Timber got to do some work the other day. He's always beyond happy to get out. Going on 10 years old in January, these hunts wear him out for a day or two...
DSC_0847_es by Sean Curran, on Flickr
The wife and I are on different pages when it come to hunting him. Understandably, she wants him to take it easy. She worries that a hard hunt, in tough conditions might do him in. I see things through a different lens. His will to hunt is too strong to leave him at home. He's in very good shape for his age. Physically and mentally he hunts like a dog half his age, but he doesn't bounce back like he used to... none of us do. Given the choice, I'd rather see him go doing something he loves to do and lives for, instead of just getting old and fat and having to be put down. It sounds harsh when it's typed out, but I'd rather go out the same way, doing something I love to do. Life is for living, you've got to make the most of the heartbeats you're given.[/QUOTE
I think you are doing the right thing. If your dog is like mine it would be mad if you left without him.
TOO Waterfowl Chronicles
- Thread starter bowhunter1023
- Start date
We've been scratching out a few birds here and there, but no great hunts yet. We teamed up with my wife's cousin this year and he's got a killer field, but the water is locked up and the geese haven't been in there much. We're meeting up early tomorrow to break ice and open a hole in the drainage. We'll have blinds in the corn stubble with a full goose spread on one side, an open hole and ducks on the other side. Should be interesting in the coming week as the rest of Ohio's inland waters freeze up and the river begins to chunk up. I suspect our fields will be on fire.
Do you have a good slug of birds in the nearby area? Just wondering what your effort:reward ratio is looking like for this one. Nowadays my requirements are much different than they were five or ten years ago... The scale needs to be tipping pretty heavily towards reward! [emoji23]
huntn2
Senior Member
I’m not to the point of weighing risk/reward of a given hunt, but I am slowly building the Arsenal.
We just hunt. This is SE OH brother, it always sucks. If we kill 2 mallards and a goose, it was a good day. Without a boat down here, you're just going to go most days, which is us. Can't kill them on the couch.
Ah, we bailed on the ice breaking. Spent the time getting the blinds and dekes set right in the field. Everyone is dry and warm now, so that's a plus!
Damn son, you did good! Heck of a start to your arsenal!I’m not to the point of weighing risk/reward of a given hunt, but I am slowly building the Arsenal.
Haha. Yea, I get it. The great thing about duck and goose hunting is you can still have a good time even if the birds don't cooperate. Kudos to you for seeing the light!
Got three Mallards and two geese today. We were hunting seven people so not the best but we didn't get skunked. That's been the motto of my season. Not great but didn't get skunked
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Got three Mallards and two geese today. We were hunting seven people so not the best but we didn't get skunked. That's been the motto of my season. Not great but didn't get skunked
Got three Mallards and two geese today. We were hunting seven people so not the best but we didn't get skunked. That's been the motto of my season. Not great but didn't get skunked
We suffered today. It was pretty out, but nothing but one flyover of geese. We actually cleaned up, I made breakfast and we swapped guns/ammo and killed some doves. We've seen 2K plus the last 3-4 hunts down there, so we went prepared just in case. Damn good shoot just doing that.
We suffered today. It was pretty out, but nothing but one flyover of geese. We actually cleaned up, I made breakfast and we swapped guns/ammo and killed some doves. We've seen 2K plus the last 3-4 hunts down there, so we went prepared just in case. Damn good shoot just doing that.
Shooting doves is fun. Those suckers seem like rockets after watching geese fly.
Wow if I had that many doves up here there's nothing else I'd rather be doing! Late winter doves are as pretty as they get. And oh so tasty!
JB, we saw groups of 8-12 very 2-3 minutes all morning. Same thing on Tuesday and last Saturday. Several groups of 20+ too. Nonstop. Never seen anything like it.
Man that's awesome. I'm jealous as hell. At this point in the season, that's one of the few things that would take my focus off of gearing up for ice fishing.
We will likely go back just to shoot them before season is out. I'd say our hunting is about done with this freeze, so we need something to do!
Got skunked today. We were running traffic and we had a few flocks fly over but none were interested.
We had a hunt of a lifetime on Saturday. Killed a 5 man limit in an hour with very little calling and nearly every bird we killed was feet on the ground prior to being shot. I can hunt 30 years around here and I'll die with less than a handful of these kind of days. It really made my season and capped off a great week of hunting for me.
We had a hunt of a lifetime on Saturday. Killed a 5 man limit in an hour with very little calling and nearly every bird we killed was feet on the ground prior to being shot. I can hunt 30 years around here and I'll die with less than a handful of these kind of days. It really made my season and capped off a great week of hunting for me.
Nice work and nice snow goose! Ive seen a couple up here but it's pretty rare. Do you guys get them down there very often?
Well, funny story, that ain't a snow goose. We all thought it was and I'm fairly certain we've seen this bird several times. They flew past us, then came back 25 minutes later. My buddy whose field we were hunting, called dibs and we got a 30' over head shot at 25 birds trying to sit on our faces. We waited for the white bird to fall, then let loose on the remainder. This bird has black wing tips and beak coloring like a snow, barred feathers like a Canada, and orange feet like a domestic. It was also significantly larger than at least half the geese we killed.
Well, funny story, that ain't a snow goose. We all thought it was and I'm fairly certain we've seen this bird several times. They flew past us, then came back 25 minutes later. My buddy whose field we were hunting, called dibs and we got a 30' over head shot at 25 birds trying to sit on our faces. We waited for the white bird to fall, then let loose on the remainder. This bird has black wing tips and beak coloring like a snow, barred feathers like a Canada, and orange feet like a domestic. It was also significantly larger than at least half the geese we killed.
Haha that's funny. Based on the beak looks like a domestic to me.