Reminiscing over October duck hunts
I looked to my right after hearing something from that direction when my hunting partner cued me in to the left side of the decoys. We saw a teal settling into the decoys and raised our shotguns, dropping the green wing just outside the decoys. We were on the board.
Prior to that, the morning looked pretty bleak. We just were not seeing many ducks. The other hunters weren’t seeing much either, judging by the lack of shooting. There was shooting a mile to two miles away, but out where the larger flocks of birds flew, the skies were empty.
Before that, if I looked left, a bird passed on the right. If I looked left, one would pass on the right. The same to the front or back. We didn’t see many passes.
When the sun finally lit up the marsh, we found that the splendors of October were upon us. Orange, red, golden trees rimmed the edge of the marsh. Coot splashed around just outside of our gun range. The sun continued to rise and lit the water up. It started to get that sparkle it gets after it’s turned over, prior to freeze up.
A couple hours after shooting light, the sun turned harsh; forcing me to watch almost continuously to the right over the bow of the boat. My partner looked to the back and towards the stern. I heard the flock of decoying ducks before I saw them. My partner saw them before he heard them. Together we saw them settling just over the decoys. He pulled up and I tried to but the stock got caught on my jacket.
The flock used their momentum to break with the wind, their wings rapidly beating to increase speed. I untangled the stock and swung on the birds coming into the harsh swath of the sun as I touched off my first round. I picked them up as they cleared the path of the sun and touched off a second round just as my partner did. Ducks rained from the sky and one more round brought another to the water.
I felt the rush of the action. We both smiled. Just like that we had ducks for dinner. Maybe fricassee of duck, possibly a short marinade in lime juice and wrapped with bacon then grilled. For sure some duck soup.
Sienna would have sat there quivering waiting to be released. Multiple marks, all on the water dead – she loved moments like that. But this is the second season since she passed.
I climbed out of the boat and retrieved the ducks in the shallow water. Most places the water depth means pushing the boat out to retrieve the ducks. The wind can make that a pain, but having ducks to retrieve is better than not having ducks to retrieve.
Cleaning ducks for the table involves a bit of work. But when prepared correctly the table fair rivals anything from a very high end restaurant.
Not long after we shot those ducks a young gent came paddling his duck skiff from way back in the small pockets off the channel. His lab standing proudly in the front of the skiff telling a tale played out on duck marshes for generations.
“I love hunting out of my skiff,” I said to Clyde.
“More than this boat blind and the high backed chairs?” he asked.
“I think it’s the image of them paddling by with the fall colors back dropping them and the sun shining on the lab’s coat,” I said. “I need to get another retriever.”
“I thought Lori wanted to wait a while for another dog?” he said.
“Well Clyde it’s like this, either I get another retriever or she’s going to have to come out here and fetch the ducks.”
“I’d really like to see you tell her that,” he responded.
“I bet you would,” I said. Seeing young hunters in their 20’s showing the gumption to paddle three miles to hunt ducks from a skiff warms my heart. The image he and his dog reminded me of a Redlin print. Just he and his dog out enjoying the hunt, the outdoors, the pursuit of adventure. Every duck hunt on water creates adventure.
It felt good to be duck hunting and sitting over a spread of decoys. If a fetcher pup shows up in a year or so, I survived the conversation.
Please remember this October that Safe Hunting is No Accident!
Through a
Decoy’s
E
ye
