Well, the opener last weekend was hot and successful, in a way. Never took the gun out of its case, but we did look at a few new places to hunt (new for us anyway) and learned a lot more.
But yesterday was a permitted property that Steve pulled a permit for in the lotto draw. So him, a friend James and I went down to Broadmoor to hunt. It had rained A LOT the day and night before so parcels of the property that were dry when Steve scouted Thursday had sheet water on it. We picked a spot and headed out to get set up with the skeeters.
It was slow, but the teal had finally showed up. While we weren't in THE SPOT, we were right next to it. Steve and James each put out a couple rigs of really neat hand carved decoy rigs. Right at legal we had several groups right in the decoys but with the cloud cover and light rain it was tough to pick the birds out. Light came and we had a few more little groups come through. Steve got a bird and I proceeded to shoot with my typical amazingly inaccurate shooting ability. By god a lot more air died than really had to. I did manage a single teal but after that it slowed down quite a bit. For a while we watched a little gator, about 2-3 feet long, feeding in the decoys chomping down on little fishes.
I forgot to mention that I was sitting there in a bright pink shirt. The blackbellies, mottled ducks and teal all seemed fascinated by it. The blackbellies especially.
Anywho, I got bored and told Steve I was going for a walk, stopped over to tell James where I'd been seeing birds moving and then picked up one of my favorite little bluewing decoys and off I went. I moved around several times but eventually I got it right. In two shots, I finished my limit with three more birds. 4 teal to take home...waaaaaaaahooooooo
I meander my way back to the blind and at least each of the guys has one bird. So no one was leaving skunked.
Anywho, Steve added a new addition to the decoy rig
cute little bugger. He decided that since there were more moorhen and babies out in the marsh than teal, he'd "match the hatch" and see what he could draw in. I was concerned for a bit that the little gator would try to chomp the little decoy.
James is hosting both of the traveling decoys on another site for the teal Season. This is Edna, carved by "Bassin" on James' forum. The duck call came to me from Bob Furia, and it's a beautiful noise maker that's for sure (in my hands). When Steve calls on it it sounds great. Me, I'm the scourge of the marsh. The lanyard was made by Jason Russell's son. LOVE the pink. Thanks a ton Bob for the call!!!! And thanks to Jason Russell's son for a very pretty, and very unique call lanyard.
Now time for the wait for regular season
Dani
But yesterday was a permitted property that Steve pulled a permit for in the lotto draw. So him, a friend James and I went down to Broadmoor to hunt. It had rained A LOT the day and night before so parcels of the property that were dry when Steve scouted Thursday had sheet water on it. We picked a spot and headed out to get set up with the skeeters.
It was slow, but the teal had finally showed up. While we weren't in THE SPOT, we were right next to it. Steve and James each put out a couple rigs of really neat hand carved decoy rigs. Right at legal we had several groups right in the decoys but with the cloud cover and light rain it was tough to pick the birds out. Light came and we had a few more little groups come through. Steve got a bird and I proceeded to shoot with my typical amazingly inaccurate shooting ability. By god a lot more air died than really had to. I did manage a single teal but after that it slowed down quite a bit. For a while we watched a little gator, about 2-3 feet long, feeding in the decoys chomping down on little fishes.
I forgot to mention that I was sitting there in a bright pink shirt. The blackbellies, mottled ducks and teal all seemed fascinated by it. The blackbellies especially.
Anywho, I got bored and told Steve I was going for a walk, stopped over to tell James where I'd been seeing birds moving and then picked up one of my favorite little bluewing decoys and off I went. I moved around several times but eventually I got it right. In two shots, I finished my limit with three more birds. 4 teal to take home...waaaaaaaahooooooo
I meander my way back to the blind and at least each of the guys has one bird. So no one was leaving skunked.
Anywho, Steve added a new addition to the decoy rig
cute little bugger. He decided that since there were more moorhen and babies out in the marsh than teal, he'd "match the hatch" and see what he could draw in. I was concerned for a bit that the little gator would try to chomp the little decoy.
James is hosting both of the traveling decoys on another site for the teal Season. This is Edna, carved by "Bassin" on James' forum. The duck call came to me from Bob Furia, and it's a beautiful noise maker that's for sure (in my hands). When Steve calls on it it sounds great. Me, I'm the scourge of the marsh. The lanyard was made by Jason Russell's son. LOVE the pink. Thanks a ton Bob for the call!!!! And thanks to Jason Russell's son for a very pretty, and very unique call lanyard.
Now time for the wait for regular season
Dani
