Our first crack at ducks after the new year happened on a Wednesday, and John and I were hunting that new pond I mentioned in my last post. It seemed like the duck hunting had slowed state wide – the birds just seemed to disappear for everyone. 

For me, that’s always a little bit of a catch 22. You can kind of understand / deal with a super slow home if you know that it’s not just your bad luck, but the same situation for everyone. But, if you hear a neighboring pond shooting a lot and having a great hunt, you get jealous and it’s hard to sit still where you are. On the flip side of that coin, it gets your adrenaline going knowing that at least there are still ducks around and maybe your next home will be as good as theirs. Does that make sense? Or am I talking crazy because I’m a crazy duck hunting lady?

Nevermind – don’t answer that. 

Anyhoo… Our buddy Kyle was in the blind with us that morning, along with a great pup named Moultrie (hey Hannah! Hey Kyle!). Because of the  quiet sky, we did more joking and laughing than hunting, but were able to take a few fairly long passing shots and bring down a few ducks. Our shots were longer than we would typically take, but that was all we were presented with, so we needed to make the most of it.

John and I both had to head back to work, so we sat until about 9:30 or 10 before calling it. We were glad to have had a fun hunt, and had just enough ducks for a great dinner.

That weekend brought in some authentic winter weather for us – the forecast calling for sleet and snow on Saturday, starting right about the time we would get up to hunt. Sure enough, we woke to below freezing temperatures and icy rain, but that didn’t slow us down. Cold, windy, and cloudy skies usually mean a great duck hunt is on deck. Ice and snow be damned, we were getting out there to hunt.

I was hunting with John, Davis, & Austin that morning, and the particular pond we chose to hunt had a blind out near the middle, so ducks could potentially circle all around us. You really needed your head on a swivel to hunt there. 

The water was about knee deep coming into the pond, with plenty of hidden pluff mud potholes, so putting out decoys warmed you up a bit before climbing into the blind. But, once you were up in the blind and out of the water for a while, that freezing wind meant you got really cold really fast. It was actually warmer to stand in the water, so that’s what we took turns doing. Unfortunately, the sleet started coming in horizontally and, for the safety of our poor eyeballs, we really could only face one direction if we wanted to see anything. 

Just a few minutes before legal shooting time, while it was still a little too dark to see well, we had a nice group of ducks work the pond and hover in right over the decoys. We waited with bated breath, but they swam or flew off a few at a time before we could even make it to legal hour. As the hunt wore on, we heard a fair amount of shooting from a few other ponds right near us, but the ducks never really wanted to work by us. 

As a last-ditch effort, John and Austin decided to take a lap or two on the dikes around the pond to try and jump something up. Davis and I stayed in the blind, hoping a duck or two would make the mistake of swinging by. Davis ended up making an excellent shot on the only duck that came back by within range. A fully-plumed drake hooded merganser is actually quite a nice looking bird!

Ahh, well… We had fun nonetheless!

The following week Dad and I hunted again on Wednesday – this time with our buddy Tyler and his Tealpup. It was a pretty morning that clouded up quickly, and we were ready for anything to be thrown (flown?) our way.

From the get go we saw ducks working – ringnecks and bluebills, and even a few mallards. It was steady, if a touch slow, but we were almost always at least seeing ducks in the air. When the opportunity presented itself, we took and made some decent shots, and had a handful of birds in the blind within the first hour or so. Teal was thankful for the retrieves!

A pair of ducks swooped by us at one point, and I noticed something a little different about them – their bills in particular. When they banked and the sun flashed on their wings, my suspicions were confirmed – it was a pair of shovelers. There seems to be a stigma against shooting the goofy northern shoveler – spoonbill, spoonie, Hollywood mallard, smiling mallard, bootlips – there are all sorts of funny nicknames for them – but, a fully plumed drake is actually a fairly pretty bird. Don’t get me wrong – I totally get that they can taste awful (you are what you eat, particularly if you’re a duck), but I’m not above throwing one into to the crock pot with some fat mallards to tenderize into barbecue. The male of this pair wasn’t completely plumed out, but still had some of those telltale colors on the wing and flanks. I pulled up to shoot and was able to knock him down, excited to have a different type of duck on my stringer.

I am honestly glad it was a somewhat slow hunt. My gun was giving me some trouble and I wasn’t even able to take a some of the shots I raised my gun for. The trigger would pull, but the firing pin wasn’t hitting the shells hard enough to even dent the primer. Thankfully, Tyler is a whiz when it comes to Benelli’s & taking shotguns apart, and he had that thing broken down to the firing pin in about 30 seconds. I’ve honestly never stripped / cleaned my gun down that far – I of course take it apart and clean it every time I hunt in the rain or in the salty marshes, and every few hunts otherwise, but I am only comfortable with breaking it down to a certain point. Actually taking the bolt out and removing the firing pin was definitely above my pay grade, but I am so glad he was able to figure out what the issue was. Just a few minutes later my gun was back together and firing perfectly. Thanks again Tyler!

In the meantime, I took some ridiculous photos with Mr. Spoonie.

Towards the end of the hunt, 3 canvasbacks came in and circled the pond, each pass bringing them closer and closer to our decoys. We sat motionless, moving only our eyes, hoping to avoid flaring them and instead entice them into our decoy set up. Or blind was certainly the one they were most interested in, but ultimately they decided to venture elsewhere. It was still pretty cool to see them come straight down the line towards our decoys so many times in a row, watching their heads turned and work as they try to find a place to light. That’s OK though – we came out of the pond with eight ringnecks and that lone spoonbill.

Despite the brakes having been pumped on our duck season, slowing it down more quickly than in previous years, its hard to complain when you’re hunting with good friends and good pups.

We’re slowly but surely making our way through duck season here at bright side outdoors. I promise – I’ve got some doozies coming your way!