Waterbirds of the Delta

Birds were everywhere last weekend and the bright sun made photographing them a little easier than usual.

Here are a few:

(click on the photo to enlarge)

This cormorant could have been bronze.

Why is there no hunting on Little Franks. It no longer serves as a refuge as there’s no habitat. Before the levees crumbled, Little Franks was marsh, now it’s open water.

Seems to be more tundra swans than last year.

Sandhill cranes seem to increase in numbers each year. Twenty years ago we seldom saw a crane. 

They’re called sandhill cranes for a reason. Webb Tract has lots of sand hills and cranes too.

Sandhill cranes make great sounds.

The cranes are quite large. In a few states they are hunted.

Sandhills are quite a sight.

The Delta is quite a place when all the winter visitors are present.

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California Delta Scenes in January

The California Delta is a wilderness in Winter. Late December and January bring out the best in waterfowling.

Here are some photos from recent trips.

Lola has learned to relax while waiting for her chance to be a star.

Click on photos to enlarge.

Different species with a common bond.

Sand is plentiful and useful in the Delta.

Same blind, same dog, another day, different bird.

The disappointment of November turns into the optimism of December and the excitement of January. November is long and January too short.

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Hardly Fired Up Goose Hunt

We make every effort to hide. Here's my hunting partner in full-guilly mode.

First thoughts about a mid-February specklebelly goose hunt were that it would be quite exciting.

As the day arrived, a look at the weather forecast moderated our excitement. Of course we had to give it a try.

Our day and a half on Webb Tract was sunny, warm and mostly boring. However, we did bag eleven white-fronts between five of us. It was mostly a test of long range shooting at passing birds.

I killed time by bringing my camera to the blind and taking a few photos. Not very noteworthy, but here are a couple of them.

Birds of prey were abundant. Besides this sharp-shinned hawk, we saw merlins, red-tails, harriers and kites.

Sometimes the ships look like they're on land.

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Waterfowl Sunrise

Matt Bloom and I watched geese rise in the east as shooting time arrived last weekend. Check out the video. One of the side benefits of waterfowl hunting is observing the sun rise.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UUOp0WJAAo&feature=plcp&context=C3ed6166UDOEgsToPDskLfl3sE28uheiCg_XpdmZ7L

We did well.

Matt shows off a couple of our geese. Specs were the main target.

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Waterfowl Mid-Season Ups and Downs

The waterfowl season has been up and down so far. Three trips to the grasslands produced two busts and one boom. Hunted Salt Slough on Wednesday the 30th of November when the winds nearly blew us off the area. We didn’t do well in the howling winds.

By the time we found a pond with ducks, the wind was blowing so hard that the ducks didn’t fly – at least not where we were. We held out until about 3:00 PM and headed home with one ring-neck duck between us.

On the following Saturday, I hunted the grasslands on a private club. My host and I shot 14 ducks of the mixed bag variety. Strong winds helped us on that day. I had a poor shooting day, which is common in strong winds.

On Wednesday the 7th of December, my friend Tom and I took advantage of reservation #4 at Merced. We decided to go with area E in the bypass. This is a mallard resting spot drainage that’s about 30 yards wide. First time at this spot for us, but we wanted to give it a try.

Mallards worked frequently, but they were very shy. We never fired a shot despite having birds in sight most of the morning. Our afternoon pheasant hunt at Salt Slough was also a bust. However, we accomplished some serious scouting and we’ll be back.

The slough was about 30 yards wide and the mud made for difficult wading. Wear stocking foot waders and tight boots for this area.

This last weekend we hunted Webb Tract in the Delta and shot three geese out of about 50,000 we saw. The conditions just weren’t right, but the birds were there.

We saw plenty of geese last weekend, but didn’t kill many.

Click on the photo to see the geese in the sky.

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Nearly Perfect 2011 Waterfowl Opener

Didn't need much clothing on this duck hunt. I bought a gillie suit that matched the green tules. I think it helped me hide.

Haven’t said much about ducks lately. Made a couple preseason trips to Mayberry. And, on Friday, I walked the spot I intended to hunt on opening day. Because our club is now so different from the way it used to be, it’s important for me to scout out hunting spots or I might run into unwadable water.

That turned out to not be a problem on this opening as the water level was lower than last year. I had seen mallards using a particular spot and set up my decoys, including a jerk string duck and wind-wacker on Friday. I figured eight decoys would be enough and it was.

The day got off to a less than perfect start, when Lola refused to stay on her dog stand, leading me to move to a spot where I could keep an eye on her. In the darkness, the jerk string got tangled in my tule stool and I dropped my shotgun into the water, completely submerging it. Even old farts get too excited on opening day.

Making a recovery, I sat and watched as the opening day parade of ducks began. There’s no other day like it. The mallards were flying at half speed and oblivious to Lola and I. I waited for a perfect shot to start it off with and before long it came. The drake passed directly overhead and I raised the Nova and fired straight up. The duck dropped dead.

Easy retrieve for Lola. Soon I had four and a drake landed in the decoys where I could not see it, but Lola did. She jumped off her stand and I reponded by dropping it in front of her. That made five greenheads in five shots.

The sixth duck was on a suicide mission and I dropped it. Hit hard. Wondered if it would be edible.

Now the real test. Could I pull off the seven-bird greenhead-limit in seven shots. The answer came after about a half hour of waiting. About 10:00 AM three mallards came directly at me. I stood a little early and the drake in my sights began to flare a little higher…boom..it didn’t fall. Thinking I’d nicked the bird I fired again. Same result.

I’ve never killed any duck limit without a miss, and that streak will continue. I did kill the eighth bird I shot at, with one shot. So I matched my best duck-shooting day ever. It all seemed so simple. The day was nearly perfect in many aspects. And, it was probably as close as I’ll ever come to the seven-bird seven-shot limit.

As the other hunters came back to camp, I found that not everybody had great shooting. I had been fortunate to locate such a hot spot. Even on opening day, such success is elusive.

On Sunday, with faster ducks and less certainty, my shooting returned to normal. The hot weather reduced time in the field, but the Sunday hunt was better than average.

With a refuge season pass in my wallet, I’m planning to get out and about more this season.

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Mayberry, March 2011

 

White front geese greeted me on the way to Mayberry. I recall seeing them at this same small pond during March of previous years – one of their last hangouts before they head north. (Click to enlarge photo.)

White-front geese near Antioch Bridge.

Another common site on the way to Mayberry in late winter is goats grazing on the levees. This levee maintainance is a necessary evil.

Levee goats 3-14-11.

Maybe the goats are early enough that the cover can recoup in time for pheasant nesting season. The levee is the only part of the property that has suitable cover for nesting.

Here's something new at Mayberry, Canada geese. Maybe they'll hang around to nest, if they can find a bush to hide behind.

 The weather was not good for photography, so I drove around the levees hoping to find something encouraging. A kildeer posed for me.

Kildeer are something else that's new.

I imagine we’ll have kildeer for a year or two, until the habitat matures. Then they look for another site with no cover.

A look at the neighboring pasture, brought back memories of the days when we had seasonal marsh.

A look at the Mayberry ponds was discouraging.

Mayberry’s ponds held a few ducks in the remaining shallow spots, but most of the ponds were deep and void of waterfowl use.

A flock of snows passed by and then a larger flock of white-fronts lifted off to the west and passed overhead.

These geese made a lot of noise.

The specs came by even closer.

White-front geese at Sherman Island

Waterfowl was evident all around, but mostly not using Mayberry.

A few sprig were using the shallowest portion of the ponds. As the skies lightened, I got a pretty good photo of one passing by.

Pintail drake over Mayberry.

Light conditions were very poor for photography of birds in flight, but the sun did come out to illuminate this pintail.

A few attempts to photograph the goldeneyes of Mayberry slough resulted in one pretty good shot.

The goldeneye live on the slough, but seldom travel over the ponds.

It’s almost time for the goldeneye to depart northward. They’ll be back again next Thanksgiving.

Cliff swallows are ever present at Mayberry.

Cliff swallows are tough to photograph in flight.

Antioch Bridge view from Mayberry.

I suppose the swallows make their nests on the bridge.

Along the Sacramento River bank, I photographed this snowy egret. He showed well on a gray day.

Snowy egret hunting.

He lifted off and the photo in flight came out pretty well too.

Things will improve at Mayberry as the habitat matures. It’s interesting to see how wildlife use changes with the habitat.

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California Goose Hunting and Population Dynamics

Hunted geese twice last week. First on Tuesday and last on Friday. The Tuesday hunt went well as two guests, Michael Flores and Chuck Alexander and myself shot almost a box of shells apiece.

Specs and snows were vulnerable in the morning fog. The final tally was 15 geese between us, nine of them were specs, the best table fare.

Last Tuesday, Chuck Alexander and Michael Flores, both with the California Correctional Peace Officer's Association, joined me for a hunt.

We’ve been hunting geese on Webb Tract since about 1978. I remember the first goose I ever killed on Webb. It was a dark goose, either a cackler or a white-front goose.

My hunting partner and I sat frustrated as a huge grind of mallards circled only 100 yards to the south of us. The circle they made was so tight that we could not come close to getting a shot.

We were hunting from a pair of barrel blinds that disappeared in the levy break that took place a couple years later. My hunting partner that day had carried a TV out to the blind so he could watch the playoff football game – can’t remember who was playing.

As he watched the football game, a small flock of geese passed overhead. We fired and both missed on the first shot, but the birds flared straight up and the second shot required no lead.

Shooting directly at the bird’s butt, I knocked him down. In those days Webb held many ducks, but few geese so the goose take was mostly incidental to duck hunting. Today the story is quite different.

Partner Fred with a nice bunch of ducks and geese on a foggy Webb morning. Note how we put out a bunch of plastic that day.

A couple years after the flood, we began to see a rise in the number of geese. First the snow goose population, then other geese.

The small Canada  goose population was so low in those days that the Aleutian goose was on the endangered species list and cackling geese were closed to hunting for a while as well.

The limit on white front geese (specs) was one and the total daily bag was three with three also the possession limit of three.

Goose hunting is feast or famine - plenty of famine.

In the ’90′s goose populations began to expand and it wasn’t long before huge flocks of Aleutians packed onto Webb during December. When hunting returned, they were very vulnerable and tended to fly within range much more than the other geese.

Snows, Aleutians and finally white front goose populations were made of largely of young birds during the 1980′s and ’90′s, but these days the goose population is much more mature.

We used to stop to admire white fronts with barred chests, but these days they are the norm. The average size of the geese is also larger. Population dynamics can be easily observed by unscientific methods.

Who knows how long the geese will maintain this boom cycle, but sooner or later it will come to an end. That’s the bad news. The good news is that maybe the ducks will then return.

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Final Verdict on the Final Approach Duck Boat

I bagged more ducks when I left the boat for Lola and hid in the tules, but having the boat allowed me to stay out all day and hunt from locations I couldn’t reach on foot.

After nearly a full season of evaluation, I’ve got a pretty good handle on the Final Approach Duck Boat.

I took my evaluation seriously and conducted all my duck hunting from the Final Approach to date. I even hunted from the boat all of the time – until this last weekend. In fact, I’d say my approach to using the boat was a bit dogmatic.

This past Saturday, I spent the entire day in the marsh, working at bagging some ducks. There were plenty around, but during the early morning fog, they didn’t fly much. Later in the day the action was better and steady.

Late season ducks are tough to decoy and I found that the ducks responded best to just a pair of mallards. The early set of eight mallard decoys didn’t work as well. They just sat there and looked lifeless.

These late season birds also picked up the boat well, no matter how hard I attempted to camo it out. The flaring birds caused me to shoot a low percentage and my shooting got worse as the day progressed and became frustrated.

The deep water of the new Mayberry made it tough on Lola and she stayed high on her dog stand, but also kept our hunting profile high, also affecting the birds.

Finally I shifted my setup, moved the boat away from the decoys and hid in the tules. Lola was happy with her perch and I was better hidden. A few ducks fell as I began to hit them. As my frustration lessened, my accuracy improved.

Unfortunately, my early poor shooting led the sailing two pintails that could not be recovered. One landed so far away that it was not practical to go after it and the other came down about 250 yards away in waist-deep water. I went after that one, but gave up as Lola was too bogged down in the cold, deep and brushy waters.

The other four ducks I bagged were all spoonies. I shot at a variety of ducks, but only one was a mallard. Another mallard almost came within range, but I moved too soon and it flared off.

It was a fun day of duck hunting, much like hunting the refuges.

Final verdict. The duck boat improved my chances by allowing me to cross deep water and hunt from locations not available otherwise.

Hunting from the boat works, but is limited. The better you hide the boat the better your shots. Hiding the dog is sometimes tough, and the boat is not big enough for both of us.

Hunting away from the boat, while using the boat as a home base, as a resting spot and a place for the dog to stand works well.

For traveling a long distance, towing the boat on foot works best as paddling is slow. I paddled the boat long distance a couple of times when I wasn’t in a hurry.

In general this is a fun way to hunt and a necessity when hunting deep water, but in shallow water walking is more efficient and productive.

(Note: After a couple years of calling this boat the Final Approach Duck Boat, I came to realize that I’d created a new name for it. Why fix it now? The manufacturer’s name is the Final Attack Duck Boat.)

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Geese Plentiful at Webb Tract

The geese were vulnerable during high winds, but hard to hit.

As is typical for mid-winter, geese have packed onto Webb Tract in the Delta. Between four hunters we brought down 17 over two days of hunting last week. As usual, the most productive method of take is pass shooting. That means finding a flyway between two grinds of geese and shooting fairly long shots as geese pass overhead.

They’re not easy to hit in the strong December winds.

Here’s a short video to give you the idea of how many geese were on hand.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXVkBzmrsQs

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