Second Split opener 12/11/10

We decided to hunt the big cut corn field for the second split opener. Not because the scouting turned up piles of birds sitting in the field day in , and day out, but because it's in a location that gives you a chance to draw birds from all directions. The scouting efforts, in fact, only had birds in this field on Tuesday the 7th, and nothing that I saw after that. So, rather than wake up at 3:00am to go out and battle other hunters for possible spots on the Public waters, we made the call to go to the field.

The weather for the day changed from clear skies and zero wind early on, to an overcast sky that finally produced enough breeze to make the spread move, before clearing again and bringing back the blue bird skies. Winds were out of the South, South East for the entire hunt. Temperatures were in the upper 20's to start the day, but climbed with the southern wind into the lower 40's by the time we were driving out of the field.

Bird movement was mostly out of the south, with only two groups of birds that we spotted coming from the north. One was a group of migrating geese flying waaaay high at 8:15am, one hour after legal shooting light. We did manage to get spotted by them, but the appearance of the decoy spread we laid out in the pre-dawn darkness wasn't enough to make them drop from the heavens and into shooting range. Another big wad of ducks came though from the north and spotted us all standing in the decoys, stretching our legs and sipping coffee, instead of laying low in our blinds. We didn't get a look from them either.

Most of the huntable birds in the area took to the air between 9:30am and 11:00am, with some large groups of geese heading north east of the spot we were located. Hopefully some scouting in that direction this week will turn up the location of their buffet, and possibly land us a new field to hunt.

All in all we had a good hunt, with the jump shot of a lone Ruddy duck from the pond, as well as a few geese that committed to the landing hole and didn't end up leaving. Timber did well too, not breaking on the geese that we called in and let land in the spread while the remainder of their group circled one more time before locking their wings, dropping their feet and following the same course. With about six or seven birds on the ground, feeding only ten to fifteen feet from our layout blinds, and nothing else in the air that was working, I called out "Kill 'em!!" to the group as we let chaos break loose. There's nothing like it!!

Yeah, we should of had a few more geese to take home, and probably some mallards too. But, that's why it's called hunting I guess. All in all a good time was had by everybody, and that's really what it's all about.