Steve Horswell
Member
For your continued reading pleasure. From time to time I will post additional mishaps and misadventures...SRH
Tales of the Old Crony---First Date
I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. It was to be our first date. My mother had introduced us, probably to make sure I didn’t get in with the wrong crowd. Barely out of college and still somewhat wet behind the ears, I lacked experience and self-confidence. He, on the other hand, was a seasoned duck hunter with a couple of decades of experience under his belt. And, although we had talked about duck hunting, we hadn’t yet hunted together. The plan was for him to meet me at my house at my house at 5:30am to hunt The Slough.
Always prompt, it was still very dark when he arrived. In the dim light, I could see an old Ford pickup and topper with a canoe hanging out the back. My hunting rig consisted of a Chevy Vega towing a pumpkin seed-style boat on a trailer. I had filled the oil and checked Vega’s gas the night before so it was ready to go. Given our chariots, we set out with little fanfare. I led the way since The Slough was my home water.
The “duck bug” hit me early in life and I had been hunting The Slough since I before I was a teenager. It was close enough to home that I rode my bicycle there in the afternoons and waded wet to jump shoot ducks. At 13 I had graduated to a little double-end duck boat, trailer, black Lab, and a dozen decoys. I pestered my parents into hauling me out there on weekends and had spent many hours exploring the area. Now I had the opportunity to share The Slough with a seasoned duck hunter.
I had scouted the area the day before in what could be best described as a gale. The mallards had been working, particularly to an opening where a tree-lined feeder creek entered into the slough. I had walked in and found that beavers had built a long, low dam that created a half acre semi-circular pool out into the marsh. The willows along the shoreline provided a nice windbreak. Duck nirvana!
The previous day’s gale had been the lead edge of a storm system that left a couple inches of snow and sent the temperatures plummeting into the upper teens overnight. Most of the slough was frozen when we arrived but the feeder creek was still open. We manhandled our boats into the road ditch and down the bank into the creek. Although not yet light, we were able to see well enough to begin the several hundred yard trip down the creek to the opening we hoped to hunt.
A short distance down the creek, we encountered a small beaver dam. After pushing and dragging our boats over the dam, we resumed our journey only to encounter a second, larger beaver dam. We repeated the crossing process only to find the third, largest, and, thankfully, last dam across the creek.
We negotiated the last dam with somewhat more effort than the previous two. Warmed by our efforts, we set the decoys in the semi-circular opening, pulled the boats into the willows, and waited for the action to begin. It wasn’t long before things began to happen---our sweaty clothes started to freeze and the continually dropping temperature caused our hole to grow ever smaller.
Around mid-morning, a bewildered mallard drake swung into the opening in the willows. One of us, I forget which, managed overcome the cold-induced stupor enough to knock the drake down. By mutual, but unspoken agreement, we broke the decoys out of the ice and retraced our water trail back to our waiting vehicles. This humble beginning set the tone for the many future outings and, unknown to us at the time, became the foundation for the Tales of the Old Crony.
To be continued…
© All rights reserved. Steven R Horswell 2015
Tales of the Old Crony---First Date
I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. It was to be our first date. My mother had introduced us, probably to make sure I didn’t get in with the wrong crowd. Barely out of college and still somewhat wet behind the ears, I lacked experience and self-confidence. He, on the other hand, was a seasoned duck hunter with a couple of decades of experience under his belt. And, although we had talked about duck hunting, we hadn’t yet hunted together. The plan was for him to meet me at my house at my house at 5:30am to hunt The Slough.
Always prompt, it was still very dark when he arrived. In the dim light, I could see an old Ford pickup and topper with a canoe hanging out the back. My hunting rig consisted of a Chevy Vega towing a pumpkin seed-style boat on a trailer. I had filled the oil and checked Vega’s gas the night before so it was ready to go. Given our chariots, we set out with little fanfare. I led the way since The Slough was my home water.
The “duck bug” hit me early in life and I had been hunting The Slough since I before I was a teenager. It was close enough to home that I rode my bicycle there in the afternoons and waded wet to jump shoot ducks. At 13 I had graduated to a little double-end duck boat, trailer, black Lab, and a dozen decoys. I pestered my parents into hauling me out there on weekends and had spent many hours exploring the area. Now I had the opportunity to share The Slough with a seasoned duck hunter.
I had scouted the area the day before in what could be best described as a gale. The mallards had been working, particularly to an opening where a tree-lined feeder creek entered into the slough. I had walked in and found that beavers had built a long, low dam that created a half acre semi-circular pool out into the marsh. The willows along the shoreline provided a nice windbreak. Duck nirvana!
The previous day’s gale had been the lead edge of a storm system that left a couple inches of snow and sent the temperatures plummeting into the upper teens overnight. Most of the slough was frozen when we arrived but the feeder creek was still open. We manhandled our boats into the road ditch and down the bank into the creek. Although not yet light, we were able to see well enough to begin the several hundred yard trip down the creek to the opening we hoped to hunt.
A short distance down the creek, we encountered a small beaver dam. After pushing and dragging our boats over the dam, we resumed our journey only to encounter a second, larger beaver dam. We repeated the crossing process only to find the third, largest, and, thankfully, last dam across the creek.
We negotiated the last dam with somewhat more effort than the previous two. Warmed by our efforts, we set the decoys in the semi-circular opening, pulled the boats into the willows, and waited for the action to begin. It wasn’t long before things began to happen---our sweaty clothes started to freeze and the continually dropping temperature caused our hole to grow ever smaller.
Around mid-morning, a bewildered mallard drake swung into the opening in the willows. One of us, I forget which, managed overcome the cold-induced stupor enough to knock the drake down. By mutual, but unspoken agreement, we broke the decoys out of the ice and retraced our water trail back to our waiting vehicles. This humble beginning set the tone for the many future outings and, unknown to us at the time, became the foundation for the Tales of the Old Crony.
To be continued…
© All rights reserved. Steven R Horswell 2015
