A couple weeks ago, the birds were in pretty thick in some of my fields in the valley. When I got an invite to head out to the Hunt unit, I was really torn.
My Uncle Jim and his son John had a reservation and wondered if I would join, hoping to increase their chance of success. After a mental struggle for most of the evening, I found myself out in line waiting to get a "good blind" on the unit. I knew the birds would be sparse, but figured if we could get somewhere in the middle, we might get a few looks.
In the morning we ended up on blind #8, and headed out for a morning of excitement
. After an hour of setting my dekes and making sure everything looked just right, we sat and watched the sun rise, and waited for the birds.
It was a quiet, balmy morning, not the kind you wish for on a day of serious duckin', but right off the get go, a set of four mallards turned from the upper limits of the sky. The call echoed in the quiet stillness that rested above the Hunt unit. The mallards were focused on only us, and I had no doubts in my mind.
After several circles, one pair split and swung over us at about 40 yards. Crack! Crack!....I looked to my right and the two of them were in shooting position watching all the birds fly away
. I couldn't believe my eyes. After a few DEEP breaths
, I politely explained that I would call the shot for them...those birds were going to get a lot closer. I guess some guys just shoot on the first pass in range
.
A while later, a pair came around and settled nicely into a glide that sent me to a world where all mallards flew on balmy mornings. I love the sound a slow, methodical, mallard call makes in the empty air. Quaaaaaack, Quaaaack, Quaaack, Quack, I whined at them as they banked on the final turn. Quaaaaaaack.....Quaaaaaaack I called out as a lonely hen... they headed right in. "Drake's on the right", I whispered...."Take 'em", and several shots later the greenhead was down on the water. Ginger, their wired up Chocolate lab, was in the water and back with the bird in no time at all, and smiles filled the blind.
After a spell a single mallard broke towards us as his mate swung wide towards another blind. While concsious of the other bird and knowing a shot could wreck me at any time, I called intently as to bring him in range before the hen made her move. Some shortened chatter quacks showed my excitement and he bit into it with locked wing. 5 yards off the water and still 80+ yards out, the shot came, just one blind down.
The Sauvie Island special I thought, but rather than give up on him, I laid into him with the loudest, demanding, laydown call I could produce, and without a thought, he locked back up off the flare and glided the rest of the way in. At a close 20 yards the boy could hear me utter "take him" as he stood up and in one shot, ended the set. He smiled big as I slapped him on the back, but what no one saw under my face mask was a smile twice as large. That is the epitimy of hunting.
The Hunt unit on a slow day can be rough, but today it was not. Pure enjoyment was shared by three fellows experiencing and age old tradition, and chuckling over a 13 year old's "hits and misses". :grin:
I believe I brought a meger seven mallards into the range that morning, but it really didn't matter. I didn't have much of an inkling to raise my gun, but enjoyed hunting from another standpoint.
To be honest, I don't think I thought even once about what was pouring into my valley field. Because of hunts like this one and the youth hunt in Sept. he went on with me, this young boy may just turn out to be one of us!!!
Here is Jim, John, and Ginger.
Jon
Youth waterfowling story
CMallardDrake
down below there in my boat and covered face, but keeping it muffled as to not embarrass the first time hunter. He didn't know and we understood that but man it was funny.
'em
Linear Mode
