Goldeneye, a newcomer!

Buckeye Lake duck season has been a strange one indeed! If the three day diver hunt in early November isn't weird enough, no mallards around Christmas is unspeakable. To add to the oddity of our season we have now bagged 3 species of birds that we have Never harvested on our lake and 2 beautifully plumed birds of species that we have not had the pleasure of holding in full stately attire. 

The latest of these is a very handsome drake goldeneye. Now we have shot goldeneye before, but never on Buckeye lake. I am not sure why. There is no rhyme or reason to their absence or their sudden appearance for that matter! 

Last January on Alum Creek (north of Columbus) there were loads of the whistling divers, but none on Buckeye. In any event, the "ice has been broken". The first goldeneye any of us has bagged on Buckeye is in the boat! 

Drake Goldeneye

Dr

Trophy Birds from “The Trophy Boat”

The opening day of the south zone in Ohio came in with a bang! We had a great day! Good shooting and good friends is an unbeatable combination! According to Dan the Mojo Man,” the only thing worse than having a bad day in a duck boat is not being in a duck boat!”

We have had a good year duck hunting thus far, and this weekend was NO exception! The day started a little rough. Randy spent the night sleeping in his boat in order to save the spot we wanted. Dan G. and I came later. Randy had 45 decoys out and 5 mojo stands. Dan and I arrived with another 50 fakes and 4 more mojo stands. Setting all that up made us 11 minutes late setting up for shooting time.  We may have been on time if I didn’t have to drive through freezing drizzle to get there. I nearly slid off the road at one point.  What a duck hunter won’t do!

The skies were dark and gray and the stiff breeze was at our back as planned. It was 7:25, but it was unusually dark. The freezing drizzle stopped, but I am not sure we would have noticed. We were at full alert, scanning the skies for the black dots that race across the sky and listening intently for wing beats, quacks or anything which says DUCKS! Our olfactory senses were filled with stench from the bog behind us. It didn’t matter because Gunner was the only one who can smell ducks anyway!

Out of nowhere a big greenhead appeared cupped up and sailed straight into the space left in the blocks for our feathery friends to land, or at least try. Dan missed and his gun jammed (it happens). One bark from my Benelli and he landed abruptly with a splash! Gunner got so excited he whined and howled at the same time. Then he launched himself ten feet from the boat like a torpedo. He was on a mission! Five minutes later Randy saw a dark feather encrusted animal flying high. One round of high balls from his Haydel call and the duck squeezed his wings and dropped from the sky. A few feeding chuckles later a beautiful black duck was lined up for the harvest! One shot and Dan made up for the first attempt. Moments later Gunner reentered the boat using his WAG Boarding Steps ladder with a gorgeous black duck. After Randy and I hailed at the next two flocks of birds, a single mallard finally accepted our invitation. I sounded the feeding chuckle while Randy sat at the ready. It was Randy’s turn and he did not disappoint. One bark from the SBE and we each had a puddle duck.

Dan had to leave with his black duck at 10:30. Randy and I proceeded to fill our limit of mallards. Dan the Mojo Man invited us over with him. They finished their limit of mallards and had birds pouring in. It is great to have friends. He and John are great guys, and we are blessed to have them as friends!

As great as the duck hunting was, it was not the highlight of the trip. The highlight was Randy’s snow goose! We had a beautiful mature snow goose fly into the Canada fakes. Randy made the shot, and he became the proud owner of his first snow goose! A trophy for us in Ohio! It was as white as snow, a beautiful bird.

On the second day the sky was not a full of waterfowl as the first day. We had our blocks and flappers out on time, and we did have three singles lock up and coast in. As usual we took turns shooting and each member of our band scored on their rotation. Matt saved the spot for us, so he put the hammer down on a nice drake gadwall. I was up next. A big majestic drake mallard tried to land outside the decoys. He did, but upside down! As I reached for more shells, Randy said hello to a duck that I never saw coming. When I looked up all I saw was a duck on his back and a very white belly. It was a beautiful drake pintail!

Earlier this season Randy shot a beautifully plumed drake bufflehead. The lucky stiff then shot the snow and a sprig! For this reason, Matt anointed my boat as “The Trophy Boat”! 

A Gentlemen's Hunt

I was sitting in the living room half watching TV on a Friday night. I was listening to the rain pounding on the glass of the French doors. I was supposed to be going deer hunting in the morning, but that was going to be miserable in the cold rain. Being a waterfowl hunter, I am no stranger to either cold or rain, but deer hunting requires you to be still as a statue for extended periods of time. Not fun in that weather!

 As my wife flipped the channel to the latest Hallmark movie, I noticed that I received a text.  "Now who could that be?", I wondered. It was my buddy Dan who lives in Lewis Center. He inquired, "What are you doing tomorrow?" Immediately I remembered that the north zone was in, and Dan lives in the north zone! Oh yes! I love to hunt ducks and I now have a good reason NOT to sit in that tree stand in the rain!

I made arrangements to meet Randy at the Park-N-Ride at 5:20. That meant I would have to get up at 4:00. We agreed to rendezvous at Dan's house at 6:15 and leave at 6:30. Right away I realized we could not get to the lake by shooting time. Dan said that we would arrive there about 7:45 and be set up around 9:00. It was a "gentleman's hunt!"

 I knew that Dan did these "gentleman's hunts” as he calls them, but I have never been a participant. I like to be there ready to go before sun-up, so as to catch the early fliers. It is a well-documented fact however that mallards like to come back from the fields in the mid-morning hours to get a drink. We call it the 10:00 flight.

It was fine. I was with friends, and I love spending time with good friends in a duck boat! My friend Dan is known for having plenty of Mojo’s in his spread of blocks. Some guys call him the Mojo Man! We put 7 full sized Mojo’s out that day. Along with the motorized flappers, Dan brought a boat load of size 72 Restle Mallard decoys. I have 24 size 72 Herter’s myself. They float so nice in the choppy water. It really makes a difference. I tried to count them a couple of times on the hunt. I will guess that we had 55 big blocks out and another 16 nice looking plastic geese. A nice arrangement of those beauties made our spread look REAL!  He had a plastic duck decoy that he found that he named “Black Jack”. He went out last.

We were there about 20 minutes before we saw our first ducks. They cupped up and turned west. We watched them cut the north wind and drop right down in front of a McDonald’s on the lake shore.  Dan blurted out, “Those ducks want French fries.” Shortly before 10:00 we had a pair lock up and coming right at us. We hunkered down behind his Avery Quickset blind and Dan said, “get ready.” The birds were about 45 yards out when they flared. Dan send, “take ’em!” Well, we tried but in spite of all the barking of our 12 gauge loads, we did not scratch a single feather. We laughed at each other and reloaded the guns.

Shortly thereafter, we had a single work us and fly off. Dan told Randy that it could have landed on the other side of the island to which we were tied. Randy decided to get out of the boat and walk to the other side. After he got to the other side, we had 8 mallards work us. Regardless of how much sweet music Dan and I played our duck calls, they just circled and circled. “ Quaaaak Quaaak Quaack Quack  Quack! Tickit tickit tickit tickit tickit! We hardly had time to sit back from our disappointment when a pair of puddlers appeared out of nowhere, cupped up and dropping fast! At 25 yards Dan gave the command and we each dropped one with a splash. Dan’s black Lab followed their splash with a belly smacker of his own as he launch from the bow. High fives all around!

Around noon Dan got out his camp stove and heated up a pot of  “Mac-N-Chilli”. We had a hot lunch which was all a part of the “gentlemen’s hunt”. The smell of the chilli was about to drive me crazy! Needless to say, it didn’t last long! It was 35 degrees and we had a 25 mph wind at our back. My toes were a little cold and I had a slight shiver. That hot chilli (complete with Tobasco sauce) warmed us right up!

We saw ducks fairly consistently and bagged 3 more by 2:00.  At 4:00 the “gentleman’s hunt” was over, and we were off the water before it was completely dark! I don’t know how many times I will initiate the gentlemen’s hunt guidelines, but it was fun. When I retire, if I want to hunt every day during the week, it might be the way to go!