How did y'all do?

[muzzy]

Pretty disappointing opener for us. No birds at all. Could have had many shots before shooting hours. The bluebird weather didn't help much at all either . Hunting the Crosslake area. Very few flocks flying around. I don't know if there aren't a lot of ducks or if there were few hunters kickin' them up. Mostly woodies and absolutely no teal. Many geese flying very high as well. Would have been a nice day of fishing! Tomorrow should be better. Good luck to all

Muzzy

[icecold]

Took my son out for his first ever opener, we got 6 total ,3 woodies 1 mallard and 2 teal. lots flying in southern minnesota.We had real good shooting from 9 to 11.30 then it was like every thing went up about a 1000 feet, could get anything to come in, packed up and went home.

[fishhawk1750]

All and all it was a good opener. We saw a few, nailed a few and missed a lot.

[eyepatrol]

Typical slow opener for us again this year. 2 gadwells and that was it. Saw more ducks this year than last, especially BWT, and the geese were in full force as usual.

It's funny but frustrating at the same time to listen to other guys on the lake call at geese. These guys must take the biggest, deepest breath they can, as if they were going to dive 100' deep without a tank, then blow the same pitched note over and over and over at such a rapid pace. Scares every goose right off the lake. If people would just listen to the sounds geese make, you'd think they wouldn't be calling like that. Funny thing is....2 geese were come our way high....I blew a few calls at them, they locked their wings and sailed all the way into these other guys who didn't even make a peep with their calls. That tells ya something doesn't it!

Tomorrow should be a little better, although I'm waring my camo t-shirt instead of camo long sleeve flannel!

[slopmaster]

we ended up with a total of 3 ducks. 2 blue wing teal and a female redhead. saw a lot of birds flying around but they were mostly high and didnt want to decoy. Still nice to get out there and hope for a better day tommarow.

[Esoxmn]

One drake mallards and two Gadwall, I watched a few hundred fly over before i put the decoys out so tommorow should be good. I should of got four, but i seem to have forgot how to shoot!!

[HunterLee]

Got 2 honkers and no ducks. Pond was loaded with ducks not to long ago, but that little cold snap sent those to you boys down south. Was nice to get to shoot again though. Midweek i get to go out and really hunt, i've been lucky enough to work all openers so far this year.

[Riverratpete]

WOW is all I can say....Took my son out for his first opener. They weren't kinding when they said the rice crop was good and water levels low..pretty tough getting around but man were the birds in there..never threw out 1 decoy, canned 2 right away then put my gun down and just worked on helping my son bag one..must went through almost a box, all pass shooting from all directions for about an hour. Best opener I've had in many years.

[kc0myy]

I had flock after flock of geese come in. Flying low to I would of had my 2 honkers if I knew how to shoot. I got 2 wood ducks. The drake of so nice looking big and colorful. I felt bad for shooting it.

[tearin' lips]

Basscatcher, Got to agree with you on the calling thing. There are so many hunters out there who do not know how to blow a call, much less blow it correctly. Please, nobody take offense to this, because I know there are some great callers out there too.

When my buddy, Laker Taker and I were out on the second day of early goose, we had guys set up about two to three hundred yards north of us. When the geese would come withing a mile these guys(eight of them by the way) would lite up and start calling. They described the same guys that you did basscatcher, they took a deep breath and started in on the high pitched fast calling. The local birds didn't even have to think twice, they knew something was up and flared far before they even came close to their spread. In the same respect, because they were calling like this, and they set up close to where we were setup, they scared away birds that we could have easily decoyed.

Anyhow, just my two cents as usual!

Take Care everyone, good hunting. I am heading out right now, so you guys will have a report to look forward to tomorrow evening!

[Gordie]

My long time hunting partner backed out at the trip to lake traverse on the last moment and not having a DL I decided to take my son out to the lake we live on and had birds every where up until 9:00 then nothing after a bout an hour a loan woodie came sailing in and I told my son to take it and he did. it was his first duck ever and I could not be prouder. On sunday we got 7 one mallard 4 woodies and 2 teal and Joey my son got three and I got four . I know that this isnt a fishing forum but we also caught 9 walleyes on saturday cast and blast weekend it was awesome.

[No_Net]

Total of 18 ducks and 2 geese for 4 guys. 7 mallards 7 teal and 4 gadwalls. Seen a lot of ducks compared to last year. tons of geese flying around. Every thing was pretty high up. It was a pretty fun weekand and, felt good to be back in the duck blind

[carpshooterdeluxe]

took two first timers out on saturday morning; made the wrong decision about where to set up; passed up an un-occupied w.m.a. to go to a private slough on family land...well that was a dumb idea. no ducks all morning and tons of shooting from the w.m.a. near by that we should have been at. ended up walking a few drainage ditches and got a few woodies. today (sunday) was much better. after finding another wildlife area that nobody had occupied after around 11 am on saturday we watched it last night till dark and saw blue wings and mallards pouring in right at dark. so the decision was made to go there this morning and we ended up limiting out on blue wings by 7:45 am. not to be one to go home and go back to bed; i quickly drove back to the home farm and snatched up the finishers and bigfoots and hauled @ss back to a cornfield near a small lake. we got our 6 geese by 10 this morning and ended up watching another 200-300 geese feed and fly around us for over an hour before we threw corn cobs at them to spook them off. all in all great opener and the best part is that everybody i ran into that was out hunting also had mostly good things to say. btw we were hunting south of morris.

[ironman]

Very dissapointing for me. Sat started out bad, being a couple of hunters were blocking the landing to the slough and had no intention of moving. So I donned the waders and made the best of it. 1 mallard, 1 woodie. To top things off they were skybusters to boot. today..same lake..same people, at least they didn't block the landing this time. Didn't get there till after the sun came up...had a gig last night wow was I tired. Anyways..one of those days...I'd be looking one way..they would come from the other, no birds flying..go fix the decoys one takes on water and flops to the side, sure enough here they come. Oh well it was nice to be out..too nice actually. Duck hunting and sweating do not go together well. Here's hoping next weekend bodes better, gonna try some new spots...maybe even take a trip up nort.

[JEV]

Not a bad opening weekend for us. Four guys on Saturday and ended up bagging 12 Mallards and 3 geese. Two of us went out again today and ended up with 6 mallards and two teal by 9:30. We also picked up two geese and were off the water by noon. It wasn't great but we sure can't complain.

JEV

[eyepatrol]

Much better day today. Dad missed a nice goose right away in the morning, maybe 25 yards out. We took advantage of the opportunities today though. We ended up with 1 goose (dad redeemed himself), 2 mallards, 1 woodie and 9 bwt between me, my dad and my brother. Limited on ducks by 8:10am and stuck it out until 10:00am to see if we could pick up any more geese, but didn't.

This was the first time in 7-10 years that we actually got a limit of ducks on either of the days of opening weekend. I was impressed with the numbers around. Though the numbers weren't great, they were certainly up from the past several years. It was a lot of fun.

[wyldewal]

Elwood, Congradulate your son on his first duck. And good job to you for getting another one hooked. I know exactly how proud you are, my son got his first duck this year too.

[ChuckN]

I can say it was the best opener I've ever seen.

Scouted some of my choice spots during the week to not find many ducks. A last ditch effort Friday evening we found the birds, and in big numbers.

The most mallards and ringbills I have ever seen. Geese were in good numbers also. For the first time we limited on a mix bag of mallards, ringbills, teal and one goose.

Returned Sunday and the first hour was good, but my shooting not so good. Ducks flew in/out all day, but stuck the main lake after the sun rose.

[orangestew]

4 of us shot our limit both days. Saturday took a little longer than we would have liked I think we were out until 1:00. Sunday we shot limit by 8:00. Got a quite a mixed bag of mallards, blue and green wing teal, gadwalls, redheads, and spoonbills.

[Rugbyguy]

Went out Duck Hunting for the 1st time yesterday for opener. I can say for sure that I will be back out.

[ironman]

I'm sure somebody will bring this up, so I may as well be him. I'm pretty sure that party hunting for ducks is a no no. By that I mean you not suppose to fill other people's limit. Personally on the ethics side of it..I'm not bothered...between two people 8 ducks were harvested no matter what...but dems da rules. Get ready for backlash.

[pathogen]

Decided to wait on the ducks for a week or two, still have goose hunting in the blood. Three of us picked a harvested soybean field at random, set up our spread and hid in a line fence. I don't know if we necessarily blow the same note over and over as a couple of guys described but we do like to put as many notes in the air as possible until we have the bird's attention, then just throw out a random honk here and there til they lock up--then we go silent. Worked for us today anyway, had six by 10 AM. We were in the Elbow Lake area, and did see several flocks of lessers although we didn't get any of that variety.

[Mark Christianson]

Good opener, but also a great opener.

First year since I started duck hunting that it was only 2 guys hunting. Me and my buddy, Brandon this year. My 9 year old son.

More ducks moving around than last year I would say.

Bad luck on set up locations both days. Or just something not right with the spreads. I don't know.

Saturday, we got 4 BWT. The only 4 ducks that came near us. We watched several small bunches dive and drop in the bay to the east of us. Quite frustrating to have them swing for a look on the dekes and sit elsewhere. But not surprising, since there were plenty of ducks that landed over there earlier, to create a natural draw for other birds.

Today I was thinking that the early morning would provide a typical good shoot early. Really hoping for my sons sake. Nope. Actually fewer birds showed up today than yesterday. We set up on the bay that seemed to draw the birds yesterday, but we only had one flock of 6 ringnecks come in, and a loner ringneck. That was it.

What made the weekend absolutely great was that Brandon took his first shot at a flying duck today(a rocket ringneck), and he dropped it with his single shot 20 gauge.

I dropped 2 out of the flock of 6 and looked over the dekes and there was a bird laying on his side of the dekes. I asked Brandon in a rather surprised voice, "Did you shoot that duck??" I knew he did, because I sure as he** didnt shoot at anything on that side. He went into a long description of how it almost sat down, then when I shot it turned to the right, and he put a lead on it, bla bla bla... Wow! Wow! The dang kid shot a ringneck on the fly. First flyin' duck taken for him.

I feel bad in a way that he was only able to shoot a handful of times total on both days, but I really think he had a blast. If only the boy could see the ducks we had to shoot at 10+ years ago. The great thing is he appreciated what he saw anyway! It's a little hard for me to sit there with Brandon for 2 days with such limited shooting compared to not so many years ago. But you know what? Brandon had fun, and doesn't know any different. He had a good time, and so did I.

[FarByondDrivn]

Good to see the kids are doing some shooting! Our opener echoed a lot of what some guys are saying. Saw a ton of ducks until about 8:30 then the skies were empty. I did manage a few misses (5) before having to go to work. Topped the day off by getting stuck on the launch on the way out. My four wheel drive conked out on me. Shared our lake with a few groups. The group we met were real nice guys and even offered to help pull the vehicle out when they got of the lake. Don't know if their on this site but I will say it again. Thanks!

[tearin' lips]

I thought that I had a good thing going with the spot that I scouted. I knew that it was going to get hunted as it was public land, but I never would have thought someone would have hunted the exact spot that I was planning on hunting. Got there this morning and the shore and water was littered with empty shells. Oh well thats the way it goes I guess, at least someone had a great shoot.

Anyhow to make a long story short I didn't see anything in that spot and moved later on in the day to prospect another spot for later this week. I found the ducks broken up in nearby waters, but no geese to be seen. I set up for a pass shoot on a natural funnel for the evening and scratched two, but I think that this will be an awesome morning spot. Only one way to tell and that is to get there in the morning. Looking to get out there mid-week and give it a shot.

All in all, not too bad of a sunday for not being familiar with the Duluth area and its hunting possibilities. I am heading back up to the I. Falls this weekend, where I know I will have a phenomenal shoot.

Take Care Guys and Shoot Straight!