New to waterfowl.. what gear?

[KurtR]

What about identifying ducks during the hunt? What's the trick to that you've figured out as you're starting out? The idea of over limit is terrifying

I would say its just a experience thing. If in question dont shoot and that can be tough in that first half hour. Later in the season gets easier as ducks get more color . study a book and spend some time at a zoo helps

 

[WCB]

What about identifying ducks during the hunt? What's the trick to that you've figured out as you're starting out? The idea of over limit is terrifying

Bring binoculars where ever you go...I never leave my truck without them for any type of hunting. At a distance guess the duck then watch it in the binos or just in general watch ducks flying in binos. It takes time just like scoring antlered or horned animals on the hoof. There are a lot of calculations that go through someone's head and some guys just do it really fast.

 

[DE302duck]

Waterfowl is largely a buy once cry once deal, with maybe the exception of motorized decoys which need to be replaced frequently and lost decoys from time to time.

Buy a dozen nice decoys like Dakota or Tanglefree flocked. Texas rigs are worth their weight in gold. You don’t need a mega spread to start.

Calls are cool because you’ll always have them. I still have my nearly 30 year old Avery call that is still a really nice option for quiet, tight calling. Don’t buy an expensive call until you master the cheaper, easier calls.

Shotgun chokes matter. Even if you’re shooting a basic gun, invest in a good aftermarket choke. You’ll be glad you did. Lube it up every season.

For clothing, buy a nice outerwear set to start, if you can. Sitka or First Lite are likely the best, then maybe Drake or Chene or something in that middle ground. Good outerwear with the base layers you already have will make a LOT of difference in your comfort and enjoyment. Wool is your friend. This is one of the only pursuits we do where concealment and camo actually matter for most situations.

Waders…just don’t buy the cheap stuff, as you’ll be lucky to get a season. Plenty of middle ground and yes, fishing waders like Simms work great. Sitka are very expensive and has had durability issues but generally stand behind their product. First Lite apparently has waders coming next year which are supposedly bombproof but will also probably be expensive . We’ll see. No wader lasts forever but cheap ones will ruin your hunt.

Great info in here. Completely agree with Simms waders. Pricey, but durable and versatile for fishing.

 

[Jesse Jaymes]

What about identifying ducks during the hunt? What's the trick to that you've figured out as you're starting out? The idea of over limit is terrifying

Scrutinize anything without a yellow bill and green head. Keep your bird book/guide in your bag. You'll know a Canvasback when it's in your hand. If you're not cofident you can tell another Can or Pin while in the air....you're a Goose hunter the rest of the morning.

Juvie pins have almost put me over a handful of time.

If you're hunting Ponderay and the surrounding area....you'll get a ton of Widgeon. Teal. And Ringneck ducks. There is no worry about count or hen/drake with those.

Lastly...like I've stated with advice to the novice.....if they're close enough to kill consistenly....they're close enough identify accurately most of the time.

 

[Idaho4x4Bronco]

Scrutinize anything without a yellow bill and green head. Keep your bird book/guide in your bag. You'll know a Canvasback when it's in your hand. If you're not cofident you can tell another Can or Pin while in the air....you're a Goose hunter the rest of the morning.

Juvie pins have almost put me over a handful of time.

If you're hunting Ponderay and the surrounding area....you'll get a ton of Widgeon. Teal. And Ringneck ducks. There is no worry about count or hen/drake with those.

Lastly...like I've stated with advice to the novice.....if they're close enough to kill consistenly....they're close enough identify accurately most of the time.

Most likely will be near Ponderay, possibly St Maries area. I haven't duck hunted since 2004, dying to dive back in. I'm not the type to shoot then look, I just enjoy the experience. I'll find a book this weekend and start studying
I don't want to hijack the man's thread though.

 

[willtim]

The single most important thing in waterfowling is to be on the X.

 

[MallardSX2]

Get you a small boat with a small Mud Motor (Mud skipper or the like) and hunt the places the big boats cant go with about 12 CLEAN flocked decoys.

I ran a big rig in NY for years. We killed a PILE of birds but I wish I had just went smaller and hunted the places that most people couldn't go with their big rigs. I could have slept an extra 3 hours a day and still killed a limit......

Advise like this would have saved me way over $25,000....

 

[Brendan]

I get cold easy, and I hunt everything from warm September hunts, to February Ocean hunts in the Northeast. I bought the Sitka Delta Zip Waders, paid retail, and they are one of my least regret purchases of any piece of hunting gear I own. Love them. My Stocking foot / Fly Fishing waders didn't come close to warm enough in the late season.

All about what type of hunting your do, but if cold weather I'd at the least look at a boot-foot wader with extra space, and neoprene or Gore Tex with room for layering.

 

[See_Bennie_Point]

You can have the fanciest and most $$$$ gear/equipment, if the ducks can see you, you won't kill anything.

Started duck hunting with a buddy last year. We spent a few nights camping and hunting. The first day and a half we spent building blinds, setting decoys (I bought a mojo because "movement not he water kills ducks") etc etc.

We killed all our ducks after finding a spot with reeds taller than us that we could disappear in. Not a single decoy on the water, no calling, no mojo.

Cover kills birds at the end of the day. I have $100 Tidewe waders from Amazon that kept me warm and dry, $250 pump shotgun, and a UA hoodie I bought at Ross. My buddy has $700 waders, $1000 shotgun, and all the sitka waterfowl camo. We killed the same number of birds.

Get out, hide, be patient, shoot straight. Find what works FOR YOU and YOUR SETUP/STYLE, and buy things here and there as you go as YOU NEED.

Also having a dog helped tremendous as we ended up hunting ponds that seemed to have quicksand once you got a few yards from shore. My GWP figured out pretty quick that duck hunting is sit and wait instead of him going out and working a field for upland. You don't need an AKC champion bloodline either. I have a buddy who hunts with a rescued german shepherd, another who runs a cocker spaniel. Its basically "wait, fetch."

My $0.02.

 

[Banded_spooney]

The one thing you absolutely want to ignore on this thread is @KurtR ’s advice to run lucky ducks. Yuk!!! Wings are too small to give you enough attracting flash and the quality is spotty at best.

I’d rather run a blade or a Mojo king mallard. Or better yet find a used original mojo with the big flashy metal wings and put a remote in it. King mallards are great but mojo quality goes down every year and model change, It’s a huge problem.

The new avian x power flight is a little spendy and I’ve only ran them for a year so can’t tell how long they hold up but they have been great so far.

I think I’m currently sitting on like 23 spinning wing decoys of different types right now so I’ve tried most types at this point.

 

[Banded_spooney]

Now if Kurt wants to grace us with dog advice we probably shouldn’t argue.

 

[MtnW]

#1 Hunt where the ducks want to be
#2 Motion , a couple of Mojo’s and a few decoys with pumps to add life to your spread and attract flocks from a distance

 

[KurtR]

The one thing you absolutely want to ignore on this thread is @KurtR ’s advice to run lucky ducks. Yuk!!! Wings are too small to give you enough attracting flash and the quality is spotty at best.

I’d rather run a blade or a Mojo king mallard. Or better yet find a used original mojo with the big flashy metal wings and put a remote in it. King mallards are great but mojo quality goes down every year and model change, It’s a huge problem.

The new avian x power flight is a little spendy and I’ve only ran them for a year so can’t tell how long they hold up but they have been great so far.

I think I’m currently sitting on like 23 spinning wing decoys of different types right now so I’ve tried most types at this point.

Funny how experience differs we have 10 lucky ducks hd on remotes never a problem. Mojos have been some breaking pieces of garbage for us. I still have the original roto duck I bought in 1994 and it still spins. It should have died fallen in water multiple times left out and frozen and full of rust just keeps spinning. Most important is being able to turn what ever off big geese hate those things.

 

[Banded_spooney]

Funny how experience differs we have 10 lucky ducks hd on remotes never a problem. Mojos have been some breaking pieces of garbage for us. I still have the original roto duck I bought in 1994 and it still spins. It should have died fallen in water multiple times left out and frozen and full of rust just keeps spinning. Most important is being able to turn what ever off big geese hate those things.

I still have two of the original mojos and they are still kicking. The newer stuff we have had lots of problems with and have even had to have mojo send us new wings and motors. But they flash 10x better than the lucky ducks so it’s worth the hassle. I think that’s important with me hunting birds that have been pressured all the way down the flyway and you catching them earlier.

It’s interesting on the honker front. Ya, I’d rather turn them off but for the most part, the honkers don’t seem to mind for us over water. We don’t shoot ducks in dry so I never put them out if I’m strictly goose hunting.

Specks though… my god they avoid them like the plague

 

[KurtR]

I still have two of the original mojos and they are still kicking. The newer stuff we have had lots of problems with and have even had to have mojo send us new wings and motors. But they flash 10x better than the lucky ducks so it’s worth the hassle. I think that’s important with me hunting birds that have been pressured all the way down the flyway and you catching them earlier.

It’s interesting on the honker front. Ya, I’d rather turn them off but for the most part, the honkers don’t seem to mind for us over water. We don’t shoot ducks in dry so I never put them out if I’m strictly goose hunting.

Specks though… my god they avoid them like the plague

Ya I’m 95% dry land for everything now. I hunt water a couple times a year to remind me how much I like dry land hunts. The specks up here come to the spinner like the ducks. Once duck season starts it’s almost always a combo hunt so we usually set up for both.

 

[spur60]

The single most important thing in waterfowling is to be on the X.

I'd agree with that; when you're first starting out. Once you understand flightlines/traffic, decoy visibility, flagging, and calling, the X isn't near as important.

 

[Banded_spooney]

Ya I’m 95% dry land for everything now. I hunt water a couple times a year to remind me how much I like dry land hunts. The specks up here come to the spinner like the ducks. Once duck season starts it’s almost always a combo hunt so we usually set up for both.

Don't get me wrong, we smash the specks, but they can be very discerning. We have to hide better from them than ducks/snows/honkers, and movement in the decoys if it's a water hunt is very important. In either scenario artificial movement is a no go. No spinners and flagging is great for attention at over 150 yards but if they are within 150 and you flag, they might not flare but they will not finish. The most annoying part is, we rarely have a 'dry field' speck hunt. They love the mud. Get them over water on big wind days or hunt feeds in nasty sloppy mess with no good hide. They get called at all over the valley and by every dude from Canada to Sacramento so being both good on a speck call and knowing how to read the birds is absolutely critical. -- they are fun and challenging imo.

Not many people dedicate time to honkers around here so when we do, we can flag them all the way to the ground. The biggest thing is starting in December if they have been living in a spot for a month they only travel 75 yards from roost to food and no matter how sneaky you are they know something is wrong before they leave the roost. Early season water is scarce so they are traveling a mile or so from the roost to food, but that season is only 3 days long. It was productive this year for sure as a food isn't nearly as plentiful right now as it is most years.

 

[CorbLand]

Funny how experience differs we have 10 lucky ducks hd on remotes never a problem. Mojos have been some breaking pieces of garbage for us. I still have the original roto duck I bought in 1994 and it still spins. It should have died fallen in water multiple times left out and frozen and full of rust just keeps spinning. Most important is being able to turn what ever off big geese hate those things.

We havent had problems with the half dozen Luckys we have used either. I had mine for a couple years and it was going strong until the day it got stolen.

Like you, we have to turn them off for geese. They will flare a mile away if we have them spinning.

 

[dtrkyman]

Keep it simple, minimal dekes, minimal crap! Save your money for gas to drive around and scout!

Gear doesn't kill ducks, good locations do! Other than location hiding is the next prority.

 

[twdjr]

This was our first outing last week as two south pawed rookies.

Y'all started out on a good note!