went goose hunting a while back, was a funny time, forgot to post about it here, so heres the whole story...
Today, my cousin Jeff and I decided to go goose hunting, and as the experience has left with me something slightly similar to bird flu, I'll post up a brief summation.
2:00 - we load up gear, foolishly decide to leave behind canoe and opt to deploy decoys and retrieve killed birds utilizing chest waders (the ater isn't deep at all, and only my cousin, I wasn't going into the water for any reason).
3:00 - we arrive at pond, deploy decoys (an assload of decoys), then we wait.
3:04 - I fall asleep.
5:30 - I wake up just as sun is setting. I am frozen solid from sleeping on cold ground, apparently with one foot in the pond, awesome.
5:31 - I comment to cousin, it's getting dark, we should load up all the decoys as it will be difficult to collect them all in the dark and walk them through the woods to the car (the wind scattered them all over the pond) cousin comments, "this is about when they start flying"
5:35 - I express my concerns again, cousin tells me to grow some nuts.
5:37 - Geese are actually starting to fly over head we try in vain to call them down to the water
5:42 - After about a half a dozen failed attempts, we finally call some geese down to the water, and greet them with biblical proportions of double BB steel shot, 3.5" loads too, ????ing big boom, it was like one of those old WWII anti-aircraft battery videos.
5:43 - It becomes apparent that after expending about $20 worth of ammunition, we manage to wound one goose
5:45 - My nose stops bleeding (I got a little excited on the first shot and pulled the trigger with the butt-pad squarely in line with my nose. owwie. it is completely dark by now.
5:50 - cousin decides that the geese are all staying where they are at this point, and we should pack up
6:15 - I am carrying several decoy bags, two shotguns, a backpack, all sorts of crap back to the car as my cousin bravely attempts to retrieve our prize, we did'nt know it was wounded at this point, we thought it was dead
6:02 - cousin corners goose and goose makes a swim for it. my cousin is weaponless and it is getting pitch black.
6:20 - I have car loaded up, cousin tells me to retrieve headlamp from car, point cars headlights towards pond, and give him a gun.
6:21 - cousin sets off into pond, on foot, wearing chest waders, in pursuit of wounded duck wearing chest waders, head lamp while wielding a .45 automatic pistol
6:30 - cousin realizes pond is full of beavers
6:45 - cousin sends me to nearby aunts house to retrieve extra pair of waders (SO I can join in the search, and two high powered flashlights)
6:50 - aunt refuses to give me chest waders, informs me that beavers will rip off your leg and the pond is full of, and I quote, "Volkswagen sized snapping turtles"
6:50 - I radio cousin and tell him about "Volkswagen sized snapping turtles" cousin relies he is already out of water as a beaver decided to fell a tree just feet from where he was standing.
6:55 - Cousin and I are on route back to his place to get canoe, continue search with high powered flashlights and rifles.
7:45 - We arrive back at pond, launch canoe. My cousin paddles while I sit up front with rifle and spotlight.
8:00 - cousin makes nasty comment about my habbit of shooting at every beaver that thumps their tails at us, claims that capsizing in the dark due to rifle recoil would be bad. I point out his fearlessness of night time activities, tensions run high.
8:30 - search abandoned, it was obvious that something ate that goose, as there were down feathers all over the water. As long as something got to eat it, I'm ok with that.
10:00 - I arrive home with sniffles and bad cough. I'm going to be hurting for this one
what a weird and funny experience, I wish I had a camera to take a pic of my cousin stalking through the pond, pistol in hand, like some vietnam tunnel rat searching out VC
