What is in your bag? January 2021

This is a mish-mash bag of what I shot the last two weeks. I believe I shot some more but the days are blending together and I've been terrible with pics.

These NJ black ducks are a fixture at this point. I think this might be my 8th-10th one this season. As much as they are all we see sometimes, it never gets old seeing them. Challenge to decoy for sure. This one pitched in perfectly to a trio of black duck decoys which seems to be my go-to number.

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Brant some days seem to want to work for us. Other days, not so much. This was an interesting day. Had a bunch of Brant trading back and forth and one lone teal, 1/2 a mile from the ocean.

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The Duck Invader 13 is coming together. Raffia on the deck is unfortunately, a little greener than I thought. The salt hay on the flappers is spot-on though. Rest assured, I put the motor down when I hunt. We had just moved the boat and my buddy snapped a quick pic as I was moving the decoys around.

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Good job Jay. There is something about the way brant come into the decoys that I love!
The Duck Invader looks awesome. Mine won't be ready for this season, but I'll be ready with it for next year.
 
Im going to cheat a little. This is Late November. But this may have been Jakes last hunt. Hes 10, has been an awesome dog, but has laryngeal paralysis that is getting worse. He cant breathe when he gets excited. Might try one more time in clean deep water, but he just doesnt want to go anymore. Hate to retire him.


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MIKE-SID said:
Good job Jay. There is something about the way brant come into the decoys that I love!
The Duck Invader looks awesome. Mine won't be ready for this season, but I'll be ready with it for next year.
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Thanks Mike. It's strange. Somedays they want to work, others not so much. It seems like depending on the day, you'll get birds that break off the main body and traverse the creeks. These are the ones we seem to do well on. Other days, they stay all balled up on the big water and won't give us a look. I had a trip a couple weeks ago where I punched my 2 bird limit on them in 30 min and watched about a dozen of them back pedal over my puddle duck spread. Ironically, that day, we had no brant decoys out. Then, the days we put them out, they don't want to work.

You are really going to enjoy that Invader.
 
Hi Brad. There were quite a few Redheads, nowhere near the numbers I saw even a few years ago though. I love hunting there, it peaceful usually.
 
MikeF...Sorry to hear about the old boy but a fitting place for him to end his career if that's the case. So that spot has fallen out of favor with all the rally boys that ruined it some years back? If so nice to hear that also.
 
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Brad F. There are still a lot of people, but less seem to be chasing birds. Less big boats. And I think the numbers of birds being down helps. Water was very high when I was there last week, and that makes it tough. Those were my first 2 Redheads in few years. Lots of GE for you. I missed the nice Drake I shot at.....
 
Always use odd number of black ducks, and less is more


Jay K said:
This is a mish-mash bag of what I shot the last two weeks. I believe I shot some more but the days are blending together and I've been terrible with pics.

These NJ black ducks are a fixture at this point. I think this might be my 8th-10th one this season. As much as they are all we see sometimes, it never gets old seeing them. Challenge to decoy for sure. This one pitched in perfectly to a trio of black duck decoys which seems to be my go-to number.




Brant some days seem to want to work for us. Other days, not so much. This was an interesting day. Had a bunch of Brant trading back and forth and one lone teal, 1/2 a mile from the ocean.



The Duck Invader 13 is coming together. Raffia on the deck is unfortunately, a little greener than I thought. The salt hay on the flappers is spot-on though. Rest assured, I put the motor down when I hunt. We had just moved the boat and my buddy snapped a quick pic as I was moving the decoys around.
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Brad Bortner said:
RLLigman said:
Will, it is not a juvenile bird, as indicated by the lack of a "V" notch in the tips of the tail feathers, so I would lean toward an adult that has just not progresses to full breeding plumage.
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RL. I am undecided as it appears that the center tail feathers are missing and likely been molted but not fully replaced. The remaining tail feathers are very worn. The tips appear to be worn and have a retained tip. Juvenile birds usually have the V notch but sometimes the downy tip leaves the rachis. But retained adult feathers could also display that feature.

Looking over the rest of the bird I don?t see much in the way of adult characteristics besides the bill. Adult males should have long ago completed their molt. I?m wondering if it was just a late hatch male that was molting in some of the adult feathers. I?ll bet it was thin and not much fat and maybe muscle. Either way it?s molt was very delayed for either an adult or juvenile.
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I'll defer to your judgement..and more practiced eye!
 
Brad Bortner said:
Posting from the boat. These are full of Japanese eelgrass. They?ll be super tasty. I?ll do a separate post on the decoy rig.
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Nice Brad, I have been thinking that I'll sell my brant rig when I leave CT in retirement, but I'm thinking I'll need to keep it to be able to do a road trip and hunt the west coast.
 
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