Once i acquired the blind I knew I had a plan if Dad and I were to do a field hunt. I spent some time prior to the weekend scouting the fields and sloughs, and the field I recently hunted was again loaded with mallards. There were a few geese, and even a few specks, but there were hundreds of mallards out there. It was a no-brainer for our morning hunt. I spent the rest of the night prepping gear after showing Dad the field, and we should be able to get out there without too many problems.
We got up early, collected our final gear, and got ready for the long nine minute drive to our spot. The drag out was not as far as we had really anticipated, but with the pitch-black, and the fact that I have never been to this side of the field before we did get a little lost. We had to do some minor back-tracking and some in the morning set-up scouting, but we eventually found a spot we figured would work and begun getting our decoys out and blinds brushed in.
As it happened last time I was here, it did not take long for the birds to start working. While I was still getting my blind finished up, there were literally birds landing right in our shot-hole.
When I finally got settled in we waited for the first group of birds to be just right.
The first group came from the left and dropped right into the set on our right. It wasn't until after the volley that we realized where the birds were going to be and where the shots were going to happen as I was the only one able to shoot. I was able to drop my first duck, and actually pull down a second on my long bomb third shot. This only rousted all of the birds on the slough east of us. More birds than we could even count starting working around the area, so I ducked back into the blind after Lou retrieved the first bird. We waited for the birds to work in Dad's favor and made short work of another pair of greenheads. After we had a few birds down and out, I did a quick collection and Lou retrieved the long bomb and we made it back to the blind.
"Dad, what did you do with that first bird Lou brought back?"
"Should be right behind the blind."
Nope.
What we failed to realize was the first bird was not completely dead. We didn't recognize this because of the flurry of waterfowl before us. I sent Lou into the weeds behind us and after 10 minutes of searching I had already given up. It was anyone's guess how far this bird went. Lou kept getting distracted but a raccoon trail and I kept calling her off if it and then I figured I would just see what she would do. I stopped calling her and walked back to the blind. When I turned around to see how far she was getting away, I see a head bobbing towards me with a white belly in her mouth. Dang this dog is smart!
The rest of the morning was a mallard show.
This was the kind of hunt you see on TV on a Saturday night. We picked off birds when they were close and the shots seemed too good to be true. We did completely biff a gimmy on a pair of honkers that looked like they were going to work right into the pocket but a few other flocks were decoy shy and I called the shot a little too early. Oh well, lesson learned I suppose.
With a pile of greenheads, and a few bonus birds, this had turned into one of the most spectacular mallard hunts either of us had been ,of. With only a few birds left on our limit, I doubled on pair of drake mallards, and we were down to our last bird for a two-man duck limit. The final bird of a limit was a lone pintail that wanted to join the fun on the field. She worked a few loops before committing like a she was fat kid on cake. Dad had some connection issues, and he redeemed himself with a flawless shot that dropped her right next to my mojo.
As our duck limit was rather short-lived, we still had plenty of morning ahead of us. We ogled the many flocks of ducks that worked our spread over and over again. We soaked in the moments, because these kinds of hunts just don't happen every day. In fact, this was the kind of hunt that happens once in many years if not a lifetime. We could have easily shot another two limits of mallards. It really was a spectacle to see how many birds were really out there. The geese were really not going to cooperate as I kind of expected, and frankly we had not seen or heard many of them. At about 10:30 we decided to call it a morning. It was starting to spit a little and we already had a legendary hunt. At this point hashbrowns were starting to sound pretty dang good. Just as we began the take-down, a large flock of specks came from the south. We buried back into our hide and hoped they would just get close enough for a shot. They were flying low, and it looked like for the first time, this was actually going to happen. If they would have dipped left once more, or flared 10 yards closer it would have been epic, but at the last second, one bird flared, and that was all she wrote. I took two Hail-Mary shots with the 10 gauge to no avail. Someday I will get my specklebelly, but today just wasn't the day. After taking down we took pics of our correctly termed, epic hunt.
It wasn't until we had packed away all of our decoys that the geese started to come. At this stage in the season, they can move around whenever they choose with no real consistency from day to day. We were less than concerned about geese and more concerned about coffee and onioned-hashbrowns.
This was the kind of hunt dreams are made of. I would have given up many hunts to get my Dad in on this one, and instead I got both; a great hunt and with my Dad. It seemed like cheating to go duck hunting without waders, but hey, feet down are feet down; its awesome wherever you are. If I could have changed one thing it would have been to share it with more family or friends, but it would have been a different hunt. This fall is shaping up to be the best fall of my life.
Stay Tuned
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