Clay's First Goose

**Mike Bard** · #1 10-09-2008, 10:52 AM

Date: September 6-7, 2008

Location: Northern NY

Sunrise: ~ 6:35 am

Weather: Sunny and warm

Temperature: Uppers 50’s warming to the mid 60’s

Wind: Calm

Equipment Used: Avery® Field Caps, Avery® Mud Case, Avery® Floating Gun Case, Avery® 6 Slot Decoy Bags, Avery® Finisher Blind Bags, GHG® Life Sized Canada Goose Floaters, and GHG® Over Sized Canada Goose Decoys.

Hunters: Frank Clifton, Rick Murphy, Jeff Tietjen, Clay Tietjen and Avery® Pro-Staffer Mike Bard

I’m sure that we all have fond memories of our first successful hunt for ducks, geese or any other species of animal that we’ve hunted, those memories are something no matter how many years go by that you always reflect on and remember the minuet details about the entire experience. I still remember my first duck, a wood duck, shot on a small beaver pond on a cool fall afternoon with my old high school buddies. I actually got lucky that day and shot my two wood duck limit. We had 6 decoys, of various species and the limit then was only three ducks a day. My first goose was a couple years later on a cold, late December morning, a few days after Christmas. It was my first goose hunt and first time ever hunting a field. Our limit was two geese and it was amazing to watch the geese commit to our small spread of old, beat up shell decoys, which we also used to cover our bodies with. We all had plenty of opportunities that morning and left with a three man limit of geese.

Well this given weekend, my friend, Jeff’s son, Clay, had recently turned twelve, the legal age to hunt in New York State. We made plans to head north to try a couple different spots that had been traditionally very good to us in the past, as we wanted to make Clay’s first goose hunting experience successful and memorable. On our arrival, it appeared that we’d have no problem getting Clay his first goose and hopefully several more, as geese were in the area in decent numbers and using the sand bar that we like to hunt. Well as luck would have it for our first set, the geese flew out to feed on queue, but decided that the freshly cut corn was too good to take a break from and never showed up at our mid-morning loafing spot. I was very impressed with Clay as he was a trooper during the long, unsuccessful wait.

All a little discouraged, we decided to pick up, get some dinner and try a different spot in the morning, which Frank had previously found, but never had hunted. Again this was a loafing spot, a mud flat where cows come down to drink from a bordering pasture. We saw fresh tracks, feathers and goose poop along the flat, so we still felt Clay would have a good chance at getting his first goose. The decoys were set and we made a hide using an old willow tree and some cattails.

This time it didn’t take long before a pair of geese were looking for a mid-morning hang out and sucked into our decoy spread. On their way in, we instructed Clay to wait for them to get in close and to shoot whenever he felt comfortable. Well these geese never had a chance, Clay popped up when they were at 15 yards and dropped them both in the decoys, so not only did he shoot his first goose, but instantly he had his first two to his credit. The rest of the morning progressed with small groups of geese working our spread and providing opportunities to add a few more to our bag. We didn’t reach any limits this weekend, but we made a lot of memories. I hope Clay had a good time and remembers his first goose or geese for a long time to come.

The group shot

Clay with his first four geese