Things to remember

Earl Denison made Reelfoot Lake Duck Calls. I have one. Back when I had no money, every now and then I would treat myself to a little something special.  The call actually doesn't sound so great as far as I am concerned, so maybe just a little piece of history.

Glynn Scobey hand painted art on his calls, Kevin's first call. Another collector piece that doesn't sound so great to me.  Typical.

Chick Majors Dixie Mallard Call, Mike's first call.  He had the pet Mallard hen named Susie that started all the Mississippi Flyway hunters calling Mallard hens "Susies".  This call is fantastic. Very small hole through the barrel makes it the easiest blowing call I have ever used.  A great call all around.  One out of 3, as far as calls from famous carvers.

Victor Glodo was a duck call maker.  George Herter sort of stole the man's name and marketed the "Vit Glodo" duck call. George Herter pretty much copied every good hunting/fishing product and marketed them under slightly different names. Don't know how he didn't get hammered for patent infringement. When the Styrofoam body Model 63 Herter's decoys first came out, they had heads that were left over from the Model 51 decoys.  I have a pair of the 51/63 Canvasbacks.  Our duck boat for 43 years was the 16' Herters Model Yukon. Their decoys revolutionized modern duck hunting.  Wish I had kept a few more of them as keepsakes, at least I have a pair of Model 63 Canvasbacks that were from the first dozen I ever purchased myself.  I have given some to my sons. Even though they haven't ever hunted over them, they are nice family collectables.

Victor Animal Trap Company made great paper mache decoys.  Or at least the best I ever hunted over. Ariduk, made by General Fiber, were very good as well.

Marbles  Corporation used the logo "Life in the Open". Their most famous products were knives, axes, compasses and peep sights.  Out of production for a half century or more, those products are still highly sought after.  Not only as collectables, but as working tools. Glad I was able to replace the one I lost 50 years ago.

MEC 250 from Mayville Engineering Company was our first shotgun shell reloading press.  Surprisingly enough, my Father let me do some experimenting around with different charge bars for our old MEC.  Using some crude methods, I was able to come up with some really good hunting loads. Then a quirk of fate pushed us to the best load I ever hunted with. I started with an old charge bar that Dad didn't use anymore. Measured the amount of shot and powder that it dropped and patterned the shells. Then I used a rat tail file to open up the bar and weighed exactly how much I filed away, then back to the patterning board.  When I finally got to the point where the pattern was blown apart by too big of a powder charge, I went back to another old bar and filed it out just slightly less. So I was very close to the maximum load. Didn't even blow a gun up or anything :-) The charge bar I worked on so much would throw 1 5/16 oz of number 4's or 1 7/16 oz of 6's.  Those loads worked very well, until the only shot we could find one season was #5's. We ran that through the bar,  and got 1 3/8 oz. Sitting on top of a AA Red wad and 29 grains of  Herco, in a AA hull, the world famous Herco 5's were born. A perfect pattern through a Remington Full choked barrel and chronographed at 1300 FPS. That was all we shot on ducks for close to 30 years.

Fred Kimble was a Mississippi River market hunter. Invented the modern clay target, called them Peoria Blackbirds. His favorite duck load was "St Louis 3's".  Given credit for inventing shotgun chokes.

Captain Bogardus ran an ad in the Chicago Tribune, challenging anyone in the world to compete with him as the best wingshot in the world.   They shot glass balls and flyers.

Gooseville Gunning Club, at  Hatteras Village, was founded by Van Campen Heiler.

A century ago, Blue geese only existed in the Mississippi and Atlantic Flyway.  Snow geese were only in the Pacific flyway. Go figure.

John Olin experimented with and seemingly perfected 3" Magnum shells.  He had Ansley Fox make a "Super Fox" for Nash Buckingham, a friend and noted duck shot. The Super Fox was overbored and choked by a famous barrel maker named Bert Becker. Olin used feedback from Buckingham to perfect his 3" shells. Bo Whoop was the nickname for the first Super Fox, because other hunters claimed the gun made a strange sound when fired. The gun was lost and Fox built Bo Whoop 2 to replace it.  Bo Whoop was found 75 years later and both are in the DU Museum.

Shang Wheeler was a CT market hunter and decoy maker.

Olly - Frederick Oliver Robinson,  Lord Ripon, Gamehog of Dallowgill.  According to his journals he killed 550,000 game birds in his life. Once killed 28 Pheasants in 60 seconds.  On driven shoots he had multiple loaders because he shot so fast.

Old paper shotgun shells were frequently marked on the shell and on the box with the letter "C"  or letter "L".  Many times the letter was in a small circle appearing immediately after the shot size. Heard a lot of self proclaimed experts say that it stood for either Copper shot or Lead shot.  Wrongo!  Just the opposite.  C stood for "chilled" shot which was made in shot towers in the winter months and dropped into cold water to harden the lead.  L stood for "luballoy", which was copper coated lead shot.

Dram = 27.344 grains avoirdupois.  People used to refer to shotgun shell loads as 2 3/4, 3, 4, etc, dram equivalent loads.   But it doesn't match the actual weight of the powder charge.  It means the amount of modern, smokeless powder required to produce the same velocity and gas pressure as a given weight in drams of black powder.   Since nobody these days ever uses the expression,  except the rules committees for Trap, Skeet, and Flyers competition I guess it is OBE.  That's alright, because I know.

Memorable Events

I've had the good fortune to hunt in a variety of locations, and shoot many species of waterfowl.  It has all been wonderful, and I am enormously grateful to have had these opportunities.

Canada, Snow, Blue, Ross', and Whitefront geese in the grain fields of Saskatchewan.

Eider from the granite ledges along the coast of Maine in -44 degree weather.

Mallards on Reelfoot Lake in a snow storm.

Brant on the marshes of Barnegat Bay.

Oldsquaw on the Chesapeake Bay in Gale force winds.

Scoter from a layout boat in the open water of the Pamlico Sound.

Magellan, Ashy Head, and Ruddy Headed Geese in the sunflower fields in Tres Arroyos, Argentina.

Redheads and Pintails from Curtain Blinds at Cape Hatteras.

Big January Red-Legged Blacks Ducks on the Ohio River.

September Blue Wing Teal in the cattail marshes of Indian Lake.

Limits of Ringnecks on the rice filled lakes of Minnesota.

Canada Geese in the cornfields outside Centreville, Maryland.

Black Ducks on the Housatonic River in Connecticut.

Wood Ducks on small, hidden beaver ponds in North Carolina.

Last but not least in the memorable events of my hunting trips was just a simple pass on Bluebills.  My son Kevin, my Labrador Cain, and I were in our old stake blind at Rhodes Point, on the New River.  Six dozen Restle and Herters decoys strung out in a fish hook pattern 30 yards from the blind.  20 minutes before quitting time, a flock of about 5000 Bluebills came flying down the river.  They turned, flew right at us, and LANDED in our decoys.  The sun was setting over my right shoulder, shining brightly on the birds.  The roar of the wind in their wings was deafening, as they banked sharply into the decoys.  Kevin and I did our work.  Cain did his work.  Everybody lived happily ever after, except the last four Bluebills to arrive, who went on to achieve greatness on the grill, drenched in Sweet Baby Rays BBQ sauce.

Old Mister Shitty Pants

       

Back in October I went up to Minnesota to hunt with my oldest hunting partner, Mighty Mike McGee. We had a great shoot.  Killed 150 ducks and geese in a two week hunt.  Rough weather made it a little hard on us, but we just shot our way through the adversity, and had a blast.

Actually, Mike had the biggest blast, and with no hesitation, adopted the new nickname "Old Mister Shitty Pants".

I guess I don't need to go into any further details of his trip to the bushes, while I was killing birds left and right. 

The Rhodes Point Blind

In 1996 we built a duck blind at Hospital Point, on the New River.  Hurricanes Bertha and Fran demolished it.  For the next couple of seasons, we just boat hunted, trying different locations on the river.  After trying out Rhodes Point and having great success on Bluebills, in May 1998 I designed and constructed what I considered to be the most weatherproof blind ever built.  I think that I was pretty close to the mark.  The Rhodes Point Blind weathered through 15 land falling hurricanes since then.  The blind was battered, broken and sometimes submerged for 2-3 days.  But when the tide finally receded, there it stood.

Until the second weekend of September, 2018, when Hurricane Florence roared ashore.  Only a strong category 1 hurricane, but enough to finally destroy the Rhodes Point Blind.  A couple thousand Bluebills had hung from my duck strap, on a hook just inside the door of that blind.  Two great retrievers spent their lives there, sitting, watching impatiently, from the dog porch.  Young hunters learned about shooting and duck hunting.   Great friendships were made.  Lukewarm coffee was consumed by the gallons.

I am an old man now.  There aren't  as many Bluebills around as there used to be, and the limit has been just two birds for the last few years.  My last retriever passed away back in February.  My time is about passed, and I have decided not to  tarnish the memories of the great shoots we had there.  I'm not going to build another blind.  None could ever equal the Rhodes Point Blind.

Cripples

Unlike some lucky folks, I didn't grow up shooting a big pile of ducks every day.  So, each duck was very special.  The dreaded nightmare was to knock down a bird, then not be able to retrieve it.  I will say that my Father tried hard to find each duck.  He never owned a retriever, but used my Uncle's Chessy when ever he could.  Used a dog that belonged to Harry Fleming.  Hunted with a couple other guys that had retrievers.  He had been a hunter all his life, and naturally marked downed birds very well.  All in all we did better than anyone else that hunted around us.  Sometimes it took quite a bit of searching, and possibly some missed shooting opportunities, but we always tried our best.

I never got over that.  Quite possibly, it was imprinted on me to an extreme level.  Like killing 267 ducks one season, and only remembering the two crippled Bluebills that got away.

I have had a lifetime of good dogs.  All of them seemed to understand my passion for finding all our birds.  None of my dogs would ever give up the search until I called them off.  I can honestly remember searching for a cripple for an hour.  Walking the marshes, riding in the boat for miles, sending the dog over and over.  I was lucky enough to have hunting partners that felt pretty much the same way.

I didn't keep great hunting records when I was a boy.  Unfortunately, my Mother threw out most of my notes when I went in the service.  Luckily, I had one old notebook that was about 99% complete, so Mom didn't completely ruin things.  So I don't really have many notes on how many ducks we lost crippled during my early years.  Later in life, I recorded them as earnestly as I did all the birds we got.

It sickens me to see other hunters not even make an effort on long cripples.  Enough to make me want to throw them in the lake/river/ocean, whatever was handy.  Last year, McGee and I saw a guy not even leave his blind after skybusting down a drake Pintail.  He deserved an ass whipping for even shooting at the bird, but then to not even try to find it.  Disgusting.  Unfortunately, too many hunters take a half hearted approach to finding their birds.  I guess it gives them the opportunity to keep on shooting.

Down in Argentina, things didn't suit me when I first started going down there.  The bird boys were instructed by the outfitter to sit quietly, and to only retrieve birds once the shooters were finished.  Even the best shot doesn't kill every duck stone dead, and cripples will sneak away if you aren't prudent.  Very first afternoon I shot ducks in Argentina, the outfitter positioned my bird boy on a shoreline, about 80 yards down wind from me, so he could gather the birds when they floated down there, without disturbing my shooting.  Seeing how it was going to work, I tried my best to put an extra shot on ducks that weren't stone dead.  50 ducks was our afternoon limit.  When the bird boy clicked up 50 on his little counter, he came to pick up the decoys.  I unloaded my gun and waded to the bank.  I was anxious to see all the new species that I had killed and started looking over my birds.  So that I could keep my log book up to date, I tossed the birds in piles by species.  Huh, only 46 birds were there.  At first I wondered if I had been cheated out of my last four birds.  Then when I turned to look out over the pond to see where the bird boy was, so I could question his count, I saw two crippled ducks swimming away from where he was gathering decoys.  I hollered at him and pointed out my birds.  The outfitter intervened and told me that they would return to the marsh the following morning with dogs and pick up any remaining cripples.  I wasn't sure about that, so I reloaded my gun and waded out to kill the cripples I saw swimming.  I found three, but not the last one.  By then it was getting pretty dark and the other hunters and bird boys were showing up, ready to head back to the lodge.  One of the other hunters looked at my pile of ducks and laughed about me worrying over "one lost duck".  At the dinner table that evening, I informed everyone that it was not acceptable to leave cripples out there due to laziness.  Most of the guys agreed.  The following morning, I kept the bird boy at my side and had him retrieve each bird right when I killed it.  When we got finished, the outfitter proceeded to inform me that I was not supposed to do it that way.  So I told him to come into the marsh with me and bring his dog.  He insisted that after I finished shooting, he would have his dogs check all over the marsh to pick up any cripples.  So, that afternoon I shot till the bird boy counted 50, unloaded my gun and had him go pick up the birds.  When he returned with 42 out of the 50,  I called for the outfitter to bring the dogs.  they picked up five more ducks, so I reloaded and shot three more, then told them the bird boy was to show me his little clicker after each duck I shot.  At the dinner table that night, we again "discussed" the situation.  The following morning, the bird boy made a point of letting me know that he had not cheated me the afternoon before, but that the missing birds had been cripples that swam away.  I had kept track, so I actually knew he hadn't cheated me, just a sloppy system of retrieving the birds.  I don't care how many millions of ducks are in Argentina, or how big the limit is, that is not how I shoot ducks.  By the end of the week, we had it all squared away and I continued to hunt with that outfitter for several years.  After that, the duck strap matched the bird boy's little counter on every hunt but one.  A single White Cheeked Pintail, that I should never have shot at because it was too high,  set his wings and sailed about a mile out into the middle of a lake too deep to wade.  By the time they drove around to the far side and let the dogs out, it was sitting about a mile out in the center of the lake.  Too far for the dogs to work.

So, what do you think I remember about that 750 duck week?  That one lost cripple.

First Retrieves

First retrieve I ever saw made was me, retrieving a Mallard drake for my Dad out on the North Fork of the Licking River in Kentucky.  Got scolded for venturing down to the water's edge to get the duck, while our retriever "Boo" was running up and down the creek, clueless as usual.

Chief made his first retrieve when he was just five months old.  During the Teal Season, Dad and I were hunting in Blackbird Basin, at Indian Lake.  About sunset, we were ready to give up, no Teal around at all.  Dad decided to poach a Wood Duck, just for the dog to get to make a retrieve.  Chief made a fine mark on a Woodie that fell in heavy cattails.  The first of many.

Hoss made his first retrieve out at Hospital Point, on the New River.  Hunting by myself, on the first day I got to hunt, I knocked down a drake Bufflehead, that fell crippled a long way out.  Hoss made a long swim to the bird, far enough away that I was watching through binoculars.  Just as he reached for the bird, it turned and pecked him in the face.  He turned and swam straight back to the blind.  Had a bloody spot on his cheek.  Who would have thought it.  125 pound Chesapeake Bay Retriever, who would fight the devil himself, wounded by a one pound Buff.   I rode out in the boat, shot the bird, then went back to the blind and sent Hoss again.  Worked out better the second time.

Cain's first retrieve was pretty amazing.  Some friends and I were spread out in the myrtle along a ditch at Catfish Lake Impoundment.  Just at sunrise, we got a pass on Ringnecks.  Knocked down five birds that were scattered over about 60-70 yards of spotty, open water, and vegetation.  Cain marked all five birds.  Each retrieve, I merely called him to heel and said "Back".  He had all the birds marked perfectly.  I guess that I knew right then, he was going to be really special.

Tully's first retrieve came out at my blind at Rhodes Point, on the New River.  Nothing fancy or complicated.  Just an ordinary retrieve on a Bluebill drake, right at the edge of the decoys.  That was the story of his life.  Routinely fetching hundreds of Bluebills, then anxiously awaiting the next one.

I can remember them all, just like it was yesterday.

Mallard Drake

The first wild duck that I ever saw killed was a Mallard drake.  Dad shot it on the North Fork of the Licking River back home in Kentucky.  I think all the rest of the ducks that he killed in Kentucky, when I was allowed to tag along, were Black Mallards, as he called them back then.  He killed plenty of Mallards, but not when I was with him.

After we moved to Ohio, and started hunting at Indian Lake, Wood Ducks made up a high percentage of his bag.  Mostly due to where he hunted on the lake.  As soon as he got a blind on the open water, we shot a pretty good variety of ducks.  Unfortunately, I didn't seem to get any shooting on Mallards. I think it was my second season of hunting our blind on Hermit Island when a nice little flock of Mallards sailed into the decoys about 10 minutes before quitting time.  I was in the middle of the blind between Dad and Harry Fleming.  The ducks decoyed beautifully.  The sun was behind us, shining brightly on the ducks, so I could clearly pick out the drakes and hens.  There was a drake to the left, a drake to the right, and five hens in the middle.  Dad doubled, Harry got the drake on the right and I killed a hen.  It was so bittersweet.  I had finally gotten a Mallard, but a hen.  The big Greenhead still eluded me.

By the following year, my shooting was getting a lot better.  The first day I got to hunt I got a double on Wood Ducks, one of them was banded.  An hour later, I killed a banded BW Teal.  My season was off to a good start.  Then Dad killed a banded Mallard Drake.  Huh, there it was again.  Dad even started joking with me, calling me "the hen man".  I killed two Mallards that season, but both were hens.  The following year I finally got my Mallard drake, but one of my Dad's friends took credit for it.  The next year, I killed my first Canada Goose, and about 7-8 new species, and a few Mallard hens.

By the following year, I had shot so many pigeons, crows, doves, and Coot that I was a pretty darn good wing shot.  I decided that there would be no more of Dad's buddies claiming my ducks.  First day that I got to hunt that year,  I killed a drake Mallard early in the morning, and killed a double on them later that afternoon.  The next day I doubled twice on Mallard drakes.  A couple weeks later, over on a different lake, I jumped some Mallards and tripled, two drakes and a hen.

Starting then, the tables had turned.  I was a Greenhead killing machine.  At times, much to the dismay of my gunning partners.  I make it clear to everybody that I hunt with; if Mallards decoy, the drake is always on my side.