duck hunting decoys..... near death experience

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guys,
last night i was out duck hunting on a slow moving artificial river. i have some mallard decoys which each have about 6 feet of cord and a wieght on each. i put them out. the wind took them and blew them further into the river.

when i was done i went to get them, wearing my chest waders. the decoys are expensive so i didn't want to lose them.... instead i could have paid a bigger price :uhoh:

the question is to you duck hunters how do you get your decoys out into a reasonable spread into deeper water and how do you get them back? photos or diagrams would be most welcome.

thanks guys

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I rarely put decoys in water over knee deep since I mostly hunt puddlers. on the rare occasion where I have to put them deeper. I use my kayak or my aluminum boat.
 
For a river...rig them like bluebills on a string with two long weights/anchors on the fore and aft ends of the rigs.

Make sure you wear a belt with your waders so they don't fill with water if you step in a hole or fallout of the boat.

Write or dremel your name and phone number on the bottom of high dollar decoys or their keels...someone may return them to you if they are lost.

Decoys are usually placed in a U formation...the open area gives the ducks a place to land - they want to land into the wind so place the decoys accordingly.

Place one decoy 40 yards away from you so you can know your max range.

Use a non-tippy boat for decoy retrieval and a pole to grab their strings with...it's stupid to drown for a 10, 20, 50, or even 10,000 dollar decoy.
 
nice photograph. I having had similiar experience with cold water, decided my labrador could fetch decoys. easy to teach, and i could handle him to the decoy that needed attention.
 
At one point, I kept an old cheap Zebco spinning rod in my duck blind with a weighted treble hook on it for getting decoys out without getting in over my hip boots.

A simple pack rod outfit would work as well for river fishing I would think.

For that matter, just a push-button spinning reel and weighted grapple hook if you can throw it far enough, and accurate enough by hand.

rc
 
Two Mallrds, eh? Awsome.
"Lunch :D"
We divide Ducks two ways here in the Arctic,apon sighting them and deciding wether to shoot or not.... "River" and "Puddle".
"River Ducks"(Just EskimoEnglish slang now) are divers, like Loons, Greebs and such run before takeoff, Puddle Ducks jump straight up annd go. We prefere tha taste of "Puddle Ducks", like Bluebills, Mallards and Teal. They usually are found in sloughs with grasses or along the rivers edge, where they feed...... prehaps you dont need to get the decoys out too far.....
My son will teather each decoy, I string them in small bunches.

Good Luck!!, (be caurefull with those nuts)
 
Love the guy on his punt sled! Does he go sliding backward with the recoil? Just for laughs, here's the closest I got to a punt gun -- a prop we had made up for the movie Tremors 4. It actually fired 12 ga blackpowder blanks.
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We have deep water decoys, which are mostly divers, and shallow decoys. Our deep rigs are ganged together and weighted with a small boat anchor. They do get put out in 60 feet of water. Our lake has a ton of weeds, so if one of the shallow deeks starts to float off, 50% of the time the weeds will catch the weight. For the others, we just fire up the boat and go get it.

If you aren't going to be in open or deep water, I would just get a stable kayak. It would be easy to transport, easy to launch, and easy to use.
 
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