Arkansas Sportsman

Duck hunts past reaffirm patience

How y'all feeling out there?

Just ducky!

I'll feel more ducky on Wednesday when the second segment of duck season opens. The first segment, which ended Monday, was memorable for good fellowship and fun, but not for shooting. In other words, I didn't shoot much, and I had even less to show for it.

That's OK. It's a 60-day season, and I'll get in my licks. My best hunts are usually late, anyway, from Christmas week to mid-January. In the past 10-12 years, January has been warm, and ducks were relatively scarce in the areas I hunt.

My most memorable hunts have been on New Year's Eve.

The favorite was many years ago with Rowe Waelder of Fort Smith. We met about 3 a.m., and it was hard not to notice that his Chevy Suburban was full of cane. Naturally, inquiring minds wanted to know.

The place Waelder wanted to take me hadn't been very good, but he had a backup. Problem was that spot was near Booneville, and Waelder hadn't hunted it all year.

"I don't know what to expect, but we're going to roll the dice," Waelder said.

What's the deal with all the cane?

"There's not any cover where we're going," Waelder said. "I cut this cane last night so we'll have something to hide behind."

A long drive took us to a farm on the Petit Jean River. As we exited the truck, the full moon illuminated what appeared to be an endless pasture. Cattle lowed all around us.

"Well, here we are," Waelder announced.

"I cannot believe I got out of a perfectly warm bed for this," I grumbled mentally.

Sunrise was fast approaching, so Waelder and I hurriedly dragged cane into the pasture and crammed it into the mud to make a screen next to a shallow pool. Serenaded by cattle, we sipped coffee as the eastern sky began to glow.

Almost immediately, the cackling of mallards and gadwalls filled the air. It looked as if the good Lord had upended a heavenly boxcar full of ducks into the air.

My shotgun malfunctioned, so Waelder and I traded shots with his gun. Even so, we limited out in about 10 minutes with a mixed bag of mallards, wigeons, pintails and greenwinged teal.

I had Waelder pose for photos. I shot two rolls of film out in the open with a big strobe while ducks landed all around us. I've not experienced anything like it since, and I probably never will again.

Another great New Year's Eve hunt was at Fort Cobb Reservoir near Binger, Okla. Jay Hughes and Owen Canfield, reporters for The Associated Press in Oklahoma City, were my companions. It was Canfield's first duck hunt.

Fort Cobb is an open, windswept lake. We had no boat, so we pitched out a small spread of decoys in a small cove.

In those days, the farms around Fort Cobb grew peanuts, and the peanut farms attracted ducks in numbers I've never seen anywhere else. At dawn, they rose from the fields so thick and so relentlessly that the flocks looked like smoke. The lake was their de facto refuge, and they came at us from every direction.

The mallards ignored the cove and landed about 35 yards off the end of our point in open, whitecapped water. They wouldn't come to us, so we had to go to them. We left the decoys in the cove, crept to the end of the point and hunkered down behind some fallen trees. Mallards cupped over one spot as if it were a designated landing zone. We shot very fast and did very well.

Unfortunately, that was deep water, and we did not have a retrieving dog. The wind was in our faces, and it blew all of our downed ducks to the shore.

After we limited out on ducks, Canada geese began flying in a line that took them low right over our point. We got a few with some passing shots that dropped them practically in our laps.

I probably won't ever see the likes of that day again either, but that's OK. If hunts like that were common, they wouldn't be nearly as special.

Duck Season Social

A reminder that the Arkansas Outdoor Society and the Arkansas Game and Fish Foundation will hold a Duck Season Social at 6 p.m. Monday at Noah's Event Venue at 21 Rahling Circle in Little Rock.

An expert panel will give presentations on duck hunting and conservation topics. Brent Birch, author of The Grand Prairie, and Trey Reid, chief of communications for the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, will moderate the event.

Admission is $25 for ages 30 and younger, $50 for standard access and $75 for VIP access. A VIP ticket also entitles holders to a meet and greet with panelists and VIPs.

For tickets, visit duckseasonsocial.com.

Sports on 12/05/2019

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