Duck Habits and Hunting Techniques

Duck Habits and Hunting Techniques
http://www.hunting.net/ (2005-04-21)

Over the years I’ve learned that one of the keys to duck hunting is to know where the ducks like to sit. On windy days puddle ducks often sit in small openings in cattail, bull rush or saw grassy areas in sloughs, ponds and lakes. They may also sit in small potholes or stock ponds that are low enough to be out of the wind; or in wooded river backwaters where the current is slower and the trees reduce the wind speed. Because these areas are small they usually contain only a few ducks, but on certain occasions there may be several dozen ducks of more than one species on this type of water. The slough I mentioned above was not more than a hundred yards long by fifty yards wide, and there were at least fifty ducks onit.

Not only do puddle ducks like to sit in small areas on windy days, they often prefer to sit on the downwind side of a hill, woods, or vegetation, that further reduces the wind speed. In the case above the ducks regularly sat on the north or west side of the slough near the cattails, to get out of the prevailing north/west winds. There was also a hill north and west of the slough that reduced the wind.

Because the slough I often hunted was surrounded on all sides by at least ten yards of cattails, I always had a ready blind. I’d just slide the canoe into the cattails, parallel to the shoreline, a yard or more from the water, depending on how thick the cattails were. I always tried to pull the canoe in parallel to the shoreline so that all the hunters, the one in the back, the one in middle, and the one in the front, had shooting opportunities; and had a clear line of fire. Once I had the canoe in position I’d carefully pull a few cattails over the sides of the canoe, and make sure a gunnysack, camouflage material or a decoy bag covered any exposed aluminum.

When the winds came out of the south or east the ducks used a larger opening about a quarter of a mile to the west, were they were sheltered from the wind by another hill. Because there were fewer cattails on this part of the slough I often sat on or behind a muskrat hive. When I did this I placed the decoys off to my right and slightly behind me if I could. I found that as long as I kept still, and kept my head down, the ducks usually focused on the decoys and not me. And because I am right handed I often had shots almost overhead as the ducks swung by before landing, or shots to my left when they did come in.

If there was no wind I might setup on the side of the slough farthest away from where the ducks were coming, so I could see them as they came in. On bright days I might set up with the sun at my back in the morning or evening. But, I usually relied more on the direction of the wind to choose a spot, or set up where I knew the birds liked to land. When the ducks wouldn’t come to the decoys, or landed someplace else, I would pick up the decoys and move to where the ducks wanted to be.

I often hunted another area about five miles from that slough, where there were several small potholes nestled in the bottoms of some rolling hills that were used as a cow pasture. Because the potholes were surrounded by hills they almost always had water in them, and they were protected from the wind. Many of the potholes were small, not more than ten to twenty yards across. But, they were deep enough to hold a few cattails and offer the ducks something to eat. Although the potholes were too small for a canoe or a duck boat, they were just right for jump shooting. I’d sneak up the back of one of the hills closest to the water, and when I was in range I’d stand up and shoot as the startled ducks took to the sky. When I hunted the bigger pot holes I set out four to six decoys, and either sat in the cattails on a five gallon pail, or made a make shift blind out of vegetation or nearby tree branches.

I’ve begun using portable hunting blinds when I hunt open area potholes in recent years. When I set up a portable blind I try to keep it down low where it isn’t sky lined, and set it in or near vegetation to break up its outline, so that it’s not readily visible to the ducks. I also don’t call much when I am sitting on small potholes. I rarely hear ducks calling from small water, and when I’ve tried calling to them they didn’t respond well. I might use a "hail call" when I first see the ducks, but when they get close I drop the call and grab the gun.

Scouting

One of the best duck hunting techniques my father taught me was to scout several areas before I hunted. He would take me out the week before the opener to watch the big slough I mentioned at the beginning of this article. We would sit on a hill about a quarter mile from the slough, where we could watch the entire two miles of cattails with a pair of 7x35 binoculars. In the evening we could see the ducks moving from the lake to the small opening where we used the canoe, or to the larger opening where we sat on the "rat hives." We’d sit there until dark, watching the ducks as they landed in small groups until there were several dozen ducks on the water. It usually got me so pumped up I couldn’t wait until the opener.

Dad would also take the family on "Sunday Drives" after church on Sunday mornings. The drives were supposedly for quality family time, and we always had fun driving around the country, following any dirt road that we came across. But, I realize now that a lot of that driving was so that Dad could check out every pothole, pond, slough and lake in the county. He wanted to know which areas had produced ducks that year, and which areas still had water in them, so he knew where to hunt when the duck season opened up. We had done it so many times when I was young, that when I got older I didn’t need to think about where I was going to hunt, I knew where the ducks were.

That’s how I chose the small hole in the cattail slough on opening morning. And that’s how I knew what the ducks would do now, because I had seen them do it several times before the season opened. The mallards came in low over the cattails, and began to back-peddle when they neared the open water. As the ducks lowered their feet I said, "Take ’em." We dropped our calls, shouldered our guns, picked out a couple of drakes, and pulled the triggers. As the concussion of the shells sounded in my ears I saw three ducks fall, one or both of us had hit two ducks. We each picked out another drake and fired again, and two more ducks fell. It was a great ending to another duck opener on my favorite spot.