Guys (and Dani),
This Saturday is opening day for North Carolina duck hunters. I will spend it with a friend on a guided hunt at the Outer Banks. As I prepare and begin to anticipate traveling and hunting, I stumbled across a story I wrote in 2002 back in the days of the Mighty Layout Boys. I thought you might enjoy it.
Larry
The Mighty Layout Chaplain
Dinner With the Bluebills (2002)
By Larry Eckart
For the second straight hunt, the odds were against me. Hunting the eastern shore of Lake St. Clair calls for a west wind. Northwest is good, southwest is better, but please don?t give me an east wind.
The forecast was a light northeast wind of 10-15 mph becoming light and variable. Sigh! I had some new things I want to try out so the hunt was on but the prospects meager. Buddy Dale was sick so the layout would be left home. I would body-boot and sit in the middle of 75 decoys.
The area I hunt is about 90 minutes from home and involves crossing the Canadian border. You can make a long day of it, but when I am alone on Big Water, I like to stay over the night before. This is my favorite routine. Home from work about 7 or 8 pm. Pack the gear. Kiss my wife good-bye and head for the border and on to Wallaceburg, Ontario and Oaks Inn. It costs me an extra $55 but increases my pleasure and safety.
The ride over is part of the fun. No mad pushing of the accelerator here. Time for pleasant conversation with the customs agent inspecting my gun. Enjoy the World Series and some munchies as the kilometers pass by. I am blessed to afford these pleasures.
Oaks Inn in Wallaceburg has taken the phrase ?cater to duck hunters? and refined it to a science. Bringing your dog? No problem. Need a license? No problem. Need a non-resident license and Ontario stamp and a Walpole Indian permit and a Walpole Guide? No problem. Want a full breakfast at 3:30 AM free with your room? No problem. And would you like a post card sent in August with a photo of Mitchell?s Bay reminding you that hunting season is coming? No problem.
At breakfast, I?m usually the only one in the restaurant. Most guys here are puddler hunters and they are up and out early. I subscribe to the creed that diver hunters are better off going out at daylight or after daylight. The waitress asks me if I?m late. I explain my strategy and she responds that I seem to be the most intelligent duck hunter she?s met. I don?t tell her that my wife has a different opinion of the intelligence of duck hunters, myself included.
It?s a 30?morning and the long underwear feels good under my neo?s. As I motor through the inner part of Mitchell?s Bay, I note that there are neither birds nor hunters using it. Too nice. East wind. A bass fisherman?s wind.
My destination is the large flat west of Mitchell?s Point. If you ever go to this area for the first time, get some good advice about motoring or you will lose your drawers, or at least your propeller. I had information about bluebills on this flat, lots of bluebills, but that was on a west wind day.
My friend Dale and I had previously refitted our main line rigs. Using large bags, we have ten lines completely rigged. I was anxious to see how it worked setting out and picking up.
The only hunters I saw were EXACTLY where I wanted to go. A boat blind and body-booter were set up in my chosen area. Such is life. Fortunately it is a large lake and a large flat. Even prior to setting up I could tell that the east wind was having an effect on the other hunters. I saw no one else hunting except my neighbors. I mean NO ONE ELSE.
In knee deep water I hopped out of the boat, dropped the anchor and started pulling lines. Wow! This beats clipping every deek. Only one line is set when a bluebill drake and hen drop by to imitate Willie Mays and ?say hey.?
With the set rigged and boat moved away, I hunker down on a ?T? seat we normally use for puddler hunting in corn. Mmm. This is my first time body-booting in open water. Where do you put the thermos? Don?t bend too low or you get an armful of water. Mmm. Very different!
I?m shooting a new Benelli Super Nova. Last summer on the clay targets I was actually becoming a decent shot. I feel confident as the first pair of blues come in and flare perfectly across me. Rude awakening: I am completely able to miss easy shots with the new Benelli . Blessing: on the third shot, a full-plumage drake crashes down without a whimper. Problem: where do I put it? Lake St. Clair only furnishes the water; it does not come with hooks to hang your birds. This is as scaled down as diver hunting gets.
Birds are intermittent and at 10:30 my neighbors depart. As far as I can see and hear, I am the only hunter in any direction. It is for this reason that I and others come to Canada. Lack of pressure. Except on Saturday, there is little hunting pressure. Sure, some guys refuse to pay the $50 to register your gun. Sure, some don?t want another country knowing their gun number. Sure, some don?t want the hassle of customs. Fine by me. That leaves me 22 miles from Detroit as the crow flies in prime diver country. Alone.
What I don?t know as my neighbors leave is that while it looks like I am alone, I am not. There are eyes watching me. Out of sight, behind the stake lines which mark the private property of the camps and clubs, is a large bay. And on that bay are a few thousandbluebills.
Over the next few hours, I am surprised to see bluebills continuously trading near me, lifting up from ?Back Bay? as it is called or coming from Walpole Island to that bay. One memorable flight: about 15 birds bore into my set, coming low over the water. As they come into the sweet spot, they flare across each other. The birds on the right flare left and the birds on the left flare right. Like a rookie, I criss-cross my gun, back and forth across the sky, acting like I?ve never seen bluebills before. The only saving grace of not firing a shot at 15 bluebills is that no one is there to laugh at me.
Rare for Mitchell?s Bay in the last week of October is that I see few redheads and cans. But I see bluebills on top of bluebills. With all the recent worry about the boreal population and the recent studies linking high concentrations of selenium to the low reproductivity of hens, I am surprised and honored to be in the company of so many of my cupped wings friends.
What a thrill to see birds come down the ?pipe? and others ignore the ?pipe? and come in from the side and still others who haven?t been taught that they are supposed to fly down the ?pipe? but, like a hard-headed student, land out at that farthest decoy of the ?pipe?, some 200 yards away. Hah! Just when you think you can manipulate them, bluebills come up with new ways to befuddle you.
I bag four plump birds. Morning has grown into afternoon and afternoon has grown into warmer temperatures and a variable breeze. Perhaps it is the absence of hunters, but as I pick up I realize I am being flanked by rafts of bluebills. It is as though they realize I am relatively harmless and they have invited me to an early dinner with them.
Watching the rafts build into an expanding image of black dots, I wonder if we hunters don?t spend too much time painting white on our rigs. To the naked eye or through binoculars, those rafts look like black dots. My decoys look like salt and pepper. Mmm.
With all the dekes in the boat, I decide to accept the invitation of the bluebills and stay for dinner. What a treat: a private dinner on Lake St. Clair with 500 bluebills as my companions. My meal is strictly blue collar: Cabot cheese from Vermont and Mennonite summer sausage from Ontario. I?d like a beer, but the bartender can?t hear my call. The menu of the birds, as I discern from the crop of my bag, is something more refined: escargot. Their crops are not full of zebra mussels but rather a miniscule snail, ?? wide at most.
I didn?t hear it but someone must have rung the dinner bell. Black dots continually drop from the sky. And someone else must have told the bluebills the parable of Jesus in which the banquet manager sends out to the highways and byways for all to come to the banquet table. Get this non-bluebill formula: the sun was warm, the wind slim to none, the lighting perfect for a picture, the traditional weather of snow squalls and wave-pushing wind non-existent, but on this day the sky became an inky wave of bluebills.
Flock would join flock in the air, each momentarily rising or falling in greeting to each other. Then, as if anticipating dinner, the birds would descend in a driving downward slant straight into the raft.
I sat in the autumn-yellow sunlight, the guest of 500 friends and realized that not only was I a foreigner, but those who ?owned? the water and land behind the stake lines were also foreigners.
The land and the water belonged to the bluebills on this day. A good and gracious God had given it all to the bluebills.
This Saturday is opening day for North Carolina duck hunters. I will spend it with a friend on a guided hunt at the Outer Banks. As I prepare and begin to anticipate traveling and hunting, I stumbled across a story I wrote in 2002 back in the days of the Mighty Layout Boys. I thought you might enjoy it.
Larry
The Mighty Layout Chaplain
Dinner With the Bluebills (2002)
By Larry Eckart
For the second straight hunt, the odds were against me. Hunting the eastern shore of Lake St. Clair calls for a west wind. Northwest is good, southwest is better, but please don?t give me an east wind.
The forecast was a light northeast wind of 10-15 mph becoming light and variable. Sigh! I had some new things I want to try out so the hunt was on but the prospects meager. Buddy Dale was sick so the layout would be left home. I would body-boot and sit in the middle of 75 decoys.
The area I hunt is about 90 minutes from home and involves crossing the Canadian border. You can make a long day of it, but when I am alone on Big Water, I like to stay over the night before. This is my favorite routine. Home from work about 7 or 8 pm. Pack the gear. Kiss my wife good-bye and head for the border and on to Wallaceburg, Ontario and Oaks Inn. It costs me an extra $55 but increases my pleasure and safety.
The ride over is part of the fun. No mad pushing of the accelerator here. Time for pleasant conversation with the customs agent inspecting my gun. Enjoy the World Series and some munchies as the kilometers pass by. I am blessed to afford these pleasures.
Oaks Inn in Wallaceburg has taken the phrase ?cater to duck hunters? and refined it to a science. Bringing your dog? No problem. Need a license? No problem. Need a non-resident license and Ontario stamp and a Walpole Indian permit and a Walpole Guide? No problem. Want a full breakfast at 3:30 AM free with your room? No problem. And would you like a post card sent in August with a photo of Mitchell?s Bay reminding you that hunting season is coming? No problem.
At breakfast, I?m usually the only one in the restaurant. Most guys here are puddler hunters and they are up and out early. I subscribe to the creed that diver hunters are better off going out at daylight or after daylight. The waitress asks me if I?m late. I explain my strategy and she responds that I seem to be the most intelligent duck hunter she?s met. I don?t tell her that my wife has a different opinion of the intelligence of duck hunters, myself included.
It?s a 30?morning and the long underwear feels good under my neo?s. As I motor through the inner part of Mitchell?s Bay, I note that there are neither birds nor hunters using it. Too nice. East wind. A bass fisherman?s wind.
My destination is the large flat west of Mitchell?s Point. If you ever go to this area for the first time, get some good advice about motoring or you will lose your drawers, or at least your propeller. I had information about bluebills on this flat, lots of bluebills, but that was on a west wind day.
My friend Dale and I had previously refitted our main line rigs. Using large bags, we have ten lines completely rigged. I was anxious to see how it worked setting out and picking up.
The only hunters I saw were EXACTLY where I wanted to go. A boat blind and body-booter were set up in my chosen area. Such is life. Fortunately it is a large lake and a large flat. Even prior to setting up I could tell that the east wind was having an effect on the other hunters. I saw no one else hunting except my neighbors. I mean NO ONE ELSE.
In knee deep water I hopped out of the boat, dropped the anchor and started pulling lines. Wow! This beats clipping every deek. Only one line is set when a bluebill drake and hen drop by to imitate Willie Mays and ?say hey.?
With the set rigged and boat moved away, I hunker down on a ?T? seat we normally use for puddler hunting in corn. Mmm. This is my first time body-booting in open water. Where do you put the thermos? Don?t bend too low or you get an armful of water. Mmm. Very different!
I?m shooting a new Benelli Super Nova. Last summer on the clay targets I was actually becoming a decent shot. I feel confident as the first pair of blues come in and flare perfectly across me. Rude awakening: I am completely able to miss easy shots with the new Benelli . Blessing: on the third shot, a full-plumage drake crashes down without a whimper. Problem: where do I put it? Lake St. Clair only furnishes the water; it does not come with hooks to hang your birds. This is as scaled down as diver hunting gets.
Birds are intermittent and at 10:30 my neighbors depart. As far as I can see and hear, I am the only hunter in any direction. It is for this reason that I and others come to Canada. Lack of pressure. Except on Saturday, there is little hunting pressure. Sure, some guys refuse to pay the $50 to register your gun. Sure, some don?t want another country knowing their gun number. Sure, some don?t want the hassle of customs. Fine by me. That leaves me 22 miles from Detroit as the crow flies in prime diver country. Alone.
What I don?t know as my neighbors leave is that while it looks like I am alone, I am not. There are eyes watching me. Out of sight, behind the stake lines which mark the private property of the camps and clubs, is a large bay. And on that bay are a few thousandbluebills.
Over the next few hours, I am surprised to see bluebills continuously trading near me, lifting up from ?Back Bay? as it is called or coming from Walpole Island to that bay. One memorable flight: about 15 birds bore into my set, coming low over the water. As they come into the sweet spot, they flare across each other. The birds on the right flare left and the birds on the left flare right. Like a rookie, I criss-cross my gun, back and forth across the sky, acting like I?ve never seen bluebills before. The only saving grace of not firing a shot at 15 bluebills is that no one is there to laugh at me.
Rare for Mitchell?s Bay in the last week of October is that I see few redheads and cans. But I see bluebills on top of bluebills. With all the recent worry about the boreal population and the recent studies linking high concentrations of selenium to the low reproductivity of hens, I am surprised and honored to be in the company of so many of my cupped wings friends.
What a thrill to see birds come down the ?pipe? and others ignore the ?pipe? and come in from the side and still others who haven?t been taught that they are supposed to fly down the ?pipe? but, like a hard-headed student, land out at that farthest decoy of the ?pipe?, some 200 yards away. Hah! Just when you think you can manipulate them, bluebills come up with new ways to befuddle you.
I bag four plump birds. Morning has grown into afternoon and afternoon has grown into warmer temperatures and a variable breeze. Perhaps it is the absence of hunters, but as I pick up I realize I am being flanked by rafts of bluebills. It is as though they realize I am relatively harmless and they have invited me to an early dinner with them.
Watching the rafts build into an expanding image of black dots, I wonder if we hunters don?t spend too much time painting white on our rigs. To the naked eye or through binoculars, those rafts look like black dots. My decoys look like salt and pepper. Mmm.
With all the dekes in the boat, I decide to accept the invitation of the bluebills and stay for dinner. What a treat: a private dinner on Lake St. Clair with 500 bluebills as my companions. My meal is strictly blue collar: Cabot cheese from Vermont and Mennonite summer sausage from Ontario. I?d like a beer, but the bartender can?t hear my call. The menu of the birds, as I discern from the crop of my bag, is something more refined: escargot. Their crops are not full of zebra mussels but rather a miniscule snail, ?? wide at most.
I didn?t hear it but someone must have rung the dinner bell. Black dots continually drop from the sky. And someone else must have told the bluebills the parable of Jesus in which the banquet manager sends out to the highways and byways for all to come to the banquet table. Get this non-bluebill formula: the sun was warm, the wind slim to none, the lighting perfect for a picture, the traditional weather of snow squalls and wave-pushing wind non-existent, but on this day the sky became an inky wave of bluebills.
Flock would join flock in the air, each momentarily rising or falling in greeting to each other. Then, as if anticipating dinner, the birds would descend in a driving downward slant straight into the raft.
I sat in the autumn-yellow sunlight, the guest of 500 friends and realized that not only was I a foreigner, but those who ?owned? the water and land behind the stake lines were also foreigners.
The land and the water belonged to the bluebills on this day. A good and gracious God had given it all to the bluebills.
