2026-2027 Season Log

[Rick]

Date:

Time:

Location:

Cloud Cover:

Wind Direction and Velocity:

Temperature:

Moon phase:

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity:

Waterfowl Responsiveness:

Hunters:

Guns:

Malfunctions:

Dog(s):

Special Equipment:

Curses:

Kudos:

Birds By Species:

Photo Ops:

Lagniappe:

[Rick]

Date: 9/19/26 Sat

Time: morning

Location: #3

Cloud Cover: clear

Wind Direction and Velocity: very light easterly?

Temperature: warm but not as humid as usual

Moon phase: waxing 51%

Special Notes: September teal opener

Waterfowl Activity: Much better than anticipated.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: Pretty much the marsh opener norm: wild early but tamed as the shock of opening day gunfire wore off.

Hunters: 3 grandsons Ethan and Preston and Preston's buddy, Hayden (who'd come on our worst day last year after Preston had talked it up).

Guns: I took the Model 12 and regretted it.

Malfunctions: I couldn't find the gun's, foreign to me, front safety while shouldering it and usually forgot to pump or even eject the fired hull in its chamber. Not that it really mattered.

Dog(s): Call was invaluable for crips and even dead birds falling in the lilies or grass.

Special Equipment: SOS plus a pair of "Power Kickers" I bought as much to lure gators into showing themselves as for bird drawing potential.

Curses: Only that the neat old Model 12 is such a nuisance.

Kudos: Blessed with a great morning for great kids.

Birds By Species: 24 blue-wings

Photo Ops: lacked the presence of mind.

[Rick]

Date: 9/20 Sun

Time: Morning

Location: #3

Cloud Cover: clear w/very light ground fog early

Wind Direction and Velocity: very light easterly again

Temperature: sticky hot

Moon phase: 'bout half

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity: Less teal and more mottled and black-belly movement than yesterday, but still eventually plenty for our purposes.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: One of those cursed timing morning, when every time we got something going someone, somewhere would shoot and send it on. Felt awful for the boys who didn't get to fire a shot until well after 7.

Hunters: 2, grand-nephews?, Deacon and Cy, shooting and their mom, my Sweet Chereaux's niece, Allie, observing.

Guns: Deacon had Allie's late father's old 2 3/4" 20ga and 3" shells, which I was able to remedy with my little ones in the blind.

Malfunctions: Not sure Papaw Pat ever cleaned the 1100, but a shot of oil got it, mostly, working.

Dog(s): Call's nose and 4WD was again invaluable in the lilies, floating black dirt and "shore" grasses. But my clothes again paid a price for my not at least wear chaps in our September heat.

Special Equipment: SOS as yesterday

Curses: None meaningful after the ill-timed gunfire of others slowed enough to let us play, too.

Kudos: The boys and their mom had a big time.

Birds By Species: 18 blue-wings (the random 6 I cleaned were 4 drakes and 2 hens)

Photo Ops: Nasty old turd, Allie, Deacon and Cy (No way was Call going to sit still with the boys, now that the restraints of boat and blind manners were behind us.)

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[DComeaux]

Nice hunts!

[Darren]

Very nice ! Temps and humidity were particularly awful yesterday, this morning on my driveway had same feel.

[MARSH BEAR]

Great hunts, it appears you have more teal than we do, Joey and I could have stayed all day and not killed 24 teal.

[Rick]

Date: 9/23 Mon

Time: morning

Location: #3

Cloud Cover: c;ear

Wind Direction and Velocity: calm to light easterly again

Temperature: hot and humid

Moon phase: ?

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity: Less movement, as expected without weekenders to push them from the rice, but enough to have some laughs and make a meal.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: Took a while to get the hang of not showing our hands, but when we settled in, the birds did, too.

Hunters: 2, SIL Tim and his grown son Tim2

Guns:

Malfunctions:

Dog(s): Low water slop is changing the wild child's sleep habits.

Special Equipment: SOS

Curses: Just that my guys didn't have more chances.

Kudos: Had a big time

Birds By Species: 9 blue-wings Tried to show them the difference between eclipse drakes and hens, but wasn't a hen in the bunch.

Photo Ops: Our gang

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[DComeaux]

Please make it rain.

[Rick]

Rained hard here late yesterday. Might have saved the lawn, but no show in the marsh.

[Rick]

Date: 9/22/26 Tue

Time: Morning

Location: #3

Cloud Cover: clear

Wind Direction and Velocity: calm to light northerly

Temperature: still hot and humid

Moon phase:

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity: Slow again.

Waterfowl Responsiveness: And again we were showing too much of what did come by what we were doing.

Hunters: 3, JJ, Mark and Connor

Guns:

Malfunctions:

Dog(s): Worked Call's buns off in the slop. Would probably be losing half of our birds without his nose and 4wd.

Special Equipment: SOS

Curses: Could have used more ops.

Kudos: Guys with no other place to hunt had a good time.

Birds By Species: 12 blue-wings (9 drakes and 3 hens)

[Rick]

Date: 9/23 Wed

Time: morning

Location: #3

Cloud Cover: mostly clear

Wind Direction and Velocity: calm to light NE again

Temperature: hot but less humid than the norm

Moon phase: full or nearly so

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity: Teal remain few and far between, but woodies and mottleds are still putting on pre-season shows to help fill the intermissions .

Waterfowl Responsiveness: Hailing hard at distance and then killing the spinners and momma teal calling has been the ticket.

Hunters: 2, ex-SIL, Chris, and his buddy, Brian

Guns:

Malfunctions:

Dog(s): Still wearing Call out for hidden crips in the lilies and slop.

Special Equipment: SOS, except just on "kicker," as the other is possessed

Curses: Just the lack of opportunity to get the guys dialed in.

Kudos: A fine time was had.

Birds By Species: 9 blue-wings

[Darren]

Have myself pretty convinced that tomorrow we'll make our first teal hunt without a spinner, maybe ever. We're not hunting traffic, it's a destination, so rather just not give them more stuff to speculate on. Note, it's a destination, when there are birds there using it, otherwise its just a hole in the marsh.

[Rick]

I've added intermittent timers to my spinners and programed them for brief periods of spin between longer pauses, more like stretching than hovering. And I've been turning them off entirely once birds are headed my way, but since the great majority of what we see is following natural passes at the very edge of or beyond my loudest calling, which is LOUD for a teal call, I'd be afraid to try doing without the spinners altogether. Would surely cost us most of our opportunities.

[Rick]

Date: 9/24

Time: morning

Location: #3

Cloud Cover: clear

Wind Direction and Velocity: nice NE breeze from the git-go

Temperature: coolest morning to date - which isn't saying a whole lot

Moon phase: full

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity: slowest to date

Waterfowl Responsiveness: So slow throughout the marsh that I don't think a single op was lost to others' shooting.

Hunters: 2, Tim and Tim2 again (this time with new camo shirts

Guns: Tim2 had a new O/U, so he must have caught a bug

Malfunctions:

Dog(s): We managed to knock most everything down in shit soup for him.

Special Equipment: SOS

Curses: just how slow it was

Kudos: still a fine time

Birds By Species: 6 blue-wings

Photo Ops: Took a short video of the kind of places Call's been finding our chipped birds after being ferried to the area of fall and given a direction to "Go to work."


That one's track took him through the roseaus he'd entered while I was turning to try following with the camera and into the canouch beyond, but ended well:

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[Rick]

Anyone know why that video won't appear?

Tried it this way [YouTube]code following "="[/YouTube]
and youtubes "copy to share" full addy [YouTube]https://youtube.com/shorts/g4y_aVJt_U0?si=GHt2Zo_jZ2qmWK0c[/YouTube]

[Darren]

Think it needs to be just the short code dropped into , and not the full string of URL. At least that's how I've done it, by no means a guru in it.

[Rick]

Think it needs to be just the short code dropped into , and not the full string of URL. At least that's how I've done it, by no means a guru in it.

All I'm seeing in that is the same blacked out youtube box I got with the short post "=" code. Are others getting the video?

[DComeaux]

Don't use the short. Open the video on youtube, right click and copy the URL. You'll have to edit the URL as you normally do from the / to the beginning.

You may have to copy it from the search window at the top of the screen when you open it in youtube.

[Rick]

Think I got too used to using youtube's "share" link on other forums and had tried pulling the WFF shortened version out of what was shown of it, rather than from the browser's link.

Anyway, thanks for the hand, guys.

[DComeaux]

Hopefully you get some water for the regular season.

[Rick]

Hopefully you get some water for the regular season.

September teal is all guides' friends and family time, we'll pump for the folks paying for it before the regular season. But Call's job will still suck much of the time.

[DComeaux]

Hopefully you get some water for the regular season.

September teal is all guides' friends and family time, we'll pump for the folks paying for it before the regular season. But Call's job will still suck much of the time.

I forgot about the pump.

[Rick]

Date: 9/25 Fri

Time: morn

Location: #3

Cloud Cover: clear to partly

Wind Direction and Velocity: northeasterly moderate breeze

Temperature: cool enough for a long-sleeved t-shirt

Moon phase: Full

Special Notes:

Waterfowl Activity: couple of the better blinds did well, but we saw the fewest birds to date at my blind - despite my hopes for help from 3-day weekenders

waterfowl Responsiveness: Thankfully excellent

Hunters: 2, old buddy and once fellow Doug's guide, Mike, and his nephew, Josh

Guns:

Malfunctions:

Dog(s):

Special Equipment: SOS

Curses: no flight

Kudos: Very much enjoyed a long and long overdue visit.

Birds By Species: 5 blue-wing teal