Ten more sleeps

no mateits not tough .its only the start of the season after all and me being retired can grab gun and gummies and go stooge round ellesmere or wherever if the mood takes me . beleive me some of my greaterst discoveries on ellesmere have been doing just that .furthewrmore why should my foolishness put good buggers like you and LSAR at risk for a bloody mallard or two shit happens and at 70 well Illjust have to wear it .anyhow givesd me another day top find that bloody stretcher the late immortal gadgetman gave me years ago .searched up in roof ,dads trailer so its gotta be hidin in me bloody mancave!coupla more beers and illfind it .gadget old chap yes its me if youre not busy up yonder could ya just send me a cxlue ...or two ....

Lots of extra duck ponds in Canterbury now
So the birds will be more dispersed

Good luck though

You fellahs enjoy this coming weekend and stay off the beersies until after you have cleaned up your gearsies.

Getting close now men !! Good luck and stay safe !

In the words of the highlander.... There can be only one!!!!

Up at sparrows fart in the morning MD?

Working day mate...working day.

Decoys are sorted, blind final brushing up complete. Big mutton roast is done. Other 2 guys have patterned and function tested guns. Everyone's here so time to have a big late lunch then a couple of beers. Up at 0400hrs tomorrow

Çreek has cut way dosn so lost half acre of prime water. Old hide is high and dry so made a temp one with nets near the creek. Usual resident birds are absent but we're hoping for some pass shooting. Fed some more grain this morning and st decoy in creek and puddles. A few parries cruised ooverhead checking out for fresh creebees and dog is getting real keen.
Anyway, can only hope for the best and as they say; " if you aint got a line in the water you'll catch no fish. Weathet looks ok though so me and missus and dog will at leadt have a nice picnic :)

Taking the old Beretta out @Woody?

Yes Ross. Still have some bismuth. Also taking along my old super saive cyl-cyl in case of some close ones early on.. Saive worked at FN and hand built his shotguns. Has a very good weapon engineer, extracted by the brits during both world wars I believe.

@Micky Duck

It's going to be a good one i can tell

Traveling home this evening

Attachment 274309

Good luck! Stop reading the forum now and get some sleep. It's not happening for me this year, so looking forward to your stories.

No more sleeps

Have at ‘em fellahs

How did it go MD? Did you slay them? Was it worth the wait?

Well....first pair came in,Billbob n AJ fired.the drake tipped over. Next pair came in,I fired once drake folded....and that,as they say was that. Nothing else even looked like dropping in. We did drink numerous cups of tea.ate lots of bacon n egg pie,a few goose nuggets,cheese toasties,chocky bickies and even some crisps n lollies. Called it a bit after lunch. Off to lake for a hoon around tomorrow.might manage another bird or two with luck.

No time for tea or bickies at my place.. ducks absolutly everywhere.. swans and geese on the pond watched the action and didn't fly, the little .410 got hot. Hoe for a coffee by 8am :thumbsup:

Home by 4. Accidental swim getting a decoy cut the day short. Wind, rain etc so perfect weather and birds played the game to boot.

Called it after lunch..... ?? we ate so much we ate into the future........ hahaha

Still a fun day with mates is all it's about.

I insisted on bringing a frying pan..... it clanged like a cow bell walking in and may or may not have frightened them away.....!!

Well, blue sky, hot, no wind. Our loal geese flew over at stratosphere altitude about 7.30 am never to return. The few ducks we saw were at a similar height but managed 4. Well down on usual. Pulked lin at 4.30 as nothing seen after 2 pm and dark would have come quick. Forecast till next friday is same so when weather gets dirty next weekend things may improve I hope. Dog very pleased with himself though with his good retrieves..

6:45am and we had not fired a shot, then we limited out by 7:55. Maybe new home flocked decoys did the trick. Got a rooster in the arvo. Great day with No.1 (and only).

3 shooters here today. Shooting a maize paddock. First frost of the year and bloody cold, only to turn still, hot and clear. also I guessed wrong at how the birds would come in, and our maimai was out by 90 degrees, so first shooter had to shoot, and then drop down to let second guy have a crack at departing birds. A bit frustrating! So tough conditions. We were one bird shy of a combined Parrie limit, and also picked up about 20 mallards and greys between us, so can't complain really.

We still had a bad start to the season for a second time in a row.
Never had any experience with duck shooting so don't know what to really expect, but am finding that most of the people firing the shots were in the same spot well away from our maimai.
Seems to be the same area in the wetlands where the ducks want to land, other shooters were telling us it was because the ducks don't like flying into the sun with the glare in the water where we were situated.
I don't seem to be the greatest shot either which doesn't help things.

Attachment 274485 the greylard hen was a woundies on lake,followed her till shot presented.the drake flew off when approached but was running rough like a B52 with engine out...kept following him.landed then off again over island and went down in long grass,I marked the spot.parked boat and stalked in with gun at ready.young Poppy was casting about then hit scent.nose going bananas then focused on tuft of long grass,she went around it but kept eyes n nose focused on spot.i approached,reached in and Yippy!!! One very much alive drake was plucked out. Made the 70 km trip each way and early start worth it just to see her work it out.

Attachment 274486 nearly a grey.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by kotuku

no mateits not tough .its only the start of the season after all and me being retired can grab gun and gummies and go stooge round ellesmere or wherever if the mood takes me . beleive me some of my greaterst discoveries on ellesmere have been doing just that .furthewrmore why should my foolishness put good buggers like you and LSAR at risk for a bloody mallard or two shit happens and at 70 well Illjust have to wear it .anyhow givesd me another day top find that bloody stretcher the late immortal gadgetman gave me years ago .searched up in roof ,dads trailer so its gotta be hidin in me bloody mancave!coupla more beers and illfind it .gadget old chap yes its me if youre not busy up yonder could ya just send me a cxlue ...or two ....

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re gadgetman and the stretchers -bugga me he came through .didnt find his but picked up two of that model in good nick and bagged off TM..wait for it $2.00!no its not a misprint $2.00.

Attachment 274490one very tired pooch after a dozen or so retrieves in raupo infested pond today and a few retrieved from stump /log/branch infested shallow water in the big lake ..

I shot by myself this morning, and as is often the case, shot really well when not having to think about others and able to choose when I wanted to shoot. Less people means less movement too and the birds decoyed well and in smaller numbers.
Ended the morning with 24 and some good shooting, which I was happy with.

Rotonaro?

@whanahuia not only does it help sometimes not having to compete with someone else in the shooting, the likelihood of shooting really well always increases exponentially if no one is there to see it

That should be a law along side Murphys.

My brother in law was among a group of twelve that shot sixty ducks on opening morning. He shot three so I took delight in pointing out that was only 60% of the average. I feel I have the right to abuse him as he hasn’t missed an opening in the last 35 years (and nor has he ever invited me to tag along).

Had the rangers and fish and game turn up to the friends pond today here in Manawatu.
All above board here Lads and nothing too see :)
They were doing spot checks along our road as there is a few shooters and mimias along it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by sikaduk

Rotonaro?

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On Saturday yep,Sunday local honey hole.

Limited out on ducks both sat and sunday on the Kaipara despite the clear fine weather. And despite receiving a text that one of my best mates passed away on saturday resulting in a high speed dash across mudflats on a dropping tide. Got back to his private ramp, walked up to his house just on dark to find him sitting the house watching tv. Some idiot got their wires crossed.
Also managed 3 canada's 1 parry. Got a possum with the jeep driving home on sunday.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Allgood

Limited out on ducks both sat and sunday on the Kaipara despite the clear fine weather. And despite receiving a text that one of my best mates passed away on saturday resulting in a high speed dash across mudflats on a dropping tide. Got back to his private ramp, walked up to his house just on dark to find him sitting the house watching tv. Some idiot got their wires crossed.
Also managed 3 canada's 1 parry. Got a possum with the jeep driving home on sunday.

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bloody good going squire!

We got 21 in our pond and a parry
Sunday qe only picked up 2 before we headed home. Could have shot alot more but my daughters first full year so she was given the 1st shot in alot of birds which the rest of us could have shot . Credit to the boys for allowing her to be able to do that . And refraining from pulling the trigger. Wasn't about the numbers shot for us .

Good on you @Quackers that's the spirit,the other thing we found helpful was making it the you guns job to finish off any woundies on water,that also means you can give them different loads,some clay target loads work well for water swatting heads,you can get steel in #7-8s now which should work well in range for that job,it probably won't have enough oomph to pepper body.