A Test

[aunt betty]

Well, it did sound farther away.

It's ok. Bash away. I don't care. Especially if it makes you feel good.

If you want to take that as "bashing" feel free, but would you really rather I lied just to make you feel you made a point you hadn't?

The book on cutdowns is that they're supposed to sound clanky up close but like a duck from a distance. That didn't sound any more like a duck at a distance than it did up close. Just sounded more distant. Fwiw, I've never seen a Kirk McCullough video that made him sound like a duck, either. But we all know he can call ducks.

From what I've seen, sounding "just like a duck" is vastly overrated, anyway. It's my understanding that a common upper level ornithology class experiment demonstrates that birds can be much more attracted to exaggerated caricatures of their calls than to faithful renditions of them. And I'd think most of us who've been at it a while have seen some pretty "awful" callers work wonders. Know I'm seldom trying to sound "just like a duck" just "ducky".

No worries man. Sensitivity is on low setting.
I do know that it sounds awful but also know what happens in the timber when I make those noises.

[Frylock]

Well, it did sound farther away.

It's ok. Bash away. I don't care. Especially if it makes you feel good.

If you want to take that as "bashing" feel free, but would you really rather I lied just to make you feel you made a point you hadn't?

The book on cutdowns is that they're supposed to sound clanky up close but like a duck from a distance. That didn't sound any more like a duck at a distance than it did up close. Just sounded more distant. Fwiw, I've never seen a Kirk McCullough video that made him sound like a duck, either. But we all know he can call ducks.

From what I've seen, sounding "just like a duck" is vastly overrated, anyway. It's my understanding that a common upper level ornithology class experiment demonstrates that birds can be much more attracted to exaggerated caricatures of their calls than to faithful renditions of them. And I'd think most of us who've been at it a while have seen some pretty "awful" callers work wonders. Know I'm seldom trying to sound "just like a duck" just "ducky".

If sounding just like a duck was important I'd kill exactly zero ducks every year.

[Rick]

That's one thing I've noticed/been learning in calling ducks, I get more response out of much longer exaggerated notes or quicker faster paced notes than I do out of duck notes. Much more, it seems to grab there attention more. Almost like reaction strike when fishing and you bang your lure against a stump or log.

Eggzackly. It's often about prompting a reflex response that changes the birds' momentum.

[aunt betty]

I sure couldn't tell you why it works but this is how it went for me in timber.
First of all I hunt the same hole every day because a million mallards fly over it every morning.
Like I said I went up the RnT list bottom to top starting with a timber call. Didn't do it for me.
Then I finally as a last resort pulled out the Throwback. From what I'd learned online that's the last thing you want to do is a super-loud call.

I learned that simply blowing on the call don't really work too good. When I started humming through it great things started happening. Of course I was learning the hole setup by making mistakes about decoy placement. I got that hole down pat now and know where to put the decoys, boat etc no matter which way the wind is blowing.
It took a few bad days to get there.

Last fall I was landing mallards in the dark in that hole and waiting until LST to shoot them. Dang that's fun!
I have so much confidence now...sorry if I've overdone it.

Am excited about finally getting really good at it and I want to share. It took me over 30 years of doing it all wrong to finally get it all together and that duck call is a large part of what made it click. Having a million mallards to play with each day helps.

[RonE]

Well, you certainly were able to call a horse and almost called a chicken but she flared at the time she should have been turning in.

[Eric Haynes]

Am I the only one here who thinks a call is borderline useless up here for ducks? I know we don't have many nortern hunters but I rarely ever use a call and when I do its usually for my own amusement. Probably the biggest reason for sucking at using a duck call is because I've never had to.

Geese on the other hand, i don't leave without my call or flag.

[Rick]

I have so much confidence now...

...Having a million mallards to play with each day helps...

I've been blessed with the opportunity to hunt with some serious good duck callers, but my most important calling lesson from a human came from a fellow making his first duck hunt. Long story shorter, I was young and pissed at a guy in the next blind and called most everything that came by to us, even off of their end of the big flooded field, until he and his guide got disgusted and left. We'd been deferring the shooting to my man's young son and were still a few birds shy when then other party left, and it should have been easy to fill out, but it was like my "luck" left with them. I begged and I pleaded and threw the book at the birds, but I just couldn't break the flight any more and finally admitted my befuddlement aloud.

Then my guest told me, "I don't know anything about calling ducks, but it sounds like you've quit telling and started asking them." Taking his observation to heart turned that hunt back around - and many, many since.

Confidence is HUGE! And when I've lost it, I need to fake it until I've got it back.

The rub for most folks, of course, is that it can be hard to gain confidence enough to crank a call up and get the most out of it, when they lack a "target rich" environment to experiment in. When it seems like you muffed the first chance you had to call all morning, it's going to be a lot harder to risk it again when another bird finally comes by, so you'll probably be more conservative, rather than more aggressive.

Anywho, it sounds like you've found the hover button. Woohoo!

[Rick]

Am I the only one here who thinks a call is borderline useless up here for ducks? I know we don't have many nortern hunters but I rarely ever use a call and when I do its usually for my own amusement. Probably the biggest reason for sucking at using a duck call is because I've never had to.

Geese on the other hand, i don't leave without my call or flag.

From what I recall seeing of your hunts up there, you're doing something very right.

I've never duck hunted east of PA, but I came to find Ohio mallards easy enough to call that I got flat cocky about it. Didn't see many, but if some yahoo didn't run 'em off, they'd probably come. (With big bunches of dry field mallards being the exception in those pre-spinner years. If we mis-scouted by even a couple hundred yards, we were probably in for serious frustration as we squawked our lungs out and watched them swarm in right over there.) I was such a hot spit Ohio Valley caller, I was flat amazed by how many Louisiana ducks failed to notice that fact. Shear numbers were in my favor, so I killed more birds here from the git-go, but my called-at to called-in ratio sucked. So I'm inclined to think of Northern ducks being easier to call. But I've been wrong before...

[Eric Haynes]

Am I the only one here who thinks a call is borderline useless up here for ducks? I know we don't have many nortern hunters but I rarely ever use a call and when I do its usually for my own amusement. Probably the biggest reason for sucking at using a duck call is because I've never had to.

Geese on the other hand, i don't leave without my call or flag.

From what I recall seeing of your hunts up there, you're doing something very right.

I've never duck hunted east of PA, but I came to find Ohio mallards easy enough to call that I got flat cocky about it. Didn't see many, but if some yahoo didn't run 'em off, they'd probably come. (With big bunches of dry field mallards being the exception in those pre-spinner years. If we mis-scouted by even a couple hundred yards, we were probably in for serious frustration as we squawked our lungs out and watched them swarm in right over there.) I was such a hot spit Ohio Valley caller, I was flat amazed by how many Louisiana ducks failed to notice that fact. Shear numbers were in my favor, so I killed more birds here from the git-go, but my called-at to called-in ratio sucked. So I'm inclined to think of Northern ducks being easier to call. But I've been wrong before...

That's all true..I think. All about location here. I mostly hunt private swamps, so the only competition I have is being exactly where they want. Otherwise I get to watch them all land 100 yards from me.

Can't say that I'm not scared to hunt down south :lol::lol:

[aunt betty]

Hey y'all, when I joined the first waterfowl hunting chat forum, u know which one, I really thought it would be a lot like this thread. Don't be shy about posting calling and that kind of thing. You will get busted balls but so? It helps learn more techniques and styles. I don't know shit about divers or coastal ducks.

We all search for the 'magic whistle' as a previous poster said.
Great way to put it.

[assateague]

That's alright, I don't know shit about mallards, either. I think I've probably killed 20 or so my whole life.

[capt1972]

That's alright, I don't know shit about mallards, either. I think I've probably killed 20 or so my whole life.

20 mallards, 1 black a day and zero pintails. Just what kind of ducks do you shoot?

[assateague]

Blacks and buffies. Pretty much it. The occasional merg, and potshots at the occasional pintail, although they never really showed up this year.

[Eric Haynes]

Blacks and buffies. Pretty much it. The occasional merg, and potshots at the occasional pintail, although they never really showed up this year.

Blacks are massive here. Love shooting my one per day...

[aunt betty]

I've shot maybe half a dozen blacks, lol. Ducks that is.

[assateague]

Blacks and buffies. Pretty much it. The occasional merg, and potshots at the occasional pintail, although they never really showed up this year.

Blacks are massive here. Love shooting my one per day...

I don't get why CT, and I think MA, get two. And Canadians get 6. What the fuck. That's why I'm gonna snap one day, and just flock shoot as many as I can. 1 a day my ass. Almost as dumb as 2 Canadas.

[capt1972]

Blacks and buffies. Pretty much it. The occasional merg, and potshots at the occasional pintail, although they never really showed up this year.

Blacks are massive here. Love shooting my one per day...

I don't get why CT, and I think MA, get two. And Canadians get 6. What the fuck. That's why I'm gonna snap one day, and just flock shoot as many as I can. 1 a day my ass. Almost as dumb as 2 Canadas.

MA and NH are both 1 a day.

[assateague]

Maybe it's just CT?

[triplecurl]

Blacks and buffies. Pretty much it. The occasional merg, and potshots at the occasional pintail, although they never really showed up this year.

Blacks are massive here. Love shooting my one per day...

I don't get why CT, and I think MA, get two. And Canadians get 6. What the fuck. That's why I'm gonna snap one day, and just flock shoot as many as I can. 1 a day my ass. Almost as dumb as 2 Canadas.

Guess I'm gonna have to come up that way to kill me a black duck. Once in awhile we'll see a couple, but not very often. The goose thing makes no sense whatsoever. We can kill 5 a day, but we don't have near the numbers you guys do.

[assateague]

I thought your Canada seasons were way restricted, even closed in some areas? Not sure why I think that, but seems I've heard it.

[triplecurl]

Nope. You can kill 15 a piece here in September statewide. After that, it goes back to 5. There are a couple counties that it's restricted a little more, but for the most of the state it's 5 a day.

[assateague]

Even our resident limits have been cut down to 9 (from 15 a couple years ago), because somebody who has never left their house and lives in a bubble thinks there is a shortage of Canada geese.

[Woody]

Michigan is home to a huge resident goose population and we are only allowed 5 then 3 in the regular season.

[aunt betty]

We have a quota system on honkers.

Illinois has four separate waterfowl hunting zones and within those zones are "quota zones". (it's a tall state)

The quota zones are where you have to call in and report your geese. When the quota is reached the entire zone (North, Central, South-central, or South) gets closed.


When the quota is reached in a quota zone say the Central quota zone...the entire central zone is closed.

This shit is complicated...does what I wrote make sense?

You're supposed to call in daily just to see if it's closed and one year...I forgot and was hunting a week after the quota was reached.
It was...50 years ago. Yeah 50. lol wink wink

[Goldfish]

Illinois isn't that tall

[aunt betty]

Illinois isn't that tall

I know. Compared to tennessee...lol
Ill. has 4 different zones though. Means we have in essence a duck season that starts in October and ends in late-January.
This year was October 19-January 26 if you wanted to travel.
98-day duck season.

[Frylock]

Maybe it's just CT?

Nope we get one a day. Funny too cause lots of my holes are chock full of 'em. Shoot one right after LST and spend the rest of the morning trying to spot mallards mixed in with flights of black ducks.

[Frylock]

Blacks and buffies. Pretty much it. The occasional merg, and potshots at the occasional pintail, although they never really showed up this year.

Blacks are massive here. Love shooting my one per day...

Where you at Eric?

[Eric Haynes]

Blacks and buffies. Pretty much it. The occasional merg, and potshots at the occasional pintail, although they never really showed up this year.

Blacks are massive here. Love shooting my one per day...

Where you at Eric?

NY

[Eric Haynes]

Blacks and buffies. Pretty much it. The occasional merg, and potshots at the occasional pintail, although they never really showed up this year.

Blacks are massive here. Love shooting my one per day...

Where you at Eric?

NY

Canada, NY to be more precise