3/10/10

Today is officially the last day of the 2009-2010 Utah waterfowl season. I made it out one last time after the snows. We have been following them for the last three days and they are the weirdest birds in the whole world. Turns out the field they had been feeding in is now their roost. When we had our chance this morning none of us had guns in our hands but Mitch got to his quick enough to get shots off. He hit two with his first shot and missed the other two. We had two others come in barely close enough to shoot at. One of them got hit pretty good and started to fall like he was going to crash but then caught himself and ended up flying away. It was still a really fun day, and a really great season. I can't wait for September to get here; only 175 days until dove hunting starts.

Snow Geese!

Me and Mitch went after the snows again this morning. It turned out a little better this time. Mitch found the birds yesterday but the owner of the field didn't want us in there because it was so muddy. We still managed a couple without having to go into the field. Didn't turn out quite the way we had hoped but still pretty cool to get my first snow goose.

3/2/10

Decided to set up for snow geese today. Saw 200-300 real early but they weren't looking to land anywhere close to us. We at least go to see a few canadas though. Only had one land in the decoys. It was pretty cool though.

The band is fake. Just wanted to play around in photoshop. The real picture is the last one.

A Few More California Ducks

I'm all back from my trip. I have a few more waterfowl pictures to post up. I found a few Surf Scoters in San Diego Harbor. That was pretty neat to see another species that I hadn't ever seen before. I also found a group of Gadwall that were in a ditch about 20 yards from the ocean. Also, after getting home and looking at my pictures, I found out that one of the Widgeon I had taken pictures of was a "Storm" Widgeon. It isn't really a seperate species, but its very uncommon for the entire face of the bird to go white.

SoCal

Got the chance to go on a little vacation to sunny San Diego with my grandparents. I was able to find a few ducks while we were here. I haven't ever seen ring-necked ducks in the wild before. These were not park ducks, they were really skidish and hard to take pictures of, even though they were on a golf course.

A Tribute

I'm going to start by saying that this post might be just a little bit sad for some. If you haven't ever had a dog from puppy till "old man" you probably will think that I am lame, but oh well. Also, if you saw the movie "Marley and Me" and didn't cry this post will be dumb.

For the last few months my dog Moose hasn't been doing very good. He turned 11 in December. He has had really bad arthritis for quite a while but it had gotten really bad. He was staying in the garage at my parents where it was a little bit warmer. It all started about last Monday. I went over to visit and went out to see my dog. He looked really bad. I petted him for a little while and knew that he only had a few days left. He hadn't been eating and I could feel his bones starting to stick out. Well I went over Friday to get some stuff and to see my dog again. No one was home so I went out to the garage to see the dog. He was terrible. I petted him and talked to him for a few minutes. He was trying to stand up but couldn't. He couldn't even raise his head. He would try and it would just smack down on the ground. I went in the house to grab a few things, came back out and he was gone. I had only been in the house for 10 minutes. I truly believe that my poor, old dog had just been waiting for me to come say goodbye. My dad had already dug a grave in anticipation of this event. I went and got Annie then came back to help my dad bury him. We buried him with a dead duck and an old decoy. It was a really sad event for me but I'm glad that Moose is out of his pain.

Now for a little reminiscing. Moose was by no means the best hunting dog ever. He had hearing problems his whole life. We tried all kinds of things on him because we thought he just wasn't listening. He never marked a bird his entire life, but he rarely didn't find a bird that we sent him after. I don't think I'll ever have another dog that will be as good of a friend in the blind though. Moose would sit there with you for hours, in icy water, and never whine. He would rest his head on your leg and just stare, waiting for a shot to be fired. He walked a lot of hard miles but was always excited to do it again. I will really miss him but I really enjoyed the hundreds of hours we spent together.

Here are a few pictures that I have of the old dog and me over the last 11 years....

1/18/10

My dad invited me to go ice fishing with him this morning. It was a lot of fun to finally get out on the ice. Duck hunting is my thing, ice fishing is my dad's thing. He out fished me of course. I can swallow my pride and admit it though because I almost always out shoot him. I also need to point out that I had to help my dad ties his lures back on after he broke it. Good thing he brought me or he would have fought that knot all morning.