Hunted with a couple buddies yesterday up near Cedar Point. It was colder than a witch's titty, and the ice really hammered that message home.
We first set up on an island, but we weren't able to get a good clean hole and the spread looked like total shit. The ducks wanted nothing to do with us, the few that we saw anyway. At about 8:15 I decided to do a little exploring. In the process I found a spot with a little bit of open water, being kept open by the wind turbulence on the water. I figured if I could but the ice around it, the wind would do the rest for me. As the other guys kept hunting from the island, I went to work on the ice... again. I ended up creating a really nice hole... about 35 yds wide and 50 yds deep. The key to clearing a shooting hole in the ice is to keep the ice chunks is as big of pieces as possible. These big ice sheets can then be shoved under the ice around the perimeter... which eliminates all the small chunks clogging up the shooting hole. I got the hole created and the strong SW wind eventually made it even bigger.
Here's a panoramic view of the spread after we got all set up in the new spot...
It's hard to see because we were brushed-in so well, but there are two layout blinds in this pic...
The divers and mergansers were absolutely everywhere. For some reason, the puddle ducks were not. We saw only 4 confirmed puddle ducks yesterday, and we killed 3 of them. I'm thinking this marsh had been frozen for at least a few days prior to this hunt, and the birds had already found another area to spend their time. We ended up with a hen black duck, a drake black duck/mallard hybrid, a drake greenwing teal, a hen common merganser, and a drake hooded merganser.
This hen black duck was trying to escape by running across the ice... The Browning Gold reached out and dropped the hammer...
If you look close, you can see the gouges where the shot was hitting the ice around her.
Here is my buddy Eric with an awesome drake black duck/mallard hybrid. I talked him into getting it mounted. It was just an absolutely perfect bird to mount... beautiful of course, but there were no holes in the bill, no broken wings... just pristine.
It wasn't the best hunt in the world, but it definitely wasn't the worst either. We spent the entire day out there... Met up at 5:50 a.m. and didn't get back to the trucks until 6:00 p.m. That hybrid made it worth the trip, though! After trudging in the swamp all day, enduring the wind and the cold, breaking all that ice... I was absolutely whooped! Needless to say, I was in no shape to "tango" with the wife last night... not on top anyway. lmao
We first set up on an island, but we weren't able to get a good clean hole and the spread looked like total shit. The ducks wanted nothing to do with us, the few that we saw anyway. At about 8:15 I decided to do a little exploring. In the process I found a spot with a little bit of open water, being kept open by the wind turbulence on the water. I figured if I could but the ice around it, the wind would do the rest for me. As the other guys kept hunting from the island, I went to work on the ice... again. I ended up creating a really nice hole... about 35 yds wide and 50 yds deep. The key to clearing a shooting hole in the ice is to keep the ice chunks is as big of pieces as possible. These big ice sheets can then be shoved under the ice around the perimeter... which eliminates all the small chunks clogging up the shooting hole. I got the hole created and the strong SW wind eventually made it even bigger.
Here's a panoramic view of the spread after we got all set up in the new spot...
It's hard to see because we were brushed-in so well, but there are two layout blinds in this pic...
The divers and mergansers were absolutely everywhere. For some reason, the puddle ducks were not. We saw only 4 confirmed puddle ducks yesterday, and we killed 3 of them. I'm thinking this marsh had been frozen for at least a few days prior to this hunt, and the birds had already found another area to spend their time. We ended up with a hen black duck, a drake black duck/mallard hybrid, a drake greenwing teal, a hen common merganser, and a drake hooded merganser.
This hen black duck was trying to escape by running across the ice... The Browning Gold reached out and dropped the hammer...
If you look close, you can see the gouges where the shot was hitting the ice around her.
Here is my buddy Eric with an awesome drake black duck/mallard hybrid. I talked him into getting it mounted. It was just an absolutely perfect bird to mount... beautiful of course, but there were no holes in the bill, no broken wings... just pristine.
It wasn't the best hunt in the world, but it definitely wasn't the worst either. We spent the entire day out there... Met up at 5:50 a.m. and didn't get back to the trucks until 6:00 p.m. That hybrid made it worth the trip, though! After trudging in the swamp all day, enduring the wind and the cold, breaking all that ice... I was absolutely whooped! Needless to say, I was in no shape to "tango" with the wife last night... not on top anyway. lmao
