Woot! I got my first woodie today!

OK, now, everyone who clicked here hoping to find kiddie porn, buzz off. I'm talking about ducks.

I went duck hunting with my friend Hellen the English Professor today at Little Dry Creek, which is probably the best public duck hunting land in the state - and this is a big state.

Unfortunately, we ended up with the worst blind in the place. Read more...
We knew it as we headed out to our spot at 5 a.m. because the listing at the hunter check station made it clear: In the three hunt days so far this season, this blind had an average of one duck per hunter - bottom of the list. And given the weather forecast - clear and still, and coming off a nearly full moon to boot - we didn't have any reason to believe we'd bring up the average today.

But sometimes ya gotta just take whatever you can get, so we headed out with the indefatigable optimism of new hunters.

After we got our decoys out - our sad, motionless decoys - we sat back down in the blind and got the lay of the land. We were facing southeast, with willow trees behind us, and a small pond ringed by tules front of us. Potentially a nice set-up.

As we listened to the cacophony of the marsh - snow geese off in this direction, specklebelly geese in that direction, wigeon swirling all around - I told Hellen we should load our guns.

"Why?" she said. "It's an hour before shoot time."

Because, I answered: Ducks might land in our decoys before shoot time, and if we pop shells in our noisy autoloaders after they've landed, they'll take off for sure.

Amazingly, the gods must have wanted me to look smart today, because about 20 minutes later when we were having a conversation about vegans, we heard the whistle of wingbeats overhead and two splashes in the water amid the mallard decoys to our left.

Meep meep. Gadwalls!

Conversation ceased as we watched their dim shadows and spoke to each other in improvised sign language. Ten minutes later, we heard two more splashes in our teal decoys straight out in front of us. Ten minutes later, another splash off to the left.

For the worst blind in the place, we sure were getting a lot of action!

Now, if they'd just hold until shoot time. We moved quietly in our blind, shifting carefully, avoiding letting our calls clank together.

Then, ten minutes before shoot time, we heard a volley of gunfire to the east.

What the hell?

It never fails - every time I go to Little Dry Creek, I hear people shooting early. The shooters were probably on adjacent private land, but five minutes later, people who were clearly on public land started shooting too.

Hellen and I looked at each other with consternation. We weren't going to shoot until shoot time - in five minutes.

And one minute later, every duck in our pond got up and left.

Sigh.

As the sky grew paler and shoot time arrived, we listened to gunfire all around us and watched the ducks flying everywhere but our little pond. Clearly, we were not on anyone's flight path.

Then I saw something off to the right near our gadwall decoys. Motion. Duck butts in the air? But they weren't moving like ducks.

Hellen and I craned our necks and I finally realized what I was seeing: otters. A family of five otters. Nearby, a heron called.

Gronk!

Lord, we had everything but ducks in this place.

We saw some off on the horizon - sorta, maybe, kinda callable... Oh, who am I kidding. But I tried anyway, lifting my newfound love, my Wingsetter Raspy Hen, to my lips. I'd been excited about this moment all week: I've finally learned to blow a mallard call, and today I might be able to use it to help Hellen get a duck, which would be her second duck ever.

I gave it a little toot, and the sound that came out was the kind of emaciated wail Arnold Schwarzenegger might make if someone kicked him in the nuts really hard.

What the hell? It had worked fine in the car on the drive over!

I tried again. No luck. Something was wrong with it. Hell.

So I switched to my Wingsetter 8-in-1, whistling a wigeon call. There'd been lots of wigeon in the area before dawn, so it seemed like a good bet.

I whistled at two ducks in the distance and they responded, swinging around and making a beeline for our blind. At 25 yards, I told Hellen, "Take 'em!"

We rose as they veered to our right and I fired a single shot, dropping my bird stone dead - belly up. Hellen didn't fire. She's still really, really new at duck hunting and just didn't feel ready in time. I totally understand.

I plunged into the water to see what I'd bagged because I hadn't quite recognized it. That's when I saw the garish black, white, red and yellow bill.

A woodie! My first wood duck ever. I shot at three hen woodies once in my second season of hunting, but had never seen anymore until today.


Hellen was excited for me, but still wanted a duck of her own. Just one duck. She has modest wishes.

Well, they might be considered modest in a decent blind in decent weather.

But our pond sucked. It was a stagnant mess. It was deadly still for the first three hours of the shoot, and when the wind picked up enough for me to put out my Windwhacker motion decoys, I discovered that the water was too deep - my poles weren't long enough to keep the fluttering metal "wings" out of the water.

Serious suckage.

We did get one flyover from a mallard pair, and we each took a shot at them, knowing they were probably a bit too high - and missed as expected. Not one single bird came within calling distance, much less shooting distance, after that.

The only bright spot of the mid-morning was that I was able to take apart my Raspy Hen, dry it out, and get it to work again. But it still didn't bring us any ducks.

Finally we had to concede defeat. Hellen and her husband were going to Napa today. She needed to get home and take a shower before their trip.

It was a bittersweet ending. I was so excited to have gotten my first wood duck - which was one of my goals this year - but so disappointed that Hellen didn't get more opportunity to shoot. She's not greedy - she doesn't expect to come home with a full strap every time. But she, like I did just a couple years ago (and to this day, I guess), craves opportunity to shoot so she can learn.

She didn't get that today.

But the season is young - we've got 92 days to go.

© Holly A. Heyser 2009