I am wondering just how many times Bob's rig has been sculled upon by hunters thinking they are real birds.
My favorite is when the clowns out cruising the river bank shut the motor down at 50 yds. and hunker down in the boat. Whenever that starts to happen, I make sure to make my presence known in a hurry. Have even scrambled up the bank to intercept folks a few times when I've watched them cut the motor and head into the bank up or down river from me, so I can make sure they don't end up behind me shooting into the decoys.
Two incidents do stand out: - A "foot" scull by a young rabbit hunter - I didn't know was there until his gun went off right behind my boat blind as he "water swatted" one of my decoys. The air was turned blue that day. Poor kid just stood there stammering, "I'm sorry; I'm sorry." Scared the c#%p out of me, so I returned the favor.
- On another occasion I watched a guy carrying a compound bow come walking up the bank of the slough where I was hunting. He spotted the decoys a long way off and proceeded to do a masterful 30 minute stalk. Since he never headed behind me, I let him get all the way to the edge of the shoreline and at full draw before I spoke up. In both cases, I imagine that these would-be duck hunters probably had no federal or state stamps, nor had they thought out how they were going to retrieve anything they might have killed or wounded out on the water. I made sure to point that out to both of them. Folks sure will do some asinine things just to take home a duck.
Now it's only fair to point out that
real duck hunters may do
ODD things in order to kill a few ducks....
odd, however, is not the same as
asinine. We do need to be prepared to explain that distinction to wives and/or girlfriends. ;-)