Happy Thanksgiving!

Today is a day that our founders set aside to give thanks for our great nation to our Creator. It may be my favorite holiday. It is often overlooked by Christmas. I like it because you just eat and spend time with family and friends. No gifts required. Be sure to take time to thank God for sending his son Jesus to earth. I know that we celebrate this at Christmas, but do it today. We are the most free and blessed nation on earth because of the relationship our forefathers had with God.

On with the hunt. This morning Longeared Mule and Sadie took me on another hunt. I shot a mallard that got away. The duck either swam away or vanished into thin air. I hate losing any duck, but losing a mallard seems worse. We had a good time, but I forgot my camera so there are no pictures of ducks.

Since there are no duck or dog pictures, I will attach a picture of my littlest Turkey. Enjoy!

Sadie.....

on the perch!!!!

Mallards

This morning started by making a 12 cup to the max pot of coffee followed by a trip to the Bojangle's drive-thru. Longeared Mule, Sadie and I got together for our second hunt of the week. We decided to eat, drink and hang out in the swamp for a while today. Our coffee was not measured. The ground jewels were just dumped. Our brew was strong enough to smack someone named shovel face in the face. Duck hunting is a lot more enjoyable when you don't have to leave the swamp at 7:30 am. There were plenty of woodies, teal and mallards before legal shooting time. They flew around and taunted us while we couldn't shoot and mostly disappeared when we could. We got buzzed a few times and didn't react quickly enough. Around 6:50 am, when we had relaxed in the blind and started to talk about things other than hunting, a pair of mallards landed about 35 yards behind us. We whispered "mallards" and hunkered down. Zorbacon on the right, Longeared Mule on the left, we counted to 3 and shot each bird on our respective side. We both hit our targets. With one clean up shot and 2 great retrieves by Sadie, we had a pair of mallards in our blind. There was one drake and one hen. We could not have done it without Sadie. The ducks landed on the creek within the swamp where the water is well over our heads. In the words of my eldest son's favorite television show, Thomas the Tank Engine, Gordon the big blue engine says "job done, job done"!!!!!!

Weekday hunt.....

This morning Longeared Mule, Sadie and I embarked on a quick weekday hunt. We met at our hunting location at 5:45. The walk to the blind included a hyper active puppy and the sound of a lot of ducks. Once we were able to shoot, there were plenty of ducks in our vicinty. We saw mallards, wood ducks and greenwinged teal. Our first opportunity to shoot included a misfired shell and some poor shooting. 2 woodies passed right over us and flew safely away. I emptied my gun. About 20 minutes later, several teal landed in front of us. We could see the ducks, but there was alot of growth between us and the birds. I attempted a shot off of the water and missed. Nothing makes you feel useless like missing a duck sitting on the water in front of you. For some reason, the ducks flew right at us after the missed shot. Both birds were taken down cleanly and Sadie the 8.5 month old puppy retrieved both of them beautifully! She did very well for such a young dog. Zorbacon redeemed himself. Sadie is the one below with the scary eyes. Zorbacon is the guy with the really pale face.

The Return of Duck Season

Over the last year I have been seeing lots of wood ducks and a few mallards using the pond on my family farm. Since all of my friends were deer hunting Saturday morning, I decided to try it out. I arrived to the farm around 6am. Legal shooting time in my location was 6:16 am. I camoflauged myself against a cow pasture fence that was covered in weeds. It is the perfect cover since it is on the side of the pond that the ducks usually use to land. At approximately 6:28 am a single drake wood duck flew in from behind my location and landed 20-25 yards directly in front of me. I waited about 5 seconds to see if any more were coming. Nothing happened. I cleanly cut him off of the water and that was the end of the hunt. I was quite pleased to have success on my first ever duck hunt on my family farm.

After the hunt I cleaned this fine specimen and had a fine little helper.

This duck did not go to waste. His breast and thigh meat were marinated, wrapped in bacon and on the grill by 2 pm.

It was a good day.