Sardines

Some days I pack a fairly nice lunch when I go out duck hunting. Some days I cram a little snack in my pocket and get by with that. Years ago we used to hunt with a little kerosene stove in the blind. We would warm up cans of soup and make toasted bologna and cheese sandwiches. That was really almost necessary when I used to hunt up North in the colder weather. Especially since ever day I went out, I planned on staying till dark.

But, in the beginning, we had to rough it. We never knew for sure where we could hunt; maybe in a blind, maybe just standing in the reeds in a marsh. So we truly packed light. Generally a can of sardines was lunch. Hard to carry crackers in your pocket without breaking them, so after you would eat a few of the sardines with your knife blade, you could add a few crumbled crackers to the remaining sardines and have sort of a cold casserole. I remember one time my Dad accused me of adding the fluff from cattails to the sardines to make it a more substantial meal. Seemed to fill me up better.

One day a full gale was blowing so Dad and I had to tuck back in the big marsh at Lucy's Pond. We figured a few birds would come into the marsh to escape the wind. A few did. Fairly early in the morning a beautiful Redhead drake sailed right in and Dad killed it. A couple hours later a Mallard hen circled a few times then landed a couple hundred yards away, out in some heavy reeds. Chief and I were able to sneak up on her and I made a long shot when she flew. So we each had a nice duck on a day that hadn't looked too promising, so we were OK. About noon I broke out my trusty can of sardines and sat down on a little hillside about 20 yards back from the edge of the marsh to enjoy my lunch. I leaned my 870 against a tree and sat there pretty comfortably taking my time fishing those sardines out of the can with my pocketknife. About halfway through my meal Dad hollered for me to look out in front of us. A BW Teal was coming straight at me, pretty high, ignoring the decoys and gaining altitude to get above the trees where I was sitting. I had to move fast. I stuck my knife in a tree trunk, balanced the half full can of sardines on my knee, grabbed my gun and snapped off a shot when the bird was straight overhead. Before I could even turn to see if I'd hit the bird, Chief already had it. I reloaded and set my gun back against the tree and got my knife and returned to my meal. I had balanced that can on my knee and not spilled a single fish. I guess when you are hungry enough you can accomplish some amazing feats.