The Teal Hunt - Sep 2024

Mid September marks the start of teal season each year.  Duck season evokes the notion of cold weather, and although a teal is a small duck that migrates south, the cold weather never quite migrates south with the birds.  Teal season normally coincides with an influx of the thickest swarms of mosquitos mankind has witnessed.  But teal hunting is fun, and there's nothing quite like fresh harvested teal and sausage gumbo in the pot.  I purchased my Basic Hunting license, Resident waterfowl, and Federal Duck Stamp and set my alarm for early the next morning. 

My buddy Gary asked me to meet him on Saturday morning, and I was there at the appointed time.  We rode his four wheeler out to the blind where we sat down on 5 gallon buckets turned upside down and waited.  It was a beautiful morning, with a full moon overhead.  Decoys were set out just in front of us to lure the birds in to their final resting place.  We talked in muffled whispers about stuff that old friends discuss - our kids, work, projects that we are working on at home.  

We heard a volley of shots go off from several locations to our west, south and east.  We saw a group of ducks fly overhead.  They were high and their motors were running.  They were in a hurry to get somewhere and it wasn't our pond.  Two cat squirrels played in the fork of a sweet gum tree behind us, dropping acorns that they had robbed from another tree.  They were making a lot of racket, distracting us from the job before us.

Soon we heard the flutter of wings and a whistle.  Ducks coming in!  They cupped their wings and landed in the pond.  Unfortunately, they were wood ducks.  Wood ducks aren't in season yet.  Wood duck drakes are, in my opinion, the most beautiful bird on the planet.  They eat acorns and aside from looking nice, they taste splendid roasted in a cast iron dutch oven with a dark brown gravy.  These birds knew they were safe in our pond since they were out of season.  I watched one wink at me and laugh.  Try that in "big duck" season, partner, I told him.

Many, many more wood ducks flew past us, maybe 35 or 40 in total.  Some got really close.  I could see their colorful plumage reflected against the rising sun.  But we couldn't shoot them.  The teal were non-existent.  The few that we saw were out of range.

Even if we could have shot some teal, I wouldn't have been able to.  When my alarm went off the morning of the hunt, I found the following sticky note: "Remember, No shooting a Gun."  Tricia made me promise her that due to my heart surgery, I would not shoot a shotgun.  Darn it!

So the only shots I took were with the camera on my phone that I shared with you tonight.  I felt like a VEGAN hunter!  Hopefully soon I will be freed up to shoot my shotgun when big duck season opens.  There are some cocky wood ducks I know that have a reservation with my cast iron dutch oven.