The 2011 Sea Duck Tournament

I pity those who have never intentionally hunted mergansers.

The omens were all there for a spectacular weekend of shooting. The wildlife was alive. When we arrived at the river, dolphins were chasing mullet near the dock and through the manatees that fed on floating seaweed. A flock of bluebills milled around in the channel, diving for mussels or something. A flock of wood ducks flew in right before dark.

I sensed a great victory for my team and let everyone know so.

Alas, the 2011 Sea Duck Tournament ended early. Cole, PJ, and Rumph smoked the field with an impressive 15-Duck Display Saturday morning. They didn’t even bother to hunt Sunday. Sawyer and Mitch pulled 1 Saturday and 5 Sunday, not bad for their first event. Travis, Chase and I – the alleged pros of the tourney - splashed one red-breasted merganser late Saturday morning and slept through the 20 degree cold of Sunday, content with humiliating defeat and warm beds.

We hunted the outer islands around St. Martin’s Key off the mouth of the Little Homosassa River. Cole’s and Sawyer’s teams reported the mergies decoyed rather well, unusual for them. Using a mixture of bluebill and puddle duck dekes, combined with a floating bluebill MOJO decoy, Cole said 90% of the ducks they shot had their feet down to land in their spread. Sawyer commented a similar response. 100% of our ducks did – but again, we only shot one.

My team messed up. I had been doing quite a bit of research over the last year about hunting divers. Our decoys were in such shallow water, they practically perched on oyster clumps. Cole and Sawyer hunted deeper water. The theory in the literature and observing their success and remembering my own history with the sport, the divers like to be in water where they can...get ready for it...dive! But Travis had seen a pile of ducks in this spot the night before.

Some of it's strategy; with the tides and vastness of open water, some of it’s a crapshoot, and I was but a lowly deckhand on T's vessel.

PJ popped a trophy hooded merganser that is on its way to the taxidermist. Sawyer – a duck hunting novice – is already discussing what waders and decoys to buy. Another victim of the Duck Hunting Disease.

You want to know about the merganser I shot? Well, OK. After all, it’s not always a numbers game. They can have their silly victory. For me, it’s about trophy hunting these magnificent mergansers. I look for The One that fits the description of a perfect hunt.

Facing the hurricane force gales, and gazing beyond the circling of bull shark fins, I spotted one lone merganser flying in the distance. More like, he was jet-screaming in the distance. Though he didn’t touch water, he still pushed a wake. I contemplated on how to get his attention.

Through my vast knowledge of interspecies waterfowl communication, I knew he wouldn’t respond to a mallard chuckle. Thinking quickly, I pulled a shotgun shell from my bandolier and pried it open with my teeth. I tossed the steel number 2’s high and out into the decoys. The plunking pellets sounded like a school of piddling pilchards, a merganser treat.

The wise old bird changed his course and approached the spread. As he was about to land, those wings - those backpedaling, pterodactyl wings - blew the MOJO into the brine and sprayed a fine salt mist into my face, like the lashing of water from an airboat engine. Wiping my eyes with my right hand and firing from my left shoulder, the mighty bird was felled. I waded quietly through the bull sharks and retrieved my prize.

One day the rest of those guys will learn a thing or two from me. Until then, they’ll have to just be content with high-volume shooting and a year’s worth of bragging rights.

I’m sure they’ll be fine with that...

Mr. Hunting Expert Bites Back

(World Renowned and Recognized Mr. Hunting Expert takes a break from his two-week Arctic Walrus Safari to answer fan mail. Each day he does not harvest the walrus of his dreams, he punishes himself by removing one article of clothing. Still, it’s not as painful as some of your questions.)

Q. My 2011 New Years hunting resolution is to hunt gators this year. It is a sport that seems to be catching on quickly. I have a 14 ft john boat and most people I’ve talked to say that is about the minimum sized boat they’d want. Friends state with reasonable caution and respect for the game, it’s a relatively safe activity, but what should I be most prepared for?

- Jason Jaws, Estill, SC

A. Easy. Game wardens. While I hunt gators by wading into a lake at night with a mask, snorkel and a catfish stringer to secure my catch, most of you lightweights prefer to hunt from a boat. So, not only must you comply with the standard game rules – bag limits, proper tags and equipment, etc. – you must also make sure that little john boat of yours is water-friendly. Life jackets, throw cushions, flares, and proper running lights. Lesser hunting associates of mine tend to get busted every year on a little oversight. They report game officers are none too friendly at 3 am and awfully unforgiving after spending the night dealing with rednecks such as you. Don’t say you haven’t been warned.

PS. New Years resolutions are for the weak.

Q. The sandhill crane population is booming here in Florida. I know they hunt them out West, but do you think they will open up a season in the Sunshine State? Also, what species of bird do you think should be open to hunting? Why?

- Clem Jones, Kissimmee, FL

A. Let my word spread across the land – no more multi-part questions!!! I will answer them no more. I doubt the sandhill will have an open season in Florida. Known as a “Ribeye in the Sky” in certain western states that allow sandhill hunting, the Florida bird is non-migratory and highly protected. It has been taxonomically designated as a unique subspecies much like other Florida natives, the Key Deer and Sunkissed Beach Babe, neither of which you will possess either.

The roseate spoonbill. The reasons are mine and personal.

Q. The time to apply for Western Big Game hunts is nearing. I want to hunt mule deer. This will be my first trip out yonder in pursuit of game. Any tips for me?

- Sea Level Louis, Biloxi, MS

A. Get in shape. Generally speaking, this style of hunting is more physically demanding that your average treestand sit for whitetail, Dough Boy. You’re gonna walk. If you’re in the hills, you’re going to climb. And you’re probably going to ache. The thin air is no joke. You’re going to wheeze, at first. If you smoke, you’re screwed. So peel yourself away from Sportscenter for a little bit and go for a walk, at the very least. Otherwise, enjoy Yellowstone with the rest of the tourists.

Enough for today! I must ready my walrus decoys, chalk my walrus whistle and settle in for my meal of narwhal blubber and snow.

2009 Sea Duck Tournament

After a year hiatus, the Sea Duck Tournament resumes this weekend. A taste of 2009's event. Posted February 2009.

That old maxim, “don’t count your chickens before they hatch,” is as true for ducks as poultry. After morning one, our team was up six birds to none – a commanding lead - in the 2nd Annual Sea Duck tournament. Obviously with a name like that, this is no sanctioned, sponsored event, rather a group of friends who turned an end of the season Homosassa River duck hunt into a yearly competition for winning or losing twenty bucks.

The rules are simple - one point per duck taken while hunting over decoys or in a blind only, agreed upon to discourage other nefarious, and often illegal, manners of cheating, that none of us would ever consider doing unless being thoroughly embarrassed at the time.

Though I’ve never been paid, my team won the previous year, and after Saturday morning, a repeat title seemed inevitable. Hmm, probably shouldn’t have talked so much trash.

We hunt mergansers - red-breasted and hooded - although from time to time vague recounts detailing flocks of pintail, oldsquaw, and harlequin ducks creep into otherwise civil, honest hunting discussions. Granted, the ol’ mergies don’t attract much love from the waterfowl faithful; they don’t decoy well or respond to calls worth a hoot, are not the highest of table fare, and are uglier than butt. However, they are plentiful, with large flocks swarming from the open waters of the Gulf into the river shortly after daybreak. Even without employing any of the above common duck hunting tactics, the sheer volume of birds is enough to expect an exciting morning.

None the less, successfully filling your bag limit of five is a crap shoot; there’s an awful lot of water for fowl to travel and feed, not to mention places for hunters to set up. Pinpointing a reliable ambush is daunting. Adding to this degree of difficulty is the nature of these waters. Oyster bars jut far out of the seas on a winter low, but hide frighteningly shallow during the highs – in short, it’s treacherous navigation, and there are just some areas you can’t go with a standard outboard.

The targets themselves are tougher than old shoes, especially the red-breasted species that breeds farther north and winters farther south than the other American mergansers. This translates into some serious muscle and very thick down to poke through, asking a lot from wimpy steel loads. A number of birds will brush off a volley of long distance shots and keep on trucking, no worse for the wear, and still more well-hit birds will tumble to the water requiring a quick follow-up shot, or a long slog through the flats to chase them down, which more often than not results in them paddling or flying away. They just aren’t impressed with cheap steel.

So, we’d done well putting six on Merganser Mound, the non-descript oyster shell island where we’d set up shop. We’d tossed out four bags of fakes, bluebills mostly, and a Baby Mojo mallard hen hoping the flashing white wings - which do mimic those of a ganzer scooting off the water - would bring a few into close range. (I do realize that four bags of dekes are but a pittance in comparison to the numbers serious open water duck hunters incorporate in their spreads.)

This approach failed. The birds did not decoy; luckily though, we’d tapped into a diver duck superflyway of sorts. Soon after first light, a low-flying, high-speed flock of hoodies whizzed by without a trigger pull. Alerted, we were ready for the next group. After an hour and a half, after the smoke cleared, the hulls quit ejecting, and the echoing of shotgun blasts ceased freight-training across the Nature Coast, five red-breasted and one hoodie hen rested on the oysters.

We’d heard the other team shoot and only assumed they’d matched our production. Personally, I was disappointed. There were some shooters on that other team, and when you have the number of birds in range like we’d had that morning, six ducks didn’t seem like a whole lot.

Didn’t seem like a whole lot until we returned to the dock and discovered they’d laid a goose egg. All their shots were too far for a reasonable chance at a kill. And a bunch of other excuses. For a while I thought it was a gag. Maybe they’d wait til later to fess up and open a cooler, hoping to embarrass us in the midst of our victorious war whooping. With these boys you never can tell. But no, nothing, nada.

And it’s true, there maaayyyyyy have been a little too much strut in our step after this, doling out professional advice and insults. Too much glide in our stride as we hunted and got skunked ourselves that afternoon in this charming, mucky place I call Misery Pit, joking about smoking those other guys in the morning. Too much bounce in our pounce (OK, these are getting lame) that evening offering to let the other team hunt with us by Merganser Mound instead of whatever crappy location they’d discovered, no matter that they’d closed their deficit to four after bringing in two birds.

As Sunday morning unfolded, we clearly heard our lead, and our chances at a repeat title, evaporate. The ducks, so plentiful the morning before, simply changed course on us. We watched them spill into the Little River, veering far past Merganser Mound, right to the other team. Our few opportunities at saving this tourney flew on the fringes of in-range, safe from the steel. The Hunting Gods simply won’t allow boasting, even in an event this crude.

Rounding up the decoys, some variation of the Kubler-Ross Five Stages of Grief set in.

Denial: “There’s no way THOSE guys killed too many birds; we may still win”

Anger: “I bet that rattling Mojo spooked the ducks away”

Bargaining: “Let’s just give it a little longer, don’t unload the shotguns yet”

Depression: “I can’t believe we’re gonna have this rubbed in our faces for the next year”

Acceptance: “Oh well, I think there’s some bourbon left at the house”

Actually, that last one may be part Depression as well. The final score, 9-6.

Not the end to duck season I’d hoped, but as always, a fun company and good times.

Besides, we’ll re-capture the title at Sea Duck Tournament ’10. I’m sure it’s not too early to guarantee victory.

Love for Lever Actions

Originally posted May 2009

Hunters are no more immune from stereotyping than any other group of humans. Say a newcomer strolls into camp toting an AR-Style firearm. What do a lot of hunters think?

“Here’s Rambo!”

Switch that rig out with the newest, fastest magnum chambering?

“Show-off, blowhard.”

And a lever action of any kind?

“Rookie, public land hunter, rube!”

Now, I may join in and hate hoot the first two groups - though I hunt with each style of weapon regularly - but I’ll take umbrage with those who consider the lever actions to be any sort of novice toy.

My first run-in with a lever action was way back in the ancient days of the ‘90’s. My longtime buddy Dirty J was carrying his father’s Marlin 336 .35 Remington down a limestone road in Manatee County when an old sow came be-bopping across the trail. Dirty tossed up the .35 and rolled the hog in an instant.

Several years later, I stood over a 170 lb mottled boar I popped with a Winchester 94 in the classic .30-30. As Dad and I re-lived the details of the stalk and shot, a black 120-pound boar crept out of a palmetto head. I deftly raised the rifle and lowered the boom, astonished this hog would stick his snout out in the commotion, yet proud as can be that Pops was there to witness it.

Since then, Dad bought a Marlin 1894 .44 Mag. which he’s enjoyed. A few years back I answered a classified ad in the paper and, more or less, stole a Marlin Guide Gun in .45-70 topped with a 1.5-4.5X Nikon Monarch, the cat’s meow in lever actions in my humble opinion.

(Note that I’m leaving out, solely for the purpose of this discussion, such fine lever actions such as the Ruger 96/44, Browning BLR, Savage Model 99, amongst a few others. What I’m really talking about are your cowboy guns. My reasons? I simply, sadly, have no experience with these. I do hope to change this.)

When I show up to camp with these guns, I am often met with the mocking statements I mentioned above, especially when those in the know realize I have much more capable and fashionable firearms in the locker. And it’s here where I’m lost trying to decide whether I’m defending these lever actions or campaigning for them. Mostly, I enjoy a little variety and debate.

Let’s start with what these guns are not. Plainly, the range limitation of the common lever action is a buzz kill. Even with a scope, your furthest responsible shot shouldn’t be much beyond 130, 140 yards. For some hunters, such a compromise in reach is unacceptable. And in truth, depending on where you hunt, this is a real consideration. Florida and much of the South is land of mixed terrain. Yes, we have the thick swamps and scrubs, but there are plenty of acres of broken pasture, prairie, and crop fields in which game is known to thrive and a lever action is out of its element.

Next, lever actions aren’t the most accurate. Start with the blunt-nosed, lead exposed bullets - they don’t scream “High Ballistic Co-efficiency” like Ballistic Tips and other spire points. Though they now have soft polymer tips for use in tubular magazines, the anatomy of the rifle is still not designed for MOA groups. These guns are made for portability - the shorter barrels, for example. You simply won’t harness the ballistic potential of any round fired out of an 18-inch tube. Couple these stumpy guns with iron sights, and precision is sacrificed. Scopes help, but even Swarovski glass is not going to improve the natural flaws of design.

As a result, there’s a stigma on how this accuracy prints on paper. Hunters equipped with a bolt action of some variety will dismissingly scoff at 3 ½ inch groups, though few really understand how accurate their own rifle and load may or may not be. A great many campfire storyteller would be humbled if their alleged sub-MOA rifles were truly put to the test. With an audience, wind, bad rests, drops in atmospheric pressure, and solar flares have all been blamed to explain why today their pet is punching 2-inch groups when just a few weeks ago a quarter covered three shots. Personal mythology aside, accuracy, as it is applied in the field and into the shoulder of a deer, is terribly over-rated.

But if we really want to talk about mythology and being over-rated, let’s discuss the lever action’s moniker of being a “brush gun”. I listened patiently to a guy in camp a few years back bragging on how his .444 Marlin would freight train through any tangle. Finally I asked him how many deer or hogs he’d shot in such conditions. He claimed none. His argument became even less persuasive after watching him miss a doe at 30 yards standing in the wide-open. The point is, a .444 will foul off a twig or anything else. Too many tests have been done to argue otherwise, but this has always been a fun source of pride and folklore for plenty of lever action enthusiasts.

The brush gun title really comes in the design of the firearm itself. These guns shine like diamonds in those dark swamps and scrubs. They are handy to carry and handle through the vines and overhanging branches. Those short barrels with open sights or low-power scopes pick up the target in a hurry. Lug a lever action with you once, and you’ll quickly discover the advantages both in portability and ease of operation.

And when you fair-punch your game, woooo-weeee, does that bullet deliver a smack-down. That slow, chugging bullet hits like a ton of bricks. The energy transfer from those blunt-nosed projectiles seems very real. Not a whole lot is left to scream across the countryside after passing through the off-shoulder which can be the case with the magnums. To date, I’ve never seen a hog or deer get his or her feet back under them after a clean shot with one of these rounds. I can’t say the same about my .300 Winchester Magnum.

So, what do we have in these lever actions? A novelty? A specialty tool?

Some of both. In swamps, oak hammocks, pine stands and other areas where you don’t have a shot much farther than 100 yards, lever actions should be in your wheelhouse, particularly if you still hunt.

Lever actions may not be ideal for your style of hunting. Still, it’s never a bad idea to keep one handy. They are slick handling, fast on the target, and all around fun to shoot. And you may think about holding your tongue next time someone rolls into camp with such a rifle.

They just may know how to use it.

Lakeland Highlands Scrub Preserve

I went to Lakeland Highlands Scrub Preserve in search of deer sign. For fifteen years my folks have lived on the northern fence line of the property and I’ve long dreamed of giant antlered deer running through the horse pasture. We’ve had visits from wild hogs, a couple of which met their demise, but never deer.

When I was a teenager, and before it had been bought by the county, I wandered this land with permission, popping quail and rabbits and whatever other small game crossed the war path of my trusty Benjamin Pump. The old railroad bed was a haven for such quarry, along with gopher tortoises whose burrows pockmarked the trail of quartz rock and prickly pear. At the back of the property, a marathon barefoot hike from the house, was a marsh where the most exotic of game lived – ducks and snipe. Though I certainly schemed and tried, all escaped the .177 pellet.

But I never saw deer sign.

It had been a decade since I set foot on this property though the park has been opened for several years now. According to the kiosk at the entrance, deer were amongst the mammals listed in the park, along with boar, fox, raccoons, and other small game. My hopes were certainly high to find some split hoof tracks in the sugar sand, perhaps a scrub oak rubbed raw back in the fall.

They say you can never go home, and in this instance, they were correct. Little was as I remembered. The marsh, bone dry from drought, now sports a boardwalk across it, where looking down, one can see empty bottles and other litter, not the turtles and gators and mottled ducks of my youth. The railroad bed has been stripped of its rails, spikes, ties and the imaginations and industries of a generation past. The once plentiful quail that ping-ponged between the palmetto hedges have flushed for good; there’s no way they can live in this terrain in need of a good burn to unclog the overgrown myrtles and fennels and sedges.

The bobwhite situation truly concerns me. It’s possible my recollections are grander than the realities, but there was a time before Eaglebrook Golf Course, before the surrounding suburbia, when coveys of quail on this property numbered in the dozens; I didn’t kill them all. The cattle kept the vegetation beat down, creating the edge habitat so vital to the quail’s survival. Occasionally, the old cowboys would take a match to the land, burning up the undergrowth, inspiring fresh life and food from the ashes. The quail thrived.

The land managers today are more concerned with the plight of the Scrub Jay which requires a niche habitat for their survival. In all my years of traipsing this land, I never saw one scrub jay. Yet, on this day, there was that bird’s picture on the kiosk with nary a mention of Mr. Bob White. Why the scrub jay merits more concern over its management and protection than the quail is for larger minds and morals than mine.

Carolyn seemed to be enjoying the hike. I guess it’s my own fault to come here with expectations and memories; few non-hunters understand the impact land, even land that does not belong to them, has on a hunter. And once that person is forced to leave the land, few times do they have the chance to return. Perhaps inside the brain of a hunter is the only place where earth remains unchanged.

Detaching from emotion, I did notice something else about this place, something that does make me happy. The trails seemed well-traveled, and if you can look beyond the occasional cracker wrapper, this is a great thing. Increasing land use introduces more people to the outdoors. Parents can bring their children to explore the beauty of the natural world. Amateur naturalists and photographers have a milieu for their hobbies. And one of my own underhanded goals was to gauge the hog population to see if I could petition a hunt of some kind in the future - not a whole lot of sign, save a few old rootings in the old railroad bed.

Wild areas are much easier to protect from encroaching civilization if a larger number of people experience its value. Hunters and anglers do a great deal of the work, but suffer from a lack in numbers. Recruiting others to enjoy nature sometimes leads to conflicts in how the land is utilized, but in the end works wonders in protecting it from concrete, fantastic news to both scrub jays and bobwhite. Lakeland Highlands Scrub Preserve will probably never be developed unless some misguided county manager strikes a deal with the devil, or there’s no one left to care about the land.

Having circled the property on our hike, we arrived back at the boardwalk. Confused by all the change and time away, I didn’t realize my marsh was now the one with this deck running through it. To make sure, we crossed it one last time to look for a dug cattle pond and the pile of dirt on which we once played King of the Mountain.

The water in the pond had run dry and the dirt mound wasn’t so much a mountain anymore, but it was there, though it’d be difficult to play any games with the pine trees growing up through the middle of it now. For a moment I recalled jumping snipe along the water’s edge, in feeble hopes of watching them drop back down so I could sneak up on them for shot. And the cows feeding on the water grasses, lifting their head to observe me in this foolishness.

And I remembered looking for deer sign, some split hoof tracks in the sugar sand, perhaps a scrub oak rubbed raw back in the fall, and how I’ve long dreamed of giant antlered deer running through the horse pasture. Of all the people who have or who will visit here, I’m selfishly pleased I’m the only one who has been able to take these memories with them.