March canadas!

**Brian Rhodes** · #1 03-05-2008, 09:03 AM

DATE: March 1st and 2nd

LOCATION: South West New York

WEATHER: Cold, snowing, icy, windy

TEMPERATURE: Upper teens to mid twenties

WIND: 10-20 knots

EQUIPMENT USED: Avery® Mesh Decoy Bag, Avery® Fleece Skull Caps, Avery® Floating Blind Bag, Avery® Finisher Blind Bag, Avery® Pit Blind Bag, Avery® Expandable Guide's Bag, Avery® Fleece Vest, Greenhead Gear® FFD Active Goose Decoys, Greenhead Gear® Pro-Grade Goose Shells with Sleeper Heads, and Greenhead Gear® Life Sized Goose Floaters.

HUNTERS: Frank Clifton and Avery® Pro-Staffers: Capt. Brian Rhodes, Mike Bard, and David Rearick

RETRIVERS: Maggie

JOURNAL NOTES:

Well it all started back in November, when I first met fellow Avery® pro-staffer David Rearick at the Cabelas grand opening in Hartford, CT. We started taking about how we needed to hook-up and do some gunning together. He was telling me about a ‘new’ resident Canada spring season, some counties in Western New York were opening for this year that offered a 5 goose per day limit and how he and fellow pro-staffer, Mike Bard, had all ready been planning on taking advantage of it. It sounded like a perfect way to extend the season and break the monotony of late February and March, pretty much the most boring part of the year for me for sure. I told him, I was in!

I had been looking forward to going on this hunt for a while. We had talked about how it would be a water hunt on a river that the guys knew always holds birds this time of year. I love hunting honkers over water! So after a few texts, e-mails and phone calls the plans were set late in February!

I headed out on Friday afternoon on my ‘5 hour’ drive. The forecast called for snow starting sometime that evening, I knew I was going to drive right into to it, but hey, what are you going to do! Well around 5 pm, I was well into NY, on route 84 and I hit the storm. My 5-hour drive was starting to grow longer by the mile. I called Mike and he reported more of the same from his area, we were all in for it. After driving, for what seemed like days through the Catskills, I finally made it to my destination. I passed several accidents and vehicles of the road. After about 4 hours, Mike made his 2-hour drive down. Dave, who had to work that evening, decided not to try and make the 5 hour trip up from PA in the storm. He told us he would head up in the morning and join us later in the day. Of course we all knew he was being lazy and wanted to sleep in. We also knew that this meant the rest of us would get up real early, set out the spread, and sit there and not shoot a thing until Dave showed up!

The morning started out nice. It was still snowing a little on and off, but nothing too serious. We had a pretty short boat ride to the spot we decided to hunt. We chose a nice big island that split the river that the geese seemed to be hanging on to set up. With a pretty good west wind blowing, we set up on the east point of the island. Mike has a real nice spread for hunting over the water. We set out about 50 floaters, almost two dozen sleeper shells and mixed a few full bodies in for good measure. We had plans of hunting out of Mike’s boat, but with the snow we thought we could hide well enough in the natural brush below the high water mark on the island.

The morning started out slow, the weather wasn’t helping to get the geese flying. Between the cold temps and the snow, the geese were not moving. We had a few singles and pairs work us throughout the morning. We saw more ducks than anything else; we had lots of mallards and common mergies hanging out in the dekes all morning. I swear they know when the season is closed! Dave hooked up with us around lunchtime. He brought us lunch because he felt guilty showing up late and having a beautiful spread set up for him already!

The afternoon brought clearer skies and warmer temps and more geese. We never saw a huge flight of birds. We mostly saw small groups working into the river for a spot to rest and have a drink. All the birds we got decoyed very nicely. The wind was perfectly at our backs, which made for some nice head on shots. Most of our action happened within the last hour of legal shooting time; we had a few nice flights come in. Frank’s dog, Maggie, had quite a nice work out for the day! The highlight of the day was when a nice group worked us just before sunset, but for some reason didn’t finish in the hole and landed around the point from us. At this point, I had filled my limit and was taking pictures, so Dave and Mike decided to walk over, to see if they could jump them up, as we couldn’t let them stay there and draw other birds to that side of the point. Well this is where the story gets a little fuzzy. All I know is when it was all said and done, Dave had two banded birds and Mike never fired a shot! Not bad for a guy who almost didn’t come on the hunt in the first place! Oh, by the way, Mike has never shot a banded bird in his home state. I know this because we were discussing it a few hours before this all went down. I believe Dave said it was his 6th and 7th bands of the year! Some guys have all the luck! The day ended with us two short of a limit.

We had planned on hunting the next day as well, but over night the temps dropped down into the low teens. We got down to the launch and we knew we were in trouble. The ice flows were so bad you couldn’t even set out the decoys. We took a ride in vain anyway. The ice seemed to have push out 90% of the birds over night. There wasn’t a clear spot on the entire river to set up. We had no choice, but to forego the hunt for day. Even with the scratched hunt it was still a great trip. It was a real nice way to spend a weekend in March. Heck, it beats staring at the wall!

I just want to thank Mike, Frank and Dave for having me tag along. It’s always great to hang and gun with some new friends in a new place! I look forward to doing it again sometime!

Here's a few pics!

**Brian Rhodes** · #2 03-05-2008, 09:03 AM

**David Rearick** · #3 03-05-2008, 09:22 AM

Brian, what does the bus look like that I am under????? LOL

It was a great time and after some long scouting trips by the three of us, Frank and Mike did a great job finding this spot for the weekend. I am glad the freezing rain and snow finally quit in the early AM so that I could make the trip up for the afternoon hunt and for Sunday.

Great PICS and thanks Mike and Brain for holding up the bands.