Regular Season 2024-2025

[Duck Engr]

Date: 12/11/24

Time: morning

Location: Frontal passage right at daylight, so tried to draw at local refuge, no dice. Left main duck hole alone for Beau this weekend, so tried to get to a little creek hole on backside of the property. County road was blocked by a 3’ diameter oak tree. Turned around and went to plan C. Had to cross a creek but it was almost waist high and ripping through the crossing from 5” of rain the last 48 hours. so I decided to cut my losses and go get a biscuit in town. Wasn’t my day to kill a duck.

[Rick]

Biscuit beats a wet arse.

[DComeaux]

Biscuit beats a wet arse.

Thats for sure.

[Darren]

so I decided to cut my losses and go get a biscuit in town. Wasn’t my day to kill a duck.

But oh the things we'll do to try! Good on you in recognizing, every now and then it's just not our day for it.

[Duck Engr]

Olly and I had a day like that back on the Alabama coast ten years or so ago. 24 degrees and roaring north wind had the most water blown out of the bay I’d ever seen. Came out of the little cove we’d launched in headed north and were quickly taking breakers over the bow of my 18’ go devil boat. Few seconds later my prop hit bottom, motor died, and we immediately began to drift sideways. Tried to turn it over a couple times and battery wasn’t making it happen. Yelled to Olly to toss anchor out front and right before he threw it I wiggled connections and she fired back up. I kicked the bilge pump on, turned around, went straight back to the launch, loaded boat, said my goodbyes to Olly, and was back in bed before shooting time haha.

[Deltaman]

Some days we are the windshield, and others, the fly!

[Duck Engr]

Date: 12/14/24

Time: morning

Location: farm 1 acre duck pond

Cloud Cover: forecast partly but was mostly, which saved our bacon.

Wind Direction and Velocity: east moderate

Temperature: upper 40s

Moon phase: bright

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity: about 25 birds came into the pond, which is a good day for us.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: good once I finally cleaned woodie whistle out

Hunters: me with Beau observing.

Guns:

Malfunctions: one of us, my dad is currently my prime suspect, misplaced the gate key we have hidden. So what would’ve been a drop off everything at the bank of pond hunt turned into me being the pack mule of our gear with a 6 year old on my shoulders a half mile each way. We stumbled to our spot about 5 minutes after shooting light.

Dog(s): June. Made a nice retrieve on the first but broke on second.

Special Equipment:

Curses:nah

Kudos: every day I get to be in the woods with my son seems to be more fun than the last.

Birds By Species: 2 wood ducks.

Photo Ops:

Lagniappe:

[Rick]

"Kudos: every day I get to be in the woods with my son seems to be more fun than the last."

Which should always be the object of the exercise. (Given the missing key, literally.)

[Deltaman]

Good exercise dad....... ha ha!!!!! Sounds like a great father/son morning in the duck blind to me, congrats!

[Duck Engr]

Date: 12/17/24

Time: morning before work

Location: local river

Cloud Cover: clear

Wind Direction and Velocity: nil

Temperature: 50

Moon phase: big and bright

Special Notes: river flooded Wednesday morning and I’d been trying to get my boss, Al, to go with me ever since. River was falling hard this morning, and made for a less fun boat ride that I’d wanted.

Waterfowl Activity: best I’ve ever seen in that area, which is all relative. Saw 75 birds or so.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: good. Needed a dip net a couple times.

Hunters: 2

Guns:

Malfunctions: I had my pass shooting choke in but needed a skeet choke. Also Missed a lot of ops chasing a cripple and down ducks from a trio we killed. Current was so fast June only had time to get one before the other two were around the bend.

Dog(s): June found a duck we never would have. Knocked one down and it climbed a bank I never would’ve imagined it could have climbed. She found it 20 yards into the brush.

Special Equipment: homemade floating spinner on its maiden voyage. Used 2 pieces of ply wood, an atv tire tube, and 3 bolts. Was worried it’d be tippy in the current but was fine.



Curses: not today

Kudos: was nice to see the fowl we did. It’s been a few years in this area.

Birds By Species: 4 wood ducks.

Photo Ops:

Lagniappe:

[Ducaholic]

Nice job on the floating spinner. Did you hang anything out of the bottom of the decoy for weight and to act as a stabilizer?

[Duck Engr]

Nice job on the floating spinner. Did you hang anything out of the bottom of the decoy for weight and to act as a stabilizer?

Thought I would have to but didn’t end up needing it, even in current. Used 1/2” plywood as that’s what I had laying around. Suspect that helped.

[Duck Engr]

Date: 12/27/24

Time: morning

Location: farm 1 acre duck pond

Cloud Cover: heavy

Wind Direction and Velocity: much stronger than expected from ESE

Temperature: 48 but felt 10 degrees colder, which was tough on the little ones.

Moon phase:

Special Notes: my 4 year old daughter’s first duck hunt. She’s been after me for 2 years to go and I finally relented.

Waterfowl Activity: maybe 25-30 wood ducks and a handful of mergansers. Gave those fishy things a pass.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: turned a few with some suhweeeeeet squeaks.

Hunters: Dad and I shooting. Beau and Anne Holloway observing/narrating.

Guns:

Malfunctions: Anne Holloway burned her finger on a heater inside the cabin before we left to go hunt. And our shooting was terrible to start the morning.

Dog(s): June. Found a cripple that had crawled up in a treetop. Also found one that fell outside the pond in waist high brush.

Special Equipment: tossed 4 decoys just to amuse the kids.

Curses: it was a long 45 minutes filled with some chaos, shivers, and tears, but no curses from me. That all comes with the territory and I knew what I was signing up for.

Kudos: I scotch doubled after missing 6 shots in a row, so that brightened my mood.

Birds By Species: 3 wood ducks. Dad doesn’t hunt ducks much and it showed in his shooting.

Photo Ops: shame on me but I didn’t take a single one.

Lagniappe:

[Rick]

Great "curses".

[Darren]

Sounds like a wonderful time, good work !

[Duck Engr]

Date: 1/19/25

Time: morning

Location: timber farm wood duck pond

Cloud Cover: heavy

Wind Direction and Velocity: moderate to strong from the NW

Temperature: upper 40s

Moon phase: not sure

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity: group of 10 woodies circled early but left. Dad was walking back from parking UTV and I suspect they saw him. Had another ten or so woodies come as singles and pairs. About a dozen mergansers to finish the morning off.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: Beau squawking nonstop on a wood duck call had them front and center!

Hunters: Dad and I shootin. Beau calling, observing, and commentating.

Guns: dad with his 1100, me shooting my M2

Malfunctions: None

Dog(s): June made all 8 retrieves. Steadiness was suspect but improving. No whining or barking today. I made her run a mile from the barn to the pond, so I suspect that took some edge off.

Special Equipment: 4 decoys and a spinner on remote to keep them on our side of the pond for easier shots for dad. Worked well.

Curses: not from me.

Kudos: Dad wasn’t sure he was going to get up as he hadn’t been sleeping well lately. He was glad he did.

Birds By Species: 6 wood ducks. 2 hooded mergansers.

Photo Ops:
Dad, Beau, and June.

Lagniappe: had planned to make trips west the previous two weekends but a flu-like illness and the snow and ice on the roads the next weekend derailed those plans. Doesn’t look like I’ll get to make another trip this season unfortunately.

[Rick]

Beau looks like part of that Robertson bunch.

[Duck Engr]

Beau looks like part of that Robertson bunch.

Haha that started as a necessity to hide his shining pale face while chasing turkeys when he was 4 and refused a facemask and has morphed into something my dad has determined he has to have every time we hunt, to the point we nearly missed first light this morning.

[Duck Engr]

Date: 1/31/25 last day

Time: morning, on time for once

Location: timber farm pond

Cloud Cover: cloudy

Wind Direction and Velocity: south 5-10

Temperature: warm, upper 50s

Moon phase: couldn’t tell

Special Notes: last day

Waterfowl Activity: maybe 30 ducks came to the pond

Waterfowl Responsiveness: they wanted to land at the other end of the pond

Hunters: dad and I shooting with a friend of dad’s and Beau observing

Guns:

Malfunctions: my shooting was terrrrrrible. Ducks were coming over my left shoulder and descending while going to the other end of the pond. Never figured out the lead.

Dog(s): June acted a fool

Special Equipment:

Curses: just my poor shooting

Kudos: nice that we had birds to play with all season. Most we’ve killed off this pond in a few years. August mowing and September water from hurricane seemed to be the ticket.

Birds By Species: 3 wood ducks.

Photo Ops:

Lagniappe:

[Darren]

Nice !

[Rick]

"Malfunctions: my shooting was terrrrrrible. Ducks were coming over my left shoulder and descending while going to the other end of the pond. Never figured out the lead."

Made me think of how safe grouse pitching down out of tall trees were from me.

[SpinnerMan]

Ducks were coming over my left shoulder and descending while going to the other end of the pond. Never figured out the lead.

I had that one day with them coming over my right shoulder and then crossing in front to land. My best guess is I wasn't getting my head down on the gun properly. After smoking the first two mallards crossing in front, it took an embarrassing number to get the last two on what should have been easy shots on mallards dropping in as pretty as a picture.

One poorly hit made it across the lake and got hung up in a small tree. Couldn't exactly send the dog for that one. After a bit of a clown show with me jumping in hip boots and smacking at the duck pinata with a long stick, I did recover the bird.