engr]

Wanted to make a note in the log that we did indeed get our new German wire hair puppy, June, on Sunday. She is assimilating well and likes to retrieve a few times before a bug or butterfly goes by.

[5 stand]

June, looks like a dandy to me...

[Rick]

Gal's got 'tude.

[Duck Engr]

Gal's got 'tude.

Hope I can tame that tude!

[don novicki]

Beautiful looking pup. Lots of spunk it looks like....

[Duck Engr]

She has been a wild Indian so far!

[Ricky Spanish]

My daughter has the same black and white dog but it had to have it's eyes removed. Sad but the dog is OK.

[Deltaman]

Beautiful Dog DE, Congrats!!!!

[Duck Engr]

Date: 12/14/22

Time: morning

Location: local river

Cloud Cover: cloudy

Wind Direction and Velocity: not much

Temperature: pretty warm

Moon phase: dunno

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity: minimal

Waterfowl Responsiveness: N/A

Hunters: solo

Guns: 20 gauge M2

Malfunctions: didn’t check river gauge before going like a moron. Figured it was “high enough”. Wrong. Made it two bends before I decided the bottom of my boat had had enough punishment.

Dog(s):

Special Equipment:

Curses: lack of planning.

Kudos:

Birds By Species: 1 wood duck

Photo Ops:

Lagniappe: shoulda stayed in bed. Need a rain.

[Duck Engr]

12/27/22

Took advantage of todays beautiful weather to ride behind the English pointers (Sadie and Ruger again) for a couple hours today. We plodded all over our little slice of creation without a quail seen, heard, or even suspected of being seen. Slight wind from the east, had Dad saying “east is least” as we returned to the barn.

As a side note young Ruger seems to be figuring out the game. Found his first covey of birds on his own and a single out of that same covey last week according to those that were witness to it. He sure did a lot of cold deer trailing today though. Shock collar will need a fresh charge tonight!

[DComeaux]

Looks like a nice ride and love the habitat. We used to have many open fields here with thick head rows and fence lines that looked like your property's grasses. The landscape here has and is changing rapidly. The bobwhite have disappeared.

[5 stand]

I saw this the other day and didn't comment, my bad.... I told Moe about it, we're both jealous....

[Duck Engr]

Don’t be too jealous, we didn’t find any birds!

[Duck Engr]

Date: 12/30/22

Time: morning

Location: farm rice pond

Cloud Cover: partly cloudy

Wind Direction and Velocity: more than expected out of the southeast

Temperature: supposed to be 52. Was 42.

Moon phase: not sure

Special Notes: My 4 year old, Beau’s, first morning duck hunt. He was a trooper.

Waterfowl Activity: disappointing

Waterfowl Responsiveness: Beau thinks he’s the king of the duck calling world. He had my wood duck whistle and was squeaking it for all he was worth all morning. He managed to end two of his calling sessions just before pairs of wood ducks landed.

Hunters: Dad and I had guns. Beau calling for us.

Guns:

Malfunctions: only had two shot ops. The first I was shooting at shadows (blind is only halfway constructed due to time constraints, so we hunted from the bank). The second, I had a partial ignite of powder in my shell. Sounded like a Roman candle. First time I’ve ever had that happen. I don’t know how that shell got in my bag in hindsight. It’d obviously been wet and was rusted. Didn’t inspect it in the dark. Lesson to be learned there.

Dog(s):

Special Equipment:

Curses: None

Kudos: Beau seemed to have a good time.

Birds By Species: Scratch

Photo Ops: post-hunt golf cart nap



Lagniappe: Beau walked in the house at lunch and when Heather asked how the hunt went he declared, “We didn’t get any ducks, Daddy is a bad hunter…..” It’s the ones that are closest to you that will cut you the deepest.

[5 stand]

With those expectations... That little feller might be a killer someday...

[Rick]

He certainly sleeps the sleep of a duck hunter. Sweet photo.

[Duck Engr]

P.S.: Heard a turkey gobble at daylight.

[Duck Engr]

He certainly sleeps the sleep of a duck hunter. Sweet photo.

Wish I’d taken a pic of him before daylight. His headlamp was a dinosaur that had bulbs for the eyes and it roared when he reached up to move the jaw on it, which he did incessantly over the cart ride from the cabin.

[Deltaman]

Glad he had a good time dad

[Duck Engr]

Date: 1/7/23

Time: morning

Location: friend’s draw hunt reservation. A valley tucked into the mountains, which was a different scene for me.

Cloud Cover: heavy with high ceiling

Wind Direction and Velocity: very light north to northeast

Temperature: upper 30s

Moon phase: big all night till daylight

Special Notes: long ass walk, dragging a kayak, into the place. Close to a mile each way. I’m getting too old and sedentary for these endeavors.

Waterfowl Activity: not near what we saw the day before. Precious few.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: good until they got about 25 yards outside the spread. Then they exited stage left alarmed. Too late but finally figured out that the bilge pump on my buddy’s splasher decoy was very loud for some reason. Ducks that boogered did so right over that decoy. Still morning, so sound was traveling.

Hunters: 3

Guns:

Malfunctions: aforementioned decoy issue.

Dog(s): Scout

Special Equipment: 2 jerk chord and that blasted pulsator

Curses: not enough ops for us to zero in on what the problem was quickly.

Kudos: saw a blonde phase mallard. First I’ve ever seen on the hoof.

Birds By Species: 1 pintail, 1 gadwall, 1 wood duck.

Photo Ops:

Lagniappe: