sunday hunt

well i had decided not to hunt this morning and go to church but someone(ssphone) called me late last night and changed my mind. so i played hooky and for some reason God still gave me a beautiful wood duck double. the drake is the biggest a prettiest woodie that i have ever shot. guess where he is going.

merritt island drakes

quakbob and i decided to go scout/hunt merritt island this morning. we were looking for spots for future hunts and figured any birds we shot would be a bonus. for the last few years i have been looking for the right drake blue wing in full plume to go on the wall next to my green wing. bob has been looking for a green wing to go with his blue wing. well, guess what? we accomplished our goals this morning. we shot the two birds within a second of each other. we ended the day with 5 ducks which isnt a huge bag but we were both very happy with the results.

sepia ducks

did a little photo shoot with the last ducks i shot

project blue boat

bailey inspecting the damages

as if i didnt have enough projects that need to be done around the house that arent getting done. well i just picked up another one. a family that i am good friends with had this canoe sitting around half in their lake half in their yard waiting to be fixed. i had asked about it a few times but the father had hopes of his kids fixing the boat (he is a quadriplegic and cant do it himself). one of the kids put his knee through the boat two years ago while playing "boat wars" whatever that is. last night he told me to take the boat. so here it is. it has two holes (not leaks but holes), a bad previous patch, two rotting wood seats and about a million spider nests. so what do you think? can it be fixed? i thought it would be a great addition to my duck hunts. i am getting a used pirogue for christmas so if i can get this canoe fixed it should give me room for a few more hunters and better duck hunting than out of my 16' white center console flats boat. planning on doing a nice camo paint job if i can get it patched. any expertise and suggestions will be appreciated.

toho ducks

pirouge(dwight) in the blind

me in the blind

"pirouge" in his pirogue

dwight picking up decoys

dwight with a nice drake ringer and a boat full of decoys

my ducks

my ducks and me

i went out to lake toho with "pirouge" (dwight) from florida waterfowler fourm today. we had a great time and he put me on some nice ringers. it was a cool, windy and overcast day which is perfect for duck hunting and something we dont get very often down here in florida. i ended up getting my limit of ducks in ringnecks (4 drakes and 2 hens). dwight shot down three ducks two of which were an impressive double on some high flying ringers. dwight got his workout doing all the hard work paddling around picking up ducks, setting out decoys and such. all i had to do was sit around and shoot ducks. it was a wonderful hunt and i really enjoyed dwights company.

tm goodwin/broadmoor marsh

scott and dave in the blind

craig in the blind

me in the blind

craig retrieving a good looking blue wing

coot decoys and marsh

scott, craig and dave with their birds

craig, dave and me with all the birds

my birds posed oldfatslow style

went out to tm goodwin/broadmoor marsh with "oldfatslow," who doesnt fit his name in the slightest, and two of his boys. it was amazing. tons of birds! we shot 22 ducks (bw teal, gw teal, mottled, ringer, pintail and shovelers). it was nice to go somewhere midseason where birds actually decoy and there is such a variety. scott, craig and dave were great hosts and very kind to invite me on their hunt. i enjoyed their company in the blind immensely. thanks again scott for a memorable hunt on the marsh!

trout stage daring breakout at fish farm

my brother-in-law sent me a link to this story. guess fish are smarter than we thought. read the story here.