It is hard to admit, with the incredible size of my ego, that even I have made a couple blunders in my duck hunting career. Nothing earth shattering, not enough to group me with the multitude of Bozo's I've encountered out hunting, but ever so slight glitches.
Out Teal hunting one year when I was young, I came very close to running out of shells. Came down to needing one more duck for our limit, and only having one shell left. My partner hadn't been shooting so well, and I convinced him to let me have the last shell. Passed up a couple tricky shots, but finally put down the last bird. I haven't run out of shells since then.
Another time, when I was young, Dad went for beer and left me in the blind by myself. Not having a lot of confidence in my shooting abilities, I looked at this to be an opportunity to prove myself. Sure enough I got a nice pass on a small flock of birds. Killed two. Just couldn't wait to show them to my Dad. When Chief brought the first one in, I was crushed to see it was a Merganser. When he went back for the second bird, I closed my eyes and prayed it was a real duck. That didn't work. Whatever. I had shot well. Nice double on a good pass. But Mergansers, not real ducks.
First time that I ever had any money in my life, I spent it on decoys from Herters. Don't remember exactly when it was, back in the 1960's, and for a limited time Herters was selling off the last of their balsa wood decoys. I bought a pair of Mallards. I was very proud of them. I think maybe we had a couple dozen Model 63 Mallards back then, but mostly old paper mache blocks. My fancy balsa wood decoys really stood out. Dad and I were hunting a blind we had back in Bear Wallow. Too windy to hunt our main blind out on the lake. So, anyhow, I asked Dad if we could separate my pair from the rest of the spread to see if they looked better to the ducks. We placed them off to the side of the stool, sort of like they were swimming up the channel to join the other decoys. Looked very realistic. Waiting on shooting time, half frozen, I fell asleep. Woke up sometime later and the first thing I saw was a pair of Mallards swimming in to us. I eased my gun up, not saying anything to my Dad. When he heard me click off the safety he said, "Are you going to shoot those nice decoys?"
Dad and Harry Fleming and I were hunting Walnut Island one time. Nice flock of geese came into the bay and we started calling. They turned right towards us. Dad was already cautioning us to remember the limit was two apiece, and to be careful. Well, the geese landed short. We called a little more and they swam into our decoys. Probably 40 geese right in the pocket and in among the decoys. One more time, Dad reminded us to only kill a pair. They stood up and shot. I waited until the birds cleared the water, swung with a bird and killed him stone dead. Swung on another bird, concentrating on the goose and not letting anything distract me. Unfortunately, I didn't let the other birds that were trying to escape distract me, and as my bird fell, two more directly on the far side of mine also fell out stone dead. Four big Canada Geese down with my two shots. Luckily, two of the birds that Dad and Harry shot were just cripples. Dad chased them in the boat, and was able to herd them into some other hunters' decoys. The other hunters said thanks, but it was us that were thankful.
One year at Oldfield Island I went out in the decoys to break up an ice floe coming through the decoys. Underestimated the weight and momentum of the ice. As it was shoving me backwards, I tripped over an old stump under the water and the iceberg sort of floated over me as I was trying to regain my footing. I was completely submerged, looking up at the bottom of the ice, clinging to the leading edge and trying to pull myself back up, with very little success. Next thing I knew, my Dad grabbed me by the coat collar and lunged his large frame against the ice. He slowed it's progress enough to pull me back up. Learned a lesson about ice that day that I never forgotten.
One day I sat on a little Wood Duck hole, hoping a few Woodies might return after the morning flight. Nothing much happening. Across the little hole, about 50 yards away, I was surprised to see a fully mature Snow Goose swimming around, minding it's own business. I was shocked, but immediately started sneaking around the edge of the pothole, trying to get close enough for a shot. When I was at the closest point that I could get to the goose, I was still a little unsure of what was going on. The more that I peeked out of the underbrush to spy on the bird, the more I was convinced that something just wasn't right. It started to swim into the mouth of the small stream that formed the pothole and suddenly I realized it wasn't a Snow Goose at all, but just a domestic white duck. I was very glad that I hadn't shot someones pet. The next evening, a friend of mine called me to tell me the great news that he had killed a Snow Goose on the little Wood Duck pond. Last time I saw him, he still had the mounted goose on the wall.
There have probably been a few more miscues, but no harm, no foul. At least I never left my gun on the dike when I waded out into a public hunting impoundment. Never took the wrong gauge shells to match the gun I was shooting. Never let feral hogs find my gunning bag and eat all my shells. Never let a flock of Green Wings fly over me so close that they pooped on my new hat and not get a shot off. Never let my dog run off in the marsh, tied to a military ammo can, and retrieve other hunters' birds. Never let my boat float away. Never lost a gun on a canoe tip-over. Never had my dog eat my hunting partner's ducks. Never had the magazine cap come off and spring gun parts out into the marsh. Never pooped in my waders.
I'm still alive and kicking after 55 years of waterfowling, so I have avoided the big mistakes.
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