sea ducks in the desert

[fish_or_die]

Took the layout boats out saturday hoping for a little diver action. The millions of blue bills that were there thrursday were spread out and not rafted up this time and we had a hard time coaxing birds in with our little spread.
Lots of blue bills and goldeneyes flying around not coming close enough for a shot. Couple weeks ago I dropped my limit with 16 shells in the marsh, I went through a box with only three scaup to my name Saturday, Man! Shooting out of a plastic tub in the waves is a whole nother game I haven’t quite figured out!

Well my birds weren’t that impressive so I’ll give you the sea duck trio our group pulled down, a Surf Scoter, a Barrows Goldeneye and an immature Old Squaw drake! Bet most of you guys had no idea most of these bad boys were hanging out in our beautiful state, 1000 miles from the coast huh?

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That stupid barrows flew right into our decoys and landed (on the other side from me [frown]) and sat there looking at us. We sat up, yelled at it and it just looked at us. BAM! No shame in water slooshing a trophy bird!
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[HFT]

Awsome! met up with a hunter last year who bagged a Barrows out by Willard Bay. It was about twice the size of our birds. So a couple make their way into us each year. Lucky guy!
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[ripnlip]

used to shoot a few barrows each year on the snake in Idaho. traded one to a buddy to mount my first Common Goldeneye. They do seem to be pretty stupid. we always joked and said you could drag a 4 bird string of goldeneye behind the boat and they would follow you.

I persoanlly think they are harder to shoot that Teal, very accrobatic and when they are dropping and cutting into your decoys, they sound like a jet..

Birds or no birds, 1 shot or a box.. nothing better than duck huntin.
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[fish_or_die]

Goldeneyes are my favorite ducks, Love that whistle as they fly over! They may be dumb, but man I swear they are the toughest birds on the pond to bring down, they're built like tanks!

We shot a barrows a couple years ago on the green river in January, in fact, it was the same punk friend that shot the barrows this time too! Jerk.
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[ripnlip]

tough isnt the right word. They are THE hardest birds to kill. We had one decoy, straight on shot 15 yds. Sommersaulted backwards he was hit so hard. floated about half a sec. dove and came stright up and flew away. we stood there with jaws dropped.

Out of all the bird we have shot hrough the years, 85% of the cripples our dogs had to chase were GE. tough, tough tough..
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