What is in your bag? December 2020

Will M

Will M

Active member
Strong winds and a flood tide made it tough this morning in NJ. Couldn?t coax anything into the spread. Anyone else have any luck?
 
L I South Shore had similar on the weekend really high tides with wind out the SW. There was no where to hide the boat with the water so high.

Joe
 
Too bad the seasons here in VA and NC are Closed (except for NC Sea Ducks--not sure about VA). There should be a good push of birds from the cold/storms up North. Once again we wasted days earlier vs. prime days now...am I wrong?
 
Havent even pulled out the boat blind and decoys yet. But the Hillsborough Bay portion of northeast Tampa Bay is covered up with bluebills.
I drive along the shoreline back & forth to work every day and this morning there were scattered small flocks of 10-20 feeding bluebills all along the shoreline & offshore.
 
2 black ducks and 2 mallards this morning for a nice solo hunt. Done by 830, could have stuck around to see what else would come in but this is typically a mallard and black duck spot and we are only allowed 2 mallards here. Could have finished the limit with bufflehead but they don?t get the juices flowing any more so I left happy with 4 big ducks



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Very nice, Will~


We re-open tomorrow morning. We've had on-again/off-again skim ice on our beaver ponds and the like. Not sure if we'll see anything, but hope to connect with a "big duck" or two.


All the best,


SJS

 
Nick, very jealous of the eiders. Another bucket list bird for me. I still enjoy watching the buffies come to the decoys, I also enjoy watching them swim and dive. Very cool little ducks
 
Will,

Still hoping for a full plumage drake to mount. Another 6 weeks of the season but I'm already biting my nails.
 
CT mostly. I have my NY and RI license for forays in the east and some of Long Island Sound. Plenty of sea ducks out that way. It's a hike for me, 1.5 hour drive to the launch, but usually ends in a productive day.
 
My wife needed the car in the morning on Saturday, so with the tide being lowest at just after noon, and little time before sundown to hitch my sneakbox and toss out decoys, best I could do was jump shoot the heavily hunted public marsh in the north zone for the last 2.5 hrs of the hunting day out of my Aquapod. It surpassed my expectations. Was pretty beat by the end after fighting current, tide, and some areas of low water. View attachment DC026231-2930-4C14-A18E-9D1AA7AE71FD.jpeg
 
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I thought I would add some comments and pics to R.Ligman's post of pics I sent him yesterday.
The MI DNR adds 2 days to our regular season, two weeks after the closure at the end of November to give Michigan it's total season of USFWS days.I loaded my Hoefgen Friday night and planned on going out Saturday morning. When a woke at 5am it was 34 degrees and raining and the forecast was to turn to wet snow! I stayed home with a more "enjoyable" weather forecast for Sunday. Of course what I think is enjoyable is far different than my wife's!

I knew I would have company when I turned onto the seasonal road and followed a lone set of fresh truck tracks in the snow.
At my put-in spot I saw where a small, flat bottomed boat had entered ahead of me. Having a good idea where they would be setting up, I launched the Hoefgen and proceeded upstream since I would be paddling well beyond them. I paddled 10' beside their boat blind in the dark to wish them a good hunt. Also to assure them I would be well upstream from them and not affecting working birds. They "envied" or is it, "lusted" after my Hoefgen! (I have enjoyed my 2 skiffs so much over the years. This one is Kevlar, which a find at 68 years of age is much easier to load and unload alone on my Sequoia than my fiberglass model.)

My Sabbath closing day would fill my "bag" with much more than harvested birds. My memory "bag" would be limited-out by the grandeur that I saw over the next 3 hours. As we all know, sometimes it's much more than the # of birds shot. Sure we have those great shooting days, but I was not disappointed at all with this closing day!


Season's Greetings to all.
Steve


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It's been awhile since I last posted, but have been getting out and carving decoys again when I can.

In my spots, Sprig is king and I've have taken some prime birds. GWT, Mallards, and Wig round it out.


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I've done a lot of scouting this year after buying a 4 rivers "Mini". Its not the perfect duck boat and I'd always prefer the lines and history of a featheredge BBSB, but it has been surprisingly deadly and suits a particular style of hunting that I've found to be effective:





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I'm getting back into carving, and have a rig of pickleweed pintails in the works, along with Teal/Wig/Headless Mallards:



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Finally, i'm starting to do a little bit of decoy collecting/using and have some beautiful birds from Tom Newell, Tom Matus, Steve Sutton, and many others. They accompanied me on a recent diver shoot (unsuccessful), but the decoys were great to look at and I'm sure Steve would've appreciated the bird being deployed in his old stomping grounds:




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