Dec 1st with Jessie

The temps this morning were climbing above freezing even while I was lying in bed. The promise of a more comfortable day finally got me out of bed. It was still early and quite a while before the sun was even close to coming up over the horizon. Today was Jessie's day to fly, and I was excited. The days are drawing to a close when I can look forward to seeing her streaking through the sky. This year she has flown higher than she ever has. She is also flying smarter as well. Since we are now flying ditches that is good as well as being a bit irritating. Good because she keeps her height when the ducks fly down the ditch, irritating because there are some of those slips that she could pull off.

Today was mail day, ( we get mail three times a week ) and Karen took Betsy with her to get the mail. Betsy knows when mail day is and she looks forward to it, so its a little hard to leave her behind. I had told Tami that I would be over at 1 PM, and though the lady is supposed to be there at 12:30, generally the mail is late. When time rolled around, I loaded up to go, put Jessie in the truck, and drove up to the top of the hill to wait for Karen and my Duck dog to show up. Finally at 1:15 she stopped to let Betsy in the truck with me. Betsy's role is two fold, and she is pretty good at it. She helps convince the ducks to fly, and she will generally stay with Jessie when she goes to the ground. Protection for Jessie when she is the most vulnerable.

On arrival at Tami's house, I found that there were Ducks in the ditch right behind their house. I went out and put Betsy's neopreme vest on her and went to the back to get Betsy's tritronics collar. Tami met me at the back, and I totally forgot what I had intended to do. We put a transmitter on Jessie, and I turned her loose on the other side of the house from the ducks. We went around the house and through the gate and began to get into position. As we went though the gate, three Pheasants flushed into the reeds along the creek. We held our breath, because they don't have that many Pheasants on the ranch. Jessie was on the other side and didn't see them, so it was their lucky day. We started hurrying along the fence to get in position and off in the distance I could hear a mournful howl. I had forgotten to get Betsy out of the truck. Crap! Too late to go get her, so we were on our own.

We failed miserably in our flush and they went down the ditch. Jessie started, then pulled out and regained her height. We had three or four more ducks flush down the ditch. She held her pitch and began circling the ditch further down. By this time, Jessie is pretty wedded to Ducks and will circle them where ever they are hanging out. The only trouble was that it was further down the ditch than my stamina would permit. I kept doing the best I could and got very lucky. There was a large horse shoe turn in the creek, (It isn't called Crooked Creek for nothing. ) and there was a bunch of Ducks in the far side of the Creek. They flushed, and Jessie hit a Gadwall hard enough to kill it in the air. She didn't even twitch while Jess did a loop and landed on her. I was especially lucky in that the water was low enough that I was able to wade across without getting in over the top of my boots.

To say that I was stunned with my success would be an understatement. If you have never hawked Ducks on a ditch, you haven't fully experienced futility. It generally turns into the worst kind of "Rat hunt" that there is, and my last two trips with Jess on the ditch has resulted in surprising success. I should be buying lottery tickets. I am apparently shot through with luck.

Jessie really enjoyed this one, I do believe that she is beginning to like the taste of them, at least the fat that they all carry at this time of the year.

After we got back and Jessie was put on her perch in the truck, I took poor Betsy out to try to make it up to her. Tami suggested that I take her over to where the Pheasants had flown. Feeling that was a good idea, we went to the reeds and we did find one Rooster there in the reeds. While we were looking around I was very surprised to see a Little Green Heron fly into the reeds to hide.

I pulled a picture off the internet so that you would be able to see what one looks like. They are supposed to be very rare in this area. This is the second one that I have seen while I have been here.

I will not be able to hunt the girls tomorrow, as it is time for a grocery run. Hopefully the weather will hold for a while so that I can keep them going.