Jeff Gudenkauf
12-12-2007, 06:18 PM
Started my "vacation" last Thursday to close out our duck season in northern Iowa. Had a large group of guys hit the fields with nasty weather moving in hoping to pile up the mallards. We were definately suprised by what we saw throughout the day. The mallards hit the fields early and with the low visibility provided by the snow, either returned above our visibilty or after shooting hours.
However, the honker action was fast and furious as we ended the day with 18 honkers and 6 bands. The shooting was VERY up close and personal as most of the geese fell in the spread knocking over dekes and providing short retrieves for the dogs.
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02824.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02828.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02830.jpg
Worked for the majority of the day on Friday trying to tie up loose ends before I hit the road for my extended weekend. Thoughts of greenheads filled my mind all day, so I had to roll out a little early. Hitched up the trailer and headed for Ames/Des Moines. Met some friends out in DM and probably had too much fun but jumped out of bed at the 5am alarm anyway. After some "miscommunitcation" we finally got on the river about 10:30. We'd decided to pick everything up by 2:30, but not before we watched some honkers make their final descent on the sandbar. We could have shot 50 honkers but had a younger hunter with us and gave him several cupcake shots at decent groups only to watch them give us the black and white middle finger...
We had a great time none the less.
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02837.jpg
Headed back to the Roost, cleaned birds, had a couple Crowns then headed to Brody's place to play babysitter till his wife got home.
Alarm went off at 4:30 on Sunday morning and we hooked up the trailer (just in case) and headed for Squaw Creek, MO to hunt with a buddy of ours at his duck camp. It's an unbelievable place - a duck club built by Art Storz many decades ago shortly after the Storz Brewery opened up. It had changed hands several times before Doug purchased the place for himself several years ago.
All of the original memoriabelia remains - Storz beer cans, "Storz Edition" DU prints, mounts throughout the lodge and a restaurant grade kitchen make this place unforgetable. Not to mention the 160 acres of flooded corn that butts up to Squaw Creek National Wildlife Refuge.
We arrived about 10:00 on Sunday morning expecting the road to be much worse than they were. We were greeted with smiles and handshakes by Doug and his buddy Jim. Got our stuff stowed in the "motel" and plopped down in the lodge to discuss how the hunting had been and what we were planning on doing. We'd pulled the trailer down in case the birds had moved out of the corn and into the fields - but after a short discussion, it wasn't going to be needed.
Finally at noon, the 5th in our party showed up and we headed for the pits.
Dropped down into a comfy pit with flooded corn out in front of us - floating 8 or 10 mallard dekes. It was decided that we were going to be shooting 1 at a time. Definately different than what I'm used to if we're trying to put a limit on the ground.
An hour and a half and 1 dog switch later (due to the 10 degree conditions) we had 20 greenheads sitting on the back of the pit. Shots ranged from 15-30 yrds with all birds hovering over the corn. It almost seemed too easy...
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02842.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02845.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02854.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/36934.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02856.jpg
Cleaned the birds and started the dinner fit for kings...
This evening was by far the hardest I'd laughed in a long time. After "Big" and I killed our limit (1/2 bottle each) of Crown, the others put their limits of beer in the bag and we managed to take down a party limit (1 bottle) of Jager it was off to bed.
The 2nd day brough more of the same - cold, damp conditions. Drove around the bottoms to see what was sitting on the river and came across a newly plowed field with about 50k snows on it. Of course, no one had the bright idea of bringing their camera.
Made our way out to a different pit about 1:30. We didn't kick near the birds out we had the day before - so needless to say we were nervous.
It was definately a different kind of action - a teal shoot like i haven't had in quite some time. We ended up putting 20 greenwings down, 18 of them being drakes and 4 greenheads. The mallards just never showed up, but it was a blast none the less.
Another fantastic meal and another limit of booze (ANOTHER bottle of Jager) we started throwing dice.
We knew some bad weather was moving in, so we'd planned on staying at the base on Tuesday. Around midnight the power went out, so we entertained ourselves with some slurred duck calling around the table and more lies.
Went to sleep around 1:30 and was awaken at 3am by some hellacious thunder - or so I thought....
However, the honker action was fast and furious as we ended the day with 18 honkers and 6 bands. The shooting was VERY up close and personal as most of the geese fell in the spread knocking over dekes and providing short retrieves for the dogs.
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02824.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02828.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02830.jpg
Worked for the majority of the day on Friday trying to tie up loose ends before I hit the road for my extended weekend. Thoughts of greenheads filled my mind all day, so I had to roll out a little early. Hitched up the trailer and headed for Ames/Des Moines. Met some friends out in DM and probably had too much fun but jumped out of bed at the 5am alarm anyway. After some "miscommunitcation" we finally got on the river about 10:30. We'd decided to pick everything up by 2:30, but not before we watched some honkers make their final descent on the sandbar. We could have shot 50 honkers but had a younger hunter with us and gave him several cupcake shots at decent groups only to watch them give us the black and white middle finger...
We had a great time none the less.
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02837.jpg
Headed back to the Roost, cleaned birds, had a couple Crowns then headed to Brody's place to play babysitter till his wife got home.
Alarm went off at 4:30 on Sunday morning and we hooked up the trailer (just in case) and headed for Squaw Creek, MO to hunt with a buddy of ours at his duck camp. It's an unbelievable place - a duck club built by Art Storz many decades ago shortly after the Storz Brewery opened up. It had changed hands several times before Doug purchased the place for himself several years ago.
All of the original memoriabelia remains - Storz beer cans, "Storz Edition" DU prints, mounts throughout the lodge and a restaurant grade kitchen make this place unforgetable. Not to mention the 160 acres of flooded corn that butts up to Squaw Creek National Wildlife Refuge.
We arrived about 10:00 on Sunday morning expecting the road to be much worse than they were. We were greeted with smiles and handshakes by Doug and his buddy Jim. Got our stuff stowed in the "motel" and plopped down in the lodge to discuss how the hunting had been and what we were planning on doing. We'd pulled the trailer down in case the birds had moved out of the corn and into the fields - but after a short discussion, it wasn't going to be needed.
Finally at noon, the 5th in our party showed up and we headed for the pits.
Dropped down into a comfy pit with flooded corn out in front of us - floating 8 or 10 mallard dekes. It was decided that we were going to be shooting 1 at a time. Definately different than what I'm used to if we're trying to put a limit on the ground.
An hour and a half and 1 dog switch later (due to the 10 degree conditions) we had 20 greenheads sitting on the back of the pit. Shots ranged from 15-30 yrds with all birds hovering over the corn. It almost seemed too easy...
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02842.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02845.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02854.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/36934.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f159/Gudey/DSC02856.jpg
Cleaned the birds and started the dinner fit for kings...
This evening was by far the hardest I'd laughed in a long time. After "Big" and I killed our limit (1/2 bottle each) of Crown, the others put their limits of beer in the bag and we managed to take down a party limit (1 bottle) of Jager it was off to bed.
The 2nd day brough more of the same - cold, damp conditions. Drove around the bottoms to see what was sitting on the river and came across a newly plowed field with about 50k snows on it. Of course, no one had the bright idea of bringing their camera.
Made our way out to a different pit about 1:30. We didn't kick near the birds out we had the day before - so needless to say we were nervous.
It was definately a different kind of action - a teal shoot like i haven't had in quite some time. We ended up putting 20 greenwings down, 18 of them being drakes and 4 greenheads. The mallards just never showed up, but it was a blast none the less.
Another fantastic meal and another limit of booze (ANOTHER bottle of Jager) we started throwing dice.
We knew some bad weather was moving in, so we'd planned on staying at the base on Tuesday. Around midnight the power went out, so we entertained ourselves with some slurred duck calling around the table and more lies.
Went to sleep around 1:30 and was awaken at 3am by some hellacious thunder - or so I thought....