Texas Coast

D

Dick Sargeant

Well-known member
Anybody gunning the Texas coast ? I just saw a spread in the new DU magazine and it looks like a duck hunter's paradise. Highest concentration of red heads in the country and miles of area open to gunning. Anyone have a recommendation about a guide or area there ?
sarge
 
Dick, I live right in the thick of it man. Just outside Corpus Christi. As far as divers go we have a ton. The numbers of redheads here would blow your mind and if you go inland a few miles there even more species of ducks. In an average year we shoot around 11-15 species of waterfowl here. And the amount of public saltwater to hunt is amazing. We have very few laws regarding duck hunting believe it or not. I've guided here for ducks since getting out of the coast guard about 6 years ago. This is my last season to guide. Im getting a bit sick of it to be honest, it takes the fun out of duck hunting. If you have some good hunting for sea ducks or something out on the East Coast maybe we could do a swap hunt next season.
Take care, John Ven Huizen
 
Cool, I look foward to hearing from you. If you've ever sculled before we have a one man and a two man sculler we use often. The one man hayden is a killer on ducks here. No one else for the most part does it.
John
 
I know Mike Braden from Jersey was just there b/c he was sending me pics by text. He frequents the site and will likely see this.

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I've always wanted to try hunting the Texas coast. Stayed a week several years ago on field trip with some high school kids I was teaching at Port Aransas. My hunting buddie and fellow teacher and maybe my college age son would like to plan something for next year. Since your getting out of the business, is their anyone you would recommend?
 
Thanks John! If you happen to be up in the Muskogee area and want to try a N.E. OK hunt next year , let me know. This year has been somewhat of disappointment due to lack of water. Hopefully, better next year.
 
Tom,

Not to change the subject but I just got back from Muskogee last night (visited the OG&E plant) and I saw more ducks sitting on the tanks alongside the highway then I normally see all day in CT. This is a poor season? By the way it was cold down there!!! I was hoping for a bit of warmth but it was colder then at home. Of course there was 2 ft of new snow waiting for me when I got back :^)

Scott
 
Scott......Nearly all of my favorite haunts are either dry or have extremely low water. Seems like the ducks that are left have been educated by the hunters who have found spots that now these ducks behave almost like geese in a park and avoid the pressure areas. We need some new bird blood in our area to pick things back up. I fear that we are on the back side of the migration process. We had some good hunts but they occurred back in Nov./early Dec.
 


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Ducks? Ducks? Did somebody say that there are ducks in Texas? We didn't see any?!



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Redheads and Pintails all over. 4 man limit here for you guys that like to count.

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And more........

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And more.........Three days of pure heaven......God I love Texas. Already got the invite to come back next year. Yee-haw!

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They also have some huge blueclaws. Many of these were 8 inches plus tip to tip. We even measured some from claw tip to claw tip.....18 inches cowboys...that's some big crabs. And they were delicious.

We were in south Texas. don't want to give the location and piss some guys off but there are certainly enough birds.
 
Sweet pics Mike, yeah people usually dont believe me when I tell them about clouds of redheads that will leave you speachless. This season was a great one for pintails to. Looks like you had a great host! Those blues are some good eating as well. We get some pretty big stone crabs over by port aransas also. Let me know when you come down again. Maybe we can do some sculling.
John
 
Mike - I know what you mean - nothing like having friends who know the area. For about 10 years I had great trips to NW IOWA and SW S Dakota for ringnecks all on hundreds of acres of private land.

Looks like you got the whole program going plus some good lookin surf and turf. The plumage on those birds looks great too !

Thanks for posting the pics.

sarge
 
Hey Jode - It was a hunt of a lifetime and I did it twice so far. Can't wait till next year.

Capt. John - The pinnies were almost as plentiful as the Redheads this year. When I was there two years ago, the vast majority of what we saw was Bluebills and Reds. Glad to see more puddle ducks this year now that you got some of the fresh water ponds backs.
 
How in the world can you drink a Heineken while in Texas????
Should be drinking Shiner Bock!
 
Man do I feel like an idiot. My best friend was stationed at a Navy base in Corpus Christi. He kept complaining about how there was nothing really to do around there, thus I never went to visit. Apparently he was wrong and I should have gone down. Now he's in San Diego, not much hunting but a cool city.
 
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