the spank
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Planet Earth Wearing My Tinfoil Hat
Got out Saturday morning with Chad, Paul and two guests. One fellow was a guy Chad worked with a few years ago and Chad decided to give him a call to join us to return the favor for him having had Chad over to a field in his area for a hunt last week. Though they got skunked they had a good time and said they would get together again before the season was out. Our other guest was a local Amish farmer and landowner of property we often hunt.
Chad called me friday night to say he had found birds, both ducks and geese. He estimated about 150 geese and 250 ducks were using the 40 acre grain field. We met at 6 am in the field and set up with high hopes of slaying some ducks in conjunction with some geese. This was the first field shoot we had found in our area in two weeks. The warm temps had the few birds that were around very hard to pattern and we just werent having any luck at finding a spot that held them for more than a day.
The lights came on and with predictions of rain all day with high winds we weren't looking forward to the soaking but it sure felt good to be in the layouts again. Dawn came slowly with the overcast and we patiently waited for the first birds to appear. We thought at first light we would be melting our gun barrels on flocks of ducks pouring in but the ducks never came.? Neither did the rain!!
A while later the first geese appeared on the horizon. A flock of 10. They came in beautifully and committed feet down to the decoys. At the call 7 went down and stayed put. Three got a free pass or so they thought. We got on the calls to plead them back around and sure enough after a few wide swings they came in low on the back side and Chad rose up and dumped the closest bird(20 yards) as the other two booked out. Next came a flock of that 4 that tried to land on the far right side of the spread. They were perfect for our two guests. Paul and our two guests opened up dropping two as the other two tried to book out. Chad and I got on the calls hard and a minute or so later one slipped in on the backside of Chad. He spun around and hammered it hard. The other one took off and again we tried to plead it back. After a minute of circling out 200-300 yards in all directions Chad gave up calling at it but I continued to and laid on a HARD RASPY screaming train.
The bird wheeled around almost instantly and from 200 yards straight out came in 6 feet above the ground all the way while I continued to wail away til I was blue in the face. It set up to land with the farthest decoy, about 30 yards out and I took it down clean with a load of #3's through my IC choke.
We had other birds work us and we collected two more for the morning. We passed up some good range overhead and passing shots to try to work them in for our guests and ourselves too( we love em feet down!) and easily could have collected a limit but we have shot plenty for the season and wanted to finish them before we finished them off! :rof: We had a pair of ducks work into us, a black and a drake mallard. Chad took down the black while Dave folded the drake mallard as it slid past him. Things then got quiet........
So we packed it in, said goodbye to our guests, happy as clams but who seemed to be in shock from having seen us call birds back around after being shot at( at least I was asked how to do that a few times...) and we headed for breakfast in town at the local greasy spoon.
Before departing we told our guests to help themselves to as many birds as they wanted and they took them all! They said they hadn't done very well so far and since we have been having our best year ever we were happy to see them make good use of the birds. It was kind of nice not having a pile to clean for a change!
Chad called me friday night to say he had found birds, both ducks and geese. He estimated about 150 geese and 250 ducks were using the 40 acre grain field. We met at 6 am in the field and set up with high hopes of slaying some ducks in conjunction with some geese. This was the first field shoot we had found in our area in two weeks. The warm temps had the few birds that were around very hard to pattern and we just werent having any luck at finding a spot that held them for more than a day.
The lights came on and with predictions of rain all day with high winds we weren't looking forward to the soaking but it sure felt good to be in the layouts again. Dawn came slowly with the overcast and we patiently waited for the first birds to appear. We thought at first light we would be melting our gun barrels on flocks of ducks pouring in but the ducks never came.? Neither did the rain!!
A while later the first geese appeared on the horizon. A flock of 10. They came in beautifully and committed feet down to the decoys. At the call 7 went down and stayed put. Three got a free pass or so they thought. We got on the calls to plead them back around and sure enough after a few wide swings they came in low on the back side and Chad rose up and dumped the closest bird(20 yards) as the other two booked out. Next came a flock of that 4 that tried to land on the far right side of the spread. They were perfect for our two guests. Paul and our two guests opened up dropping two as the other two tried to book out. Chad and I got on the calls hard and a minute or so later one slipped in on the backside of Chad. He spun around and hammered it hard. The other one took off and again we tried to plead it back. After a minute of circling out 200-300 yards in all directions Chad gave up calling at it but I continued to and laid on a HARD RASPY screaming train.
The bird wheeled around almost instantly and from 200 yards straight out came in 6 feet above the ground all the way while I continued to wail away til I was blue in the face. It set up to land with the farthest decoy, about 30 yards out and I took it down clean with a load of #3's through my IC choke.
We had other birds work us and we collected two more for the morning. We passed up some good range overhead and passing shots to try to work them in for our guests and ourselves too( we love em feet down!) and easily could have collected a limit but we have shot plenty for the season and wanted to finish them before we finished them off! :rof: We had a pair of ducks work into us, a black and a drake mallard. Chad took down the black while Dave folded the drake mallard as it slid past him. Things then got quiet........
So we packed it in, said goodbye to our guests, happy as clams but who seemed to be in shock from having seen us call birds back around after being shot at( at least I was asked how to do that a few times...
) and we headed for breakfast in town at the local greasy spoon.Before departing we told our guests to help themselves to as many birds as they wanted and they took them all! They said they hadn't done very well so far and since we have been having our best year ever we were happy to see them make good use of the birds. It was kind of nice not having a pile to clean for a change!
