Al Hansen
Well-known member
One day while sitting in the duck blind, I thought about Sarah. This young girl with big, bright, blue eyes was walking up to my desk to check with me, the spelling test that we had just finished. As she approached, I asked, “Well, Sarah, do you think you will get another 100% today?” “ I sure hope so,” she replied. As she stood at my side, we went down through the list of 30 words. Just before we got to the bottom of the page, I said very quietly, “Oh, oh, you missed one.” She looked at the word, which was supposed to be (shirt) and said this, “What is wrong with it?”
“Well, hon, you forgot the “r”. She looked at me and said, “What a silly mistake to make.”
That is one of the reasons why I enjoyed my life as a 4th and 5th grade teacher. The beautiful yet wonderful innocence of young kids.
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I have often wondered that if my father had taken a giant step back when my sister and I were just small kids in the 40s, would I have been a transplant to Mexico? My father had a long list of things that he enjoyed doing in life. Some of them were; music, photography, reading, science, birding, although it wasn’t called that back then, astronomy, painting, and languages, all 22 of them that he had studied and knew how to speak them well. He loved Spanish as much as English I think, maybe more so. Anyway, in the course of our traveling about in and around North America, dad made sure we saw all 19 states in Mexico.
Maybe two to three years before his death, I was sitting in his living room while we listened to an Italian opera and I asked him if he had ever considered moving us to Mexico. His eyes told me what he had always wanted to do but didn’t.
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Back in the 1980s when I was living in the Wausau, Wisconsin area, we had a particular tornado that did an extreme amount of damage. It was my father-in-law who called me and said, “It is coming directly towards your house. Keep everyone in that closet under the steps.” I did go to the lower level and look out the family room window just in time to see the twister die as it came to our woods. Gus, didn’t tell me about the huge maple tree that had crashed down across the middle of his house or that his barn was completely destroyed with one of his replacement heifers stone dead in the pasture, when a 20' 10"x10" support beam that was hurtling through the air broke its neck. That was my closest call to the first tornado that I saw. By the way, there was also a part of the Kolbe and Kolbe Millwork’s paint shop roof in his corn field that we found later that summer. We are now talking a few miles for that roof to be tossed through the air.
I guess it was several years ago, maybe around 2009 or 2010, when I saw my 2nd tornado. This one that I saw was while duck hunting on the Rio Grande and instead of seeing a funnel cloud of debris made up of sheets of plywood, shingles, trees, and branches, this funnel was made up of ducks. Yes, ducks, literally hundreds and hundreds of them.
It started out to be one of those November days that is so typical around here in the desert southwest where the sky doesn’t have a cloud anywhere in sight. (Severe Clear) If there was a breeze it was so gentle that you wouldn’t have noticed it. The morning had been great in my estimation. I had 4 ducks on my strap which included a gorgeous drake widgeon and three greenheads. As is so typical of my of duck hunting, I was sitting in my folding chair with Chili on my right and Pepper on my left. In my hand was a cup of delicious hot black coffee and I was just soaking up the sights.
Out of no where, quite high in the sky, came a flock of mallards, oh, maybe 50 or so. The lead hen had the rest of the flock behind her as she began to make some tight circles towards my spread of decoys that were spread out in the flooded cockleburs of this area. I only needed two more ducks, so I set my coffee cup down, grabbed my Benelli Nova and got ready for some action. The flock made a circle away from me and I decided to sneak a peek. That is when I then saw another very large flock of mostly drake pintails coming in from up high right behind the mallards. There had to be a good hundred of them. As only pintails can do, they sure put on a show as they began spiraling down with some whiffling like only Canadas and snow geese can. Not seconds later a huge flock of mallards followed the pintails in their corkscrewing fashion. I estimated that flock to be 250 and soon I had at least 400 birds that were constantly in motion, mallard hens talking loudly, and two dogs that were on high alert sitting next to me. I guess it was at this time, with my mind racing like an Indy 500 car, that I made the decision to put down my shotgun and pick up my camera. Maybe my age was now beginning to do the talking, I don’t know. Some of the first part of this flock was now beginning to get quite close to me----maybe 60 yards or so. As they flew out across the rio on another swing, I glanced upwards to catch sight of yet another massive flock of ducks with this one being made up of mallards, gadwalls and widgeons. Right behind them followed two smaller flocks of mallards and it was about then that I tried to make a calculated guess that there was probably 750 ducks now coming into my little spot on the rio.
How can I even try and tell you about my emotions at that particular time in my life? Just the sounds from their wings let alone the chattering from the hen mallards was incredible. With my Canon 50D in my hands, I tried to capture as much of this remarkable show that Mother Nature was putting on for me. Chili and Pepper were doing exactly what I had trained them to do and that was “sit”! Oh, I have to admit that Pepper was whining a little as is her custom when ducks are in the area. As for me, well, this marked the first time in my duck hunting career that I had ever seen anything like this.
I now had ducks landing in my decoys and swimming about. The majority of them were maybe 15 yards on the other side of the small opening where most of my spread was located. They were busily walking/swimming in the shallow waters of the Rio Grande feeding on all the wild seeds that were in the muck and the water.
For no apparent reason within a split second, the entire flock rose into the air in a tumultuous fashion and began circling about this small piece of the rio that I was on. I had ducks flying in front of me, behind me, and right above me. It was a sight never before in my life had I ever witnessed. The large flock moved out towards the middle of the rio and began to get organized. I watched them make circle after circle all the while taking pictures.
Just like this tornado began, I could sense that it was about to die like that one that I saw in Wausau, WI. It was then that I gently set my camera on top of its bag and grabbed my Nova. This monstrous flock was now heading south of me, still corkscrewing through the air and right at the end of this very massive sweeping motion was a single pair of mallards that flew directly over my decoy spread. With two shots from my Nova, there was now much action in my blind, as I followed the line of Chili and Pepper as they plowed through the shallow waters of the Rio Grande heading for the pair of mallards that were still kicking and flopping around. It was a sight that would make any duck hunter’s heart fill with pride. Both dogs had a duck in their mouth and were now coming back to me. The first part of this flock was now disappearing around the bend in the rio to the south of me and my hunt was officially over for the day. It seems that once again that my life has been blessed with yet another of those miracles that only He can show you----that is if you want to take the time to watch.
Al
