Hank Huntington: The Small Ducks are Down and the Big Ones Will Follow

My wife and I were on Safari to Kenya and Tanzania when the duck season opened in Nebraska. Checking e-mails while on the trip the opening was absolutely fantastic and it kept getting better. The duck composition was mostly made up of gadwall, widgeon and green wing teal. As reported by some of the well known hunting magazines these ducks had a really big increase in the hatch for this fall.

Next was my elk trip to Colorado after getting back from Africa and in the meantime it appeared that the club would shoot ever duck along the Missouri Flyway. What had happened was the wetlands along the Missouri River had dried up due to the drought and our club had 40 acres of open water. The birds migrating down the river could stop on the river or come over for some rest and relaxation among some very friendly decoys and hunters. The way the spread was set up was the best this club member had ever seen.

The top picture is looking straight east, and the next one is looking north easterly.

Three blinds made of steel are sunk in the ground with padded seating, a rack for guns, they are heated, and you can cook in them. There are three that run in a row and ten people can comfortably shoot in each one. This is truly gentleman hunting. The blinds are buried in the ground and run north to south. Water surrounds them on three sides, and it cannot get much better than this.

My time finally came when a trip to Tekamah was made and the club had harvested as many ducks by the first of November as they did all last year, and the Mallards had not even started migrating. This does not count the Canada Geese that seem to be increasing each fall in big numbers. What is interesting about the geese is the size of the bird. They are really really big and there has been several shot this year that weighed in at 15 pounds. For our area this is a really big Canada.

There is John with a really big Canada

The action was overwhelming. Each time a flock came by they locked up and came into the setup, and in all the years hunting this spot this was a first for me. By 10:00 AM hunters were starting to leave with their limits. What was now starting to show was some migrating mallards. This is just going to get better.

Kieth with another nice big Canada

The action slowed by 11:00 AM, but leaving was out of the question as the Canadas started showing up and the action picked up again.

By 2 PM, the lake was starting to go calm as the wind was starting to make a shift and it was time to pick up and clean some birds.

The bag for the day. Missing is 20 additional duck and 4 Canadas as four hunters left before noon with limits of ducks and some Canadas.

My schedule has put me out of the action for the next few days, but a front is moving down and there should be some excellent decoying and shooting of Mallards.