Barney Ford Hunt 2009

We had another great hunt this year for the group that generously contributed to the Barney Ford diversity scholarship at the Leeds School. Thanks to Donal Culver, Matt Grassman, and John Gable of Boulder Valley Farm for making this hunt possible two years in a row.

Everything went smoothly besides Matt and I getting stuck in the mud when we were scouting the day before. Everybody shot straight and we killed 8 different species of ducks.

Bling Bling

Second week in a row with a banded bird. This bird was banded in Saskatchewan in 2004 and the one from last week was banded somewhere in Colorado in 2008. The certificates will not show up for a couple weeks.

This was definitely the coolest duck hunt I have had in Colorado thus far. Sarah and I scouted this spot the night before we hunted and we barely saw any ducks. We picked a spot on an island that had plenty of cover and some slack water and decided to book it because it was getting dark and a big front was rolling in from the north. To make a long story short the wind picked up by about 15 mph and the temp dropped from about 50 to about 25 in less than an hour. I also proceeded to get us lost in the dark and soaking wet. Fortunately Sarah has not called off the wedding yet.

Over the course of the night about 2 inches of snow fell and temperatures dropped down to 17 degrees. As we walked in we hoped that the cold front would bring a bunch of new ducks down and we were not disappointed. After a pretty major decoy adjustment at about 8:00 mallards just started dumping into our spread. We had a big group commit and dropped 3 green brains right in front of us and then I got one that sailed into the woods and thick brush on the opposite side of the river. We sent Dex on the 3 birds in the current before they were swept out of reach. The next 30 minutes were ridiculous because every time we were about to get settled and send Dex after the bird in the brush new ducks were showing up and dumping into our spread. 4 more greenheads died before I got a chance to send Dex over to the other bank. I was worried that we might have lost the bird because the cover was really thick and the duck looked like it might have had a little life in it when it went down. Dex made me sweat it out for about 5 minutes as he charged around with no results but then he came trotting out of the woods with a big ole bull chuckle head jewelry and all.

Opening Day O9

Dex standing proud. He made a couple really long retrieves on cripples.

Banded Gadwall. What a way to start the season. Will post info when it comes in.

Blue bird day until around 10:30 and the wind showed up finally.

Part of our spread. We had 11 dozen dekes and 3 robos rockin.

I can't remember a hunt with such a diverse bag. We killed 2 drake red heads, 2 drake mallards, 5 widgeon, 2 greenwing teal, 1 bluewing teal, 1 pintail, and 9 gadwall. We hunted till 2:30 in the afternoon so it was by no means hot and heavy but a solid day. A lot less work was involved this year thanks to Chris McReynolds and his drift boat. In my experience opening day is always a comedy of errors but this year things went pretty smooth. There was some minor hiccups with the motor on friday, the snail inspection by DOW, and the fact that Winchester and I both forgot our calls. Fortunately for the ducks we remembered our calls on Sunday and scared everything away before it could get in shooting distance.

Bucket Face and Fat Daddy part deux

Another Thug from the Colorado River

Average Fish At the driving club

gotta love top water action

Diddy needs to learn how to show off a fish

Both of these places are aquariums.