Anyone ever had a GE do this?

Dwight Harley

Dwight Harley

Well-known member
I set up my Canvasback today as a layout boat for divers. I had several GEs drop right in like they are supposed to. One bird, however, surprised the hell of out me. This duck was just about to land when I sat up to shoot. As I pulled the trigger, I swear the bird went into a dive straight down into the water and disappeared. I was so shocked that when the bird popped up about 15' away from where it hit the water that I missed twice more as it took off.
 
I shot at one once that was just about touching the water...when the spray cleared he was nowhere to be seen. He popped up about 30' away and swam out of range and took off.
 
Happens a lot! I've had it happen after the bird is hit and the splash is actually red from blood. In one of those instances the bird NEVER came back up and I was in 20ft of water!!
Welcome to the wacky world of divers
 
pair of Whitewing Scoters that he doubled on....the first bird hit the water in a dive and the next time we saw it it was a good hundred yards away....the second bird went down like a fat chick grateful for a date on prom night and and then took two more rounds of the much vaunted BLACK CLOUD before finally succumbing......

Earlier he had a Goldeneye do the same thing....

Those birds were hit though which isn't exactly what you saw.....I've seen it several time with Goldeneyes but more frequently with Harlequins and Old Squaws.....the first Harlequin I ever ashot was one of four drake flying with a single hen.....I shot the trailing drake and all five birds hit the water in a dive,......gone completely when the splash settled.....I was stunned, (this was back before they were restricted in the limit), and looked at the guy that I was with and said, "HOLY CRAP I killed em ALL".....he said, "just watch".......the remaining three drakes and the hen left the water like little blue polaris missiles....I swear they FLEW out of the water......the drake I had shot popped to the surface on his back, feet kicking feebly......I've seen that a couple of times since, most often on a close shot on a very low bird. You get a splash behind the bird and the next thing you know it dives into the water.....when they come out if they float for any period of time before taking flight its so quick that you can't see it in regular speed.....

Steve
 
Dwight, how'd you end up doing? I imagine you were hunting the "big water" near oldham??
The cans seemed to have left leaving only trailing numbers behind, are you noticing the same thing?
Lots of g.eyes though, and a few bills.
Ryan
 
Dwight, just the other day I had a Bufflehead dive on me as he landed. Just disapeared as he hit the water. When he came up about 30 sec. later he was mine. Kevin
 
Ryan, I saw zero cans and no bills all day. Some GEs and a buff here and there. It has been a frustrating diver season for me. I have chased them all over eastern SD and I always seem to miss any big concentration of migrating birds. We have done OK on mallards and Canadas.
 
Yup, me too. Divers/sea ducks only though. Never seen a puddle duck do it (although I haven't been hunting ducks long compared to most on this site).
 
well ive had similar things happen,they dive and grab ahold of seaweed and drown themselves and on more then a few occassions them that dive are lunch for others as the seals come along and pluck them from the seaweed like horderves,,,,you see a bubble of air and sometimes feather fluffs floating up..

my buddy justin down the south shore where the water is warmer have sharks feeding off the seaduckers ,one does not let dawg go after ducks down there...


and this year someone reported eagles and hawks have joined the fray stealing decoys or downed burds,,one fella said the eagle was half across the lake when it decided it wasnt good to eat and let it go from high altitude....
 
first duck hunt i ever went on. 3 gaddies swam into the decoys. three of us unloaded at <20 yds. they disappeared and never came up. we kicked the rice stubble for 20 minutes trying to find em. puddlers will do it too no doubt

jeff
 
Charlie,

Had a woodie do it one time. Crippled one and it glided to the edge of the island. When I went out to the boat to look for it, I saw it up under a tree root and he took off swimming down the shoreline. As I was getting ready to pull the trigger it dove and never came up. When I got back to the blind I was telling my uncle what he did. He told me they'd latch onto something underwater and drown themselves.

Ed L.
 
I've been chasing GE's for a lot of years. I like them because of the wacky things they do, and this is certianly one of their wackiest traits. I have a similar experience to Steve, first time I ever saw the ol' diving trick I had a flock of 6 drakes coming into the blocks, I rose to shoot and although I missed they all hit the water. I thought I musta been using some REALLY good shells to knock down all 6 of them! After a few seconds they all popped to the surface and took off. Since I never shoot divers after they've landed, they all had a free pass. I've seen it happen again many times.

God was having a good time when he created GE's. He said "I'm gonna make a duck that nests in trees, has whistling wings, and is the hardiest freshwater duck in N. America, and then give them a few peculiarities such as anti-social waterfowl syndrome and the desire to dive into water to escape danger". Maybe that expains why they are such silly birds.
 
Was hunting the Arkansas River last year and had three goldeneyes lock up and fall into the decoys. Partner shoots, and all three hit the water and dive.

I said, "You killed all three..." and about that time the first two popped up out of the water, flying. I've never seen anything like it. We smacked the third when it popped up and took off.
 
Hi,

I apologize if this shows up twice. I posted it and poof it went away.

Steve you need to come clean on what was happening with those birds. First they are incredibly tough birds and second was how I was hitting them (barley.) Now you know why Aspen is so good on cripples...lots of practice. Thanks for the great day on the water.

My best,

Don
 
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