First goose hunt with a twist...

B

Brian Hiller

Member
Rather than drive my kids for more than an hour round-trip for a half-day of Kindergarten I decided to take them out on their first goose hunt. Checked the bird activity from the day before and it didn't look promising, not many birds working and fewer dropping into decoys. Our day started off overcast with a slight NNE wind coming from behind us, but the birds didn't start moving until about an hour after legal shooting.
The first flock had four big birds and one much smaller one...I'm thinking, cackler?? As they cup into the dekes I see white on the wings with a lighter head and I'm now thinking blue goose...cool! Well, it was neither

View attachment Ruddy shelduck2.jpg

The boys had a great time hiding from the incoming birds, we probably had 350 geese come over between 7:30 and 9:30.

View attachment Hiding from geese.jpg

and they especially enjoyed it when the whole plan came together and they got to hold the birds.


View attachment Twins and geese.jpg

All in all it was a very interesting and positive first goose hunting experience for both boys and I have a sneaking suspicion that I have a new pair of hunting partners!

Hope you all have a Happy Thanksgiving!

Brian

PS- Sorry if the pics don't actually end up in the post!
 
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Seems like you guys had a enjoyable hunt...Nice birds...I have never seen the orange colored bird...What type of bird is that?

Regards,

Kristan
 
Cool hunt, glad the boys had a good time. It seems like someone else shot a Ruddy Shelduck along the east coast a couple years ago too. Neat bird, you'll have to report back on how it tastes.

Tim
 
You should get that brown whachamacallit mounted for you may never get another chance too. I Hunted snow geese after the canada goose season closed afew years back .As a string of geese flying towards me, I could hear that they were canadians but with them flew which appeared to be one snow goose flying last on the starboard side ,my buddy said pop the snow ,I did ,he fell ,but after picking it up there was no black markings on it and it had light blue eyes,don't know what kind of goose it was and no it was not a swan . It gave me the creeps,kinda scary, like I felt I did somethig wrong.Oh well.
 
The blue eyes is a pretty rare thing, it would be cool to see a picture of that.
The Ruddy Shelduck will be breasted and eaten, but the skin is going to be prepared and placed in the research collection at UConn. I thought about mounting it but one of the wings had most of the secondaries cut off in an attempt to keep it from flying, which obviously didn't work, so it kind of looks a bit funny. I will be sure to let you know how it tastes.
The boys have been retelling the story of the day to my parents who have arrived for Thanksgiving. They are just as excited as they were while we were in the field!

Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Brian
 
Hey Bri, good to see you are now breaking Gemini into the finer points of waterflowling. Looks like they were certainly enjoying themselves!
Have A Blessed Thanksgiving
 
Very cool! Glad to see you got your priorities right with the kids education. : )

So what the heck is a ruddy shelduck doing in Conn.? Or I guess I should say was, now that he is deceased.

You still making any decoys?

Mike
 
Too bad there are no pics of the blue eyes, oh well.

Hey Mike, yeah that one was a no-brainer! They learned a whole lot more in the field and will likely remember that day longer than a 1/2 day of school! My best gues is that it was an escape from someone's collection/aviary. The secondaries were clearly cut off on the right wing...not that it did any good!

I'm still making a few decoys here and there when time allows. Shoulder surgery last year to repair a rotator tear cut down on that and a lot of hunting too! This year I rounded out my my balsa walk-in rig and am trying to build up my diver rig; mostly buffies and ringers but I have attached a pair of Whistlers I made earlier this year.

View attachment Whistler pair_small.jpg

Most of the decoy work will be put on hold until I finish up work for my degree in March...gotta get out of school!

Hope all is well with you, love the profile pic!

Brian

PS- Thanks Steve for fixing the pics in the last post, hopefully this one will work!
 
Great story. Funny how kids like to hold dead birds - Gus has always loved them. Funniest/saddest was him walking around with a Greater Prairie Chicken last fall when he was 18 months old calling it his baby.
 
The twins are all about "studying" the feet, wings, and beaks/bills of the birds I bring home. They asked me to cut the feet of the last woodcock so they could study them under the microscope at my lab. The feet from the goose on Weds were saved for the same reason. They are totally fascinated by how the bird "works" and spend a lot of time on the goose hunt checking out the different parts. With the serious lack of ducks around right now, they may get to do some more goose hunting.
 
Cool hunt, glad the boys had a good time. It seems like someone else shot a Ruddy Shelduck along the east coast a couple years ago too. Neat bird, you'll have to report back on how it tastes.

Tim
Click to expand...

Had one killed out of my boat on Lake Champlain on the NY side about 10 years ago. It was an escapee from someone as it had a small metal numbered tag in one of the wings.
 
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