Waterfowl Hunting

It's been a while since I updated my blog but I have been working out of town for months and haven't had a lot of time for hunting. I finally had some time off and was able to take Artus out to try to hunt some ducks.

The first day we went, we didn't have much luck. Actually, I'm just a bad shot so it didn't go too well. I did work with him on sitting quietly and he did a decent job of it. It was a transition for him to go from searching for birds like we usually do to just sitting and waiting. One thing that seemed to work with him was whispering "shhhh! Look for the birds!" Then he would start scanning the sky.

Yesterday, I tried to take him out again but ended up breaking through an ice shelf into freezing water while I was trying to set decoys. I got back to the truck as fast as I could to get warm and dry. It was a dangerous thing to do and I'm lucky I just got a dunk in the river for my troubles.

This morning, when I went down to the river bottoms on the farm I live on, there were a couple of other trucks down there so I went to see who was there. As I walked up I heard someone calling "Atticus" which is the name of a friend's dog. I recognized the dog but none of the guys. Turns out that they were friends and brothers of the guy I knew and were borrowing his dog. After introductions, I asked if Artus and I could join them and we did.

The dogs were leery of the ice shelf. Atticus had a bad experience last year not being able to get back up on one and Artus was unfamiliar with it. The six guys there had bagged some birds before I got there and I wasn't able to shoot one, but we played fetch with Artus with one of the ducks for a bit. When he was a puppy he didn't like to let go of animals in his mouth very well and I'd have a hard time getting game we were training with from him. Today he was great and gave me the duck every time. He and Atticus both ended up breaking through the ice and swimming and they both swam well but had a hard time with the ice shelf getting out. I thought I was going to have to get in a couple of times to get one or both of them. For a first hunt, I thought Artus did good. It's all a matter of putting it all together. I'm going to take Derek when we go tomorrow. He's excited. I am going to a different spot however. I'm done dealing with the ice shelf at the river bottoms.