It is now less than one week until our opener

Al Hansen

Al Hansen

Well-known member
I just checked and when next Wednesday rolls around our season will officially begin at 6:58AM! Hot diggety damn. Yesterday Sonora and I got into the Mule and went on a 17 mile ride looking for water. The Rio Grande actually has a small stream of it. When the Rio looks like this, which is extremely shallow, normally I can't use decoys with regular keels. This is where my Herters model 72s come in handy along with any teal decoys that I have.

I was happy to see that I don't have to walk too far to get this spot. Driving wise I do but that is all right with me. I'll just have to leave my house earlier, that's all.


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Sonora had her fair share of fun, also. Later on this fall I will bring her along when I am hunting with Habi. She will help teach her the ropes.

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Habi when she was almost a year old. This was in 2012-13.

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I hunted a little side stream to the Rio Grande that was no wider than 15 feet, deeper than 15 inches and longer than 40 feet. It was 250 yards from the river but produced an almost unbelievable amount of action. It was definitely on the "x".

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I did not use motion wing decoys here just because the geese were often flying through the area. My jerk string worked wonders. All of this took place 5 years ago. The Rio Grande makes huge changes almost yearly.
Al


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Great pictures of the dogs! Find any birds to go with the water? Crazy how much that landscape changes
 
Hope you have some birds! And water!

We're still 5 weeks out from opener, which is good. Its still hot and no ducks in site other than flocks of bluewings passing through.
No coots yet, which is actually late.
 
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Good luck Al! We still have a month left to go until our opener. siiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh
 
Come the opener, I can see you & the dogs tucked right in the trees on that point!

Hopefully no snakes curled up near you this year ;-) ;-)
 
Hi Will---I have not seen many ducks yet other than the locals. Doiwn here that means the Mexican ducks and a smattering of mallards. I did see two flocks of bluewing teal this past week and that was a shocker because normally they are long gone (to Mexico) by now. Must be pleasantly warm in Canada.
Al
 
Carl, I just checked the Waterdata gov't website and the Rio Grande is flowing at 10cfs in our area. Things are very different this year. No rains in July in this area which is the beginning of our monsoon season. Saying that means that there is no food growing for ducks in the river bed. The only reason ducks would want to be on the river now is to loaf the day away. So hopefully Bosque del Apache NWR will be holding some ducks this year.
Good luck to you when your season opens.
Al
 
Hey Pete. Great to hear from you. Do you remember holding the chocolate pups? Caya just had a 10 litter on Monday. Bev's dog, Casa, had a 10 pups litter yesterday. It is busy here.

Hopefully we will have some ducks here so that Habi and Chip will get some action. Now I am raising Sonora, my black pup, to also retrieve.

Have you been out to hunt ducks?
Al
 
Bob, it has been usually warm down here. When the temps now should be in the lower 70s we are actually in the mid 80sF That is not fun trying to cut firewood either. I do know that the mosquitoes in certain spots are really thick. As for that point, I can't get to it because the salt cedar jungle there. That is alright though because I found a better spot.
As for snakes I will be on high alert. I have had one close shave with them as you know and care not to EVER experience that again.
Al
 
Great backdrop for a waterfowling adventure Al. I hope your season opener goes better than it did here in PA. The crowds are absolutely horrible anymore. There were guys sleeping in their canoe and others camped out along the road in one of the areas I hunt. Needless to say, it was way overcrowded and we ended up searching elsewhere for our opener. We ended up squirrel hunting last week instead of fighting the crowds again. Good luck to ya, and I hope the dogs get plenty of work.

Steve
 
That should change soon and hopefully in time for your season. We are getting extremely lucky with a cold front that started pushing last night and should end about 30 miles north of us. The amount of birds that have showed up in the last 36 hours is impressive. It's all been geese I've been seeing around the house but I'm hoping that correlates to ducks for tomorrow's opener. I scouted last weekend and there was a fair amount of teal and a surprising number of black ducks but would like to see more teal and some mallards and some "color" ducks starting to appear. Nothing better than a nice mixed bag!
 
Al - Good luck and have a safe opener.

Our season opens tomorrow, and the drought here is ending as I write this. Got at least a inch of water in my basement shop with no end in sight. If it continues as forecast I'll be bailing not hunting, but so be it...
 
Al - Only photo's were of the water in my shop, with a "who cares" story. Did scout in the afternoon. The shop is now mostly dry and attended to. So my first day will be tomorrow morning. Even after all these years I'm like a kid at Christmas.

I've not taken hunt photo's since my 35mm died years ago. Have a large drawer full of photo's of, "been there done that" with many partners that have Walked On. Never easy to look at anymore.

My wife gave me a small digital camera last year to use. I seem to have misplaced it. I try my best to see and absorb as much as possible, then infuse it into my paintings and carvings.

This falls color's have been jaw dropping stunning, despite the drought.

Hope your first day went well. I'm sure you will have some good photo's.
 
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