I did my best to overcome that problem.
The knee surgery completely eliminated my deer season and limited how often I could get out after I had the OK to do so. Then on top the weather did not cooperate.
Early goose - got out 1 day. Pre-surgery the knee was not up for more even though the geese seemed to be in the area.
Early duck- perfect weather for hunting woodies. Got out two days thanks to Jose pushing me. The club did well on the woodies and I'm sure I would have had a good first couple weeks. Just wasn't up to asking people to take me out and was very limited on where I could go on top of that. Perfect weather for afternoon hunts with the wife and sitting in a tree stand. Neither happened at all.
Middle duck - just went on my out of town diver trip that was basically a bust (3 ducks total in 3 days for me) I think I shot at 5 ducks. I'll take shooting 3 out of 5 from a layout boat, but expect to shoot 3 boxes of shells not the dozen or so that I did. You can burn a lot of shells trying to finish off the cripples.
Late duck - got some ducks to hunt in the fields, could have used some more cold and definitely snow, but had 1 great day where I should have limited on mallards. Would have hunted more, but the knee was only good for one day then needed a day or two to recover.
Late goose - the snow just never came so most of the geese never came - DNS on my part
Trying to put a positive spin, while I didn't get out much, my DIY duck hunts were definitely better than average for me. I definitely feel more confidence on the field hunting ducks which I did more than I had the last few years and hope to do a lot more of that in the future. I think I need more spinners!
Species - My harvest / Total group harvest including my harvest
Canada Geese - 2/3
Wigeon 1 / 1 (my first drake wigeon)
Bufflehead 0/1
Common Merganser 0/1
Bluebills 3 / 8
Mallards 5 / 6
Old Squaw 0 / 5
White-winged Scoter 0 / 2
Total Ducks - 9/24
Total Waterfowl - 11/27
The knee is doing pretty well. Should be good to go full bore next season. Looking forward to it.
