GF's first Waterfowl Season

[Bobb-o]

So last year Brittany got into upland bird hunting. She loved hunting grouse and pheasant (even though she didnt shoot a pheasant in last year's down season). Last November while we were out walking the dogs in the field behind our place she was able to watch a couple goose hunters drop some birds out of the sky, and she immediately said, "I want to do that!!" So we got her all geared up this summer so she would be ready come early goose and duck opener. I even talked her into going to the DU banquet in Crosby where she won a print of the 2012 federal stamp. After winning the print, she made it her goal to shoot the perfect drake woodie to put on the wall. My goal, as it has been for every duck season, was to shoot a drake pintail.

Early goose was a strikeout for us, as the field we got permission to hunt wasn't harvested until the second weekend of duck season. But opening weekend of duck season was spectacular! Opening morning we were set up on a small river flowing into the Mississippi near Brainerd with a few dekes out. Before it was shooting time you could hear wings whistling past us. Being as it had been a few years since I had last duck hunted, i did not shoot well. As far as Brittany's shooting went, well it was non-existent. She was so in awe of the birds dumping into the decoys and flashing in front of us that she maybe took 3 shots all morning.

The next morning we went out with Jesse to the same spot, but relocated to a better shooting position so that the birds were coming at us instead of crossing in front of us. We got a few birds out of that spot before they stopped flying for the morning with the bluebird skies. We decided to go hit another pond not far away that a neighbor who only grouse hunts told me aboot. It was quite the bushwack back into it, but wow, was it worth it! We jumped close to 50 birds off the pond initially, and they kept coming back in waves.

The Pond

One tired dog and owner with their first ducks

It took a while with dogs that are used to jumping birds, but we finally got them to stay still and watch the skies

Next weekend we were very anxious to hit our new found pond again. We were up at the cabin to help my parents build their new shed, so we told them we would be back by 1 to help. We headed down aboot an hour before shooting time to get settled in. With the difficult path in we didnt bother bringing any decoys with as most of the birds who came in to the area wanted to land in the open water. In fact we had a couple teal and hen wood ducks land on the pond from directions we were not expecting, including a few that tried to land over the tops of the dogs as they were retrieving previous birds on the top of the floating bog. One of the most surprising things aboot this duck season was the amount of woodcock we saw, I even was able to shoot a snipe that attacked me (If you dont believe it attacked me, ask Adam Johnson, we was a witness!!) After one retrieve the younger pooch also showed the importance of cleaning your equipment so as not to spread invasives...

That same weekend Britt got pretty mad at me as I was able to shoot the woodie she had been after all season. We decided to jump shoot the one morning, which included hiking through some nasty dump to get back to the backwater at the cabin. We were approaching the stream that flowed in between the backwater and the lake when two drake woodies got up. Brittany looked at me and whispered, "Those are drake woodies" I already had my gun up and fired a shot at the one on the left. It went down, and I looked at her waiting for her to shoot, but she merely said, "How did you hit that?" We sent both dogs in after the bird on a blind retrieve, but neither could find it right away. We hoofed it around and across a beaver dam to try and get closer to where the bird fell and tried resending the dogs on a blind retrieve. When they came back with nothing, I was more than a little peaved, but sent them on a slightly different track. That was when I looked down and watched this duck waddle past in the weeds aboot 20 yards away. I could tell it was a gorgeous drake woodie so I fired a shot a little above his head to get the dogs to come back. After a few tense moments, one of the dogs came back with the duck in mint condition. He didnt even have a mark on him and actually was looking at me as the dog was bringing him to me. I still don't know what caused that bird to fall, but he is going on the wall. He had the longest mullet I have ever seen on a drake woodie (over 3.5"long)!

As we were hiking back across the beaver dam (Brittany fuming at me the whole way because I shot the bird she wanted), We stumbled upon a great piece of drift wood that I though would be the perfect mount piece. It was a 2-pronged piece, and I was able to console her to the fact that I would put my bird on it for now, and when she got hers we could add it later. To which she replied, "Even if I get that drake pintail you want?" My immediate thought was, sure, you try and get the bird I have been after for years...

She did get a few drake wood ducks, but never quite the ones that could really go on the wall, including one hen wood duck that she literally put a hole through (That was the last time we let her use a super full choke)

One of the most recent weekends (pheasant opener actually) involved Brittany horse-sitting for a couple around Battle Lake. We hit the first spot we planned on hunting only to see two pickups of pheasant hunters getting ready to go into the WPA. We let them have the spot and were halfway to our next spot when I slammed on the brakes in the middle of the highway. I had seen a random dog walking the ditch-line! We backed up to her and she quickly came over to us. As far as we could tell the nearest hunters were over 3 miles away and the dog had no collar or identification on her. We coaxed her into the back of my truck (instead of the cab cuz she smelled like she had rolled in something) and brought her to the vet in town. They scanned her for a chip but found nothing. She had obviously had an owner previously as she loved people, other dogs, and especially treats. We took the day off from hunting and drove around to all the farms in the area, but no one recognized her. So we brought her back to the place were staying at and got her cleaned up. She had obviously been out in the wild for a few weeks judging by the amount of burs and ticks on her, and she was malnourished. We fed her a little bit at a time and got ahold of a lot of people in the area, but it quickly became apparent that someone had just dumped her. As much of a sweetheart as she was I couldnt stand to just drop her off at the Humane Society to be euthanized, so we brought her home with us until we could find her a good home. She wasn't gunshy at all, but didnt really have the ambition to hunt. In fact we took her out the next day with us jump shooting ducks and she would follow by your side and wag her tail everytime we shot. A little training was all she needed. Withing 4 days of having her at our place I was able to get her to retrieve tennis balls to hand, and if we could have more than two dogs I would have kept her. But we were able to find her a new home with one of Brittany's friends.

All in all a good season so for for the newbie, Can't wait to get her on a good diver hunt late season!!

[dan z]

Great story!

[Shane Z]

Great story! Nothing better than getting someone into the sport and enjoying just as much as you! Thanks for sharing!