Latest / Ducks Unlimited Podcast / Ep. 474 – Houston Waterfowling: East vs. West with Doug Pike

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Ep. 474 – Houston Waterfowling: East vs. West with Doug Pike · Ducks Unlimited Podcast

• 00:00 John Gordon Hello everybody and welcome back to the Ducks Unlimited podcast. I'm your host John Gordon and this is part three In a three-part series that I really wanted to do on Houston, Texas and the Houston waterfowling culture We had Rob Sawyer on the author of a hundred years of Texas waterfowling first He really kind of talked about the East and the West sides of Houston in more broad strokes than I had Shannon Tompkins on You know great writer and a member of a great Outdoor writing team for the Houston Chronicle for many years and he grew up on the east side of Houston It really could give a much deeper dive into the to the places and people there and we mentioned our guest today during that podcast who was one of Shannon's peers and and and really covered and hunted the west side of Houston In depth and that's Doug Pike Doug Pike. Welcome to the DU podcast Thank you very much my friend by the way, the west side was always better than the east side just saying Well, you know, I kind of hunted both I started out as a little kid basically my stepdad would would would get up in the crack of dawn and and take me down to bear a ranch and and God bless him for that because I know what you want to do it But he did it anyway, and so I kind of cut my teeth over there But when I was I had a friend of mine in high school It was a year older than me and he and he could drive first It's 16 and I was 15 and we started hunting really more on the west side of town because we really were both 01:32 Doug Pike Pretty enamored by the goose hunting culture out there. It was deep out there. It really was I came into it about in the middle of it My dad didn't hunt and well, I take that back. He hunted twice in my lifetime as I Understand it and that was about it once was on a I'll tell you a very quick story The only time he ever went waterfowl hunting was when he was invited by some people in South, Louisiana They jumped in a float plane. I'll abbreviate this as best I can jump in a float plane He doesn't know anything about hunting for guys. They get dropped off by the pilot. The pilot says stay here Listen for the airplane. You'll see the ducks. He's out there He probably never even fired a shot the rest of those guys Blazed away for 20 30 minutes while this pilot ran running around moving ducks. They're on their way out. They land They've got ducks in the pontoons. They got ducks in the cockpit. They got ducks everywhere and Somebody in that group said man, this was fun. Let's do it again sometime soon and their hosts said we're gonna have to let it cool Down we were hunting in a federal game preserve and my dad just about lost his mind It's like oh my god So that was his introduction to hunting mine was a lot a lot more legal for sure 02:48 John Gordon An interesting story and probably kept your dad from really wanting to hunt ducks again I think he's probably worried he's gonna caught up into something bad you you grew up in the Houston area 02:57 Doug Pike I did I was born and raised here and with him not hunting I he did take me to his credit He he taught me a ton about fishing when I was young But the hunting stuff came from my friends kind of like yours did and then from some of their dads Taking me along because my dad just he just flat wasn't interested not I fell in love with it the first time I went goose 03:20 John Gordon hunting something about goose hunting I tell people that because over here There's a lot more folks that are starting to get into it especially in Arkansas because of just the sheer numbers of geese You know the specs and snows But there before that there was really no goose hunting culture and people kind of looked at you crazy that you that you wanted to hunt geese You know because I think a lot of it just revolves around the amount of work involved in it that it's just you know You can throw out a couple dozen duck decoys and and and and kill a few ducks, and it's really pretty pretty Easy, but you know one of my mentors back in the day Jack Sebring told me he said man. He said you know Duck hunts for wimps and goose hunts for men and so that's kind of how I always approached it that I kind of had that you know That wore that badge of honor that you know as a goose hunter I was willing to really put in the extra time and effort to get it done and really and get after those birds so it It's really a great thing so okay you start when did you when did you start writing for the Chronicle Doug? I was trying to remember that I was a high school kid 04:24 Doug Pike 89 80 something late 80s and I ended up I was I came out of school and Got actually I just took a little time off and got tended bar for a while had a lot of fun Fishing and hunting in the mornings after getting off of work at two o'clock and then be out either in a muddy field or down on the beach by about 530 or 6 I Started out doing that and just trying to figure out what I was gonna do I actually published a little kind of like a swap publication for outdoorsmen I wrote my own little outdoor stories in there and Sold whatever anybody wanted to sell kind of like a swap meat and meats Field and string well not on that level at that point But anyway, I ran into Bob brister I did some competitive shooting for a while some pigeon shooting and I kept running into Bob at these shoots And I told him how much I've wanted to be an outdoor writer And I'd love to do what he did and all that out of nowhere one day He calls and says hey You still want to be an outdoor writer and I said I'd love to man And then he spent about 45 minutes trying to talk me out of it and telling me how hard it was And how I was gonna have to do this and that basically what I was gonna be doing is fetching coffee for him and dog And it sounded like and I ended up saying you're not gonna talk me out of it. I got to do this and 05:49 John Gordon Started out there and just kept going for 23 years for people who don't know the Houston Chronicle I don't know if there's ever been an outdoor because you know what you know most papers had one guy Maybe two and the Chronicle had had the four of you You know between you and Shannon yeah, Joe doggett and Bob brister and Bob brister was really the Dean of Texas writers And and on a national level too. I mean he was fantastic So to be able to learn from those guys had to have been incredible because I think I think Shannon started right about the same Time I think it was 89 so the two of y'all just kind of ended up It looked like covering one covering east and one going west and and really man reading those articles that y'all wrote just really made me want to hunt geese more and and become a goose hunting guide 06:34 Doug Pike We had a lot of fun. I'm not gonna lie to you I was actually I was probably three four maybe five years prior to Shannon But one way or the other we all four were doing it for a pretty good amount of time And I still have people walk up to me today and say man we loved reading what you guys wrote We really did and it made me feel good about you know what all of us put into it because it was a job It wasn't just running around hunting and fishing granted We got to do a lot of that, but it was still a job to get in there and write stories people would read 07:04 John Gordon Oh, yeah, plus you're working on deadline. You know it's a newspaper It's I mean you got it I'm sure y'all burns a midnight oil and it at the office trying to get things ready for it was Thursday and Sunday if I Remember correctly that the outdoor articles came out 07:20 Doug Pike Were the two big days I had a column on Wednesdays no I had a column on Tuesday dog and have one on Wednesday two of us wrote on Thursday and Then I think it was Shannon maybe who had Friday and then we had two more big columns on Sunday again We had a page and a half on Thursdays And it was it was anything we wanted to write about and a true confession on how much prep we did Joe dog And I would go down when we had Thursday a Thursday page and a half to fill up he and I would go to lunch in the tunnel underneath the Chronicle downtown Houston and Have lunch at this Chinese food place and I'd look at him or he'd look at me first and go well What are you thinking and I'd go? Yeah? Well, what are you thinking in between? Like 1130 and 1230 we'd come up with a plan and we'd come up and have that page and a half ready for publication in four hours somehow 08:18 John Gordon That's pretty good and one I was drunk so That helped I'm sure but man, I couldn't wait in to go in those days You know the paper was in the driveway every morning I used to send my dog out there to pick up the paper and he'd bring it back to me and Thursdays and Sundays man the big Carter country ads All of it man. It was just a celebration of the Houston area outdoor scene, which is big, you know Houston's the fourth largest city in the world, but not in the world but in the US but it's it's got a tremendous culture You know really all the way around it that people that hunting and fishing if you like the outdoor sports Houston wasn't a bad place to grow up in not a bad place to grow up and and really because there's just so much in all Directions around here. You don't have to drive Florida to do pretty much anything you want to do any outdoors from Houston, Texas Oh, yeah, you can be fishing fresh water salt hunting deer hogs doves Quail the you know the tremendous duck and goose hunting and Houston really is at the epicenter of Sportsman's paradise it still is You can be within a couple of hours You can be on the bay catching trout or at Lake Conroe catching bass. Sure It it's really unique city with a great culture that surrounds it Memphis is is a lot of the same way here at DU headquarters. We've got to you go across the Mississippi River You're right there in Northeast Arkansas Way from Stuttgart all the way up to you know in the Jonesboro area Which is tremendous waterfowl hunting and really where a lot of the geese that used to go to Texas went with the rice base It's really still there which I know with water issues that the guys really you're having a hard time growing rice down 10:05 Doug Pike Southeast Texas now like they used to it's been a long time since we had Anywhere near the numbers of geese that I remember seeing out there it was the west side itself entered a million plus waterfowl and That's a lot of birds to have on any prairie. I don't care how big that prairie is and it was just it was a show a Fantastic awesome show every single morning. I got it out there 14 years and it was just it was always different To us it sort of started to look a little bit alike when you'd see a roost get up over here and just pretty much Black the sky and then over there it'd be one come up and just dot out the Sun completely for a little while and We kind of I don't think any of us ever got numb to it It was always something special the sounds the sights every bit of that was Truly unique in each and every one of those kind of like sunrises 11:01 John Gordon But it was something we could count on just just as sure we could count on that sunrise That's right. That's right. One of my favorite times of year was you know, you'd be getting toward late October You know you first getting that fur those first North winds blowing just just waiting to hear the first waves of snow geese You know fly over in in there, you know in their cries in the air was just something I look forward to every year and without fail Like I said, you know by the time it got to late October early November They were they were that coming in by the you know hundreds of thousands 11:30 Doug Pike Wish we still had that John I got to tell you it's been probably five or six years Since I could maybe even more since I could reliably go outside at night in the wintertime and hear geese Coming over if I stood there ten minutes 11:44 John Gordon I'd hear some now you could stand out there all night your underwear and not hear a single goose go over man That's that's hard to believe and I really got lucky because I followed them I didn't have any idea that I was gonna do that Yeah, I grew up in Mississippi and in an area and really wanted it to come back here I wanted to raise my son in small-town, Mississippi So that's what I did But when I did it it was I moved over here back over 2005 that seemed to be kind of a transition point to where a lot of the central flyway white geese and specklebellies were moving More towards the east and wintering in Arkansas Mississippi Delta Some in West Tennessee and so I didn't I haven't missed that like like y'all have That ended up staying in Houston. I I've been able to enjoy those birds every season without missing a beat so I got lucky on that deal 12:36 Doug Pike We were hunting them Yeah, but we were hunting them back when it did take men to hunt snow geese now with four-wheelers and just pretty much anybody You know, it's a miracle that nobody died carrying decoys and geese into and out of fields Isn't that the truth? We pushed a lot of those people pretty hard. It's in hindsight These guys had come into town stay there till two o'clock and then bounce off the pillow and be out there to go put out a rag spread and 13:03 John Gordon Some of that stuff was pretty hard on them. I guarantee you. Oh, that's true We you know as a guy you you know, you would have your wind up You know about a couple weeks and to be able to throw those rags on it and help it across those rice fields Which anybody who's walked right or walk across the rice field knows that the the footing is sketchy at best So yeah, you're right. I mean guys are coming for the hunt three days out of the whole year I'm amazed that nobody had a heart attack and just fell over dead right there in the in the spread 13:30 Doug Pike We were pretty lucky because it was it was very difficult Navigating all that stuff and you get a little fog involved and kind of I would lose people sometimes I'd start out with four cars and tell them to stay real close. Don't anybody slow down This is even pre dating cell phones So you just had to kind of hope for the best and I'd get there and I'd park and I'd get out and I'd walk Back and there'd be a car missing the last guy just fell off somewhere So we'd go out and put the whole spread out and I'd just leave somebody in charge and I'd just try to backtrack in there 14:03 John Gordon They'd be just sitting on the side of the road didn't want to get lost any more than they were and with a no GPS Is like now you can drop pins and locations, right? We you had to know where you're going out there 14:12 Doug Pike The worst of fog the worst it was I'll tell you a quick story about fog hunting I had scouted a place and knew exactly where I wanted to hunt the next day I've been about probably 20,000 birds in this field and I wanted to go out like three levies out and then Kind of take a west and go about another 200 yards Whatever probably about a 400 yard walk was what I was looking for So I get my guys already and you can't see your hand in front of your face Don't worry follow me boys and we go out there and we're walking and I'm really confident that I'm on a good line There's no cars on the road though that morning for reference There was one road where we could kind of count on traffic telling us which way was north I get out to where I want to set up we set up the light starts to come up the birds are moving They're coming into this field. We're getting a few good shots But we're not getting as many as I thought we should where we were and the light comes up a little bit more And we're shooting and having fun and it's going okay But not the way I wanted it to and there was a guy Winged bird out in front of us and it sailed off kind of behind me and I turned around to shoot And I had to pull my gun up because we were about 75 yards from all our cars we'd walk for 30 minutes and I'll let god forsaken mud and Covered maybe maybe a hundred yards 15:29 John Gordon Every guy's got that story I believe or you set up right by the fence line or something because you had no idea in that fog Where you know you said you could walk straight man 15:38 Doug Pike We got to be at the spot and you were never at the spot seems like GPS out of whipped him that day I guarantee you So you're doing a radio show these days Doug. Yes, I did Saturday Sunday mornings, correct? Yeah, three years you still see you started it back then. Yeah, Saturday and Sunday. I started this thing in 2000 actually I Had some people from what was then clear channels now I heart approach me and they said look we we want an outdoor showdown here Would you be willing to do it and I thought about it for about three minutes and said sure let's go lunch Let's talk about it. We kind of hammered out some details and I was told that when I started doing this not to be nervous or anything because I would have one of the guys from the Sports department kind of sit in as a co-host until I got comfortable Well, the first week went really well he and I had a great conversation the second says back then it was only One day a week Saturday mornings, I think around 10 something like that now It's 7 to 10 on Saturday and 8 to 10 on Sunday on Sports Talk 790 But anyway, the second week I go in and I saw the guy in the hall said hey good to see you again I'm looking forward to working with you again. He goes. Oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you I talked to the sports editor and he said that if you were doing okay That I didn't have to come back in anymore. I told him you were doing great. I'll see ya That would be longest hour of my life I have no preparation for a monologue. I had all kinds of prep for a conversation with the guy He was in the wind before I could even sit down in the chair man 17:16 John Gordon I bet that was yeah, but that was a long hour talking to yourself 17:21 Doug Pike Yeah, and now three hours, you know, whatever it's okay, I'm comfortable with the material I love what I do still and I've got a good audience behind me that 17:30 John Gordon Calls and fills in with some great stories of their own, right? You know I remember that there were seemed like there were a couple of guys who did the early early like they they came on like 5 a.m I want to say 17:43 Doug Pike Are they still right? And then it's been passed to other people over the years and now Mickey Eastman's doing he's no great old friend of mine He and I were in boats to get his boat a lot when when he was kind of just a young fishing guy 17:57 John Gordon And I was a young writer and now he's doing that's that show for them on the other station. Yeah I just remember going, you know, you know growing up in Kingwood We always had a drive somewhere no long ways to get to a field We listened to that show and it was great man All the guys were calling in giving the reports of sure what was happening on the prairies and what they were seeing Yeah, my exact man I didn't know it was still going on I'm gonna have to try to listen to some of that when I'm back down there again But but anyway, so folks if you want to listen to the duck pot show you can do it right online I checked it out today. It's it I heart is it our heart media. Is that words? 18:35 Doug Pike Or yeah, I heart radio radio radio doing either way But I heart radio you can just kind of even ask Alexa to play it or something if Alexa 18:43 John Gordon I don't know if Alexa hunts or fishes or not, but she can call my show She could find the show and I don't think you talk about it quite a bit that I noticed is golf 18:50 Doug Pike I do I love golf. I still play a lot. I practice more than I play only because of time constraints, but I'm still getting to play Enough I'm carrying an eight handicap which isn't so horrible No She's costing me money too with these old bunch of retired guys I play with Monday's my only day off and there's a game out Where I play most frequently where I also have bass fishing privileges That's between golf and the bass fishing out there. It's saving my life John. I gotta tell you I caught Okay, I'll just tell you real quick because I know we're talking about water here but I went and played golf Monday then I had some time to kill before I had to go pick up my son from a friend's House and fished for maybe an hour maybe an hour and a half and came across one area where there were Yeah, I don't know. I probably caught eight or nine and missed five or six more bites because I don't pay attention I'm look we've got an eagle. I watch there's all just all this other stuff going snakes swimming by Miss as many as I caught but these fish were conservatively between four and eight or nine pounds man and just Smoking it right on the rod tip. It's too much. It's too complicated to go into detail a why 20:02 John Gordon But most of the fish most of the fish bit within six feet of the rod tip. It was crazy Once again, man living in Houston Yeah, you've got a lot of pretty cool stuff and golf course ponds are great places to fish a lot of time 20:15 Doug Pike They don't get any pressure Well, no, not that's not true anymore Used to me. Yeah, we've got kids sliding under fences and all and but it's still they're good kids And I tell them I slow just don't come out here in the middle of the day and stand on the on the bank of a Lake in the middle of a fairway Wait till late wait get out here early, but don't don't get in the way or they're gonna run y'all 20:38 John Gordon You know, I did that as a kid too. I just I'm gonna I'm gonna give you some some places and I just want to talk about some of this stuff because it's a lot different now than it was In 1980s you think about what they were then and what they are now 20:55 Doug Pike So we're just gonna dive right into that Katie, Texas Katie, Texas then probably the Closest place to a major metropolitan area where you could meet a bunch of guys Have a good breakfast and then go out and drive 20 minutes and be into some of the most incredible water fouling in the world now Neighborhoods that's it man. It's gone you know a lot of those guys whose farms were out there now have I give people the Jordan farms is now something like Jordan's Landing I can't remember what the name is but yeah They sold out and made sure their name got on the deal to at least remember it that way But that's about it a lot of those bigger red bigger farms out there have been long gone for 20 25 years almost 21:40 John Gordon Yeah, that's right. I don't recognize it anymore I'm just thinking about doing man. There used to be some you know, there was a field here wasn't there? You know, you try to remember where it was you talking about Lyle Jordan That's one of the great characters from the West Side and you know, Texas safaris and you know I mean he was he really helped kickstart, you know The goose hunting as an outfitter over there along with a couple other guys we're gonna talk about but Jordan farms I know was 22:09 Doug Pike Was really one of the premier properties right south of it and I hunted that was the first place wherever actually Paid money to be in a group of guys who loved to hunt and there were ten man groups when the way Lyle had it Set up and ideally what you wanted was four guys who loved to do it and six guys who would show up on opening day 22:26 John Gordon And then never come back. It was beautiful. It was cheap back in those days I remember buddy, you know my buddy and I you know least a field in Katy area You know, you could have a guest right so we just pulled our money together and it was just me and him so we I think We're like 300 bucks for the season something like that. Sure 22:46 Doug Pike Yeah, there was a lot of land there were a lot of birds so that it was a buyer's market really Yeah, yeah, they couldn't sell you something that the guy next door couldn't sell you $10 cheaper If you know if you wanted to go shop 22:59 John Gordon Market People don't think about that now man, it's just like people you have to pay 23:05 Doug Pike Exorbitant amounts of for really good places now. Oh, I'd be scared to even try to buy into a good lease right now In fact, I know the place doesn't matter whose farm it was But he was he was asking me if I wanted to lease it or maybe find somebody to go in on it And this was it wasn't that many acres. It was maybe a couple hundred acres I think in which out there on that prairie and much barely enough room to park a car and so he said yeah I'm thinking about leasing it to this corporation, but I wanted to call you first is how much you want for it? He said 20,000 Are you selling it? 23:40 John Gordon Yeah, and I've seen it here in Memphis to really some of the you know premieres places in Arkansas, yeah I've just become To where they're oh, you know, you've got to have the big money to be a 23:52 Doug Pike I 23:54 John Gordon See after whatever name you have in front of that on your checkbook, you know, that's right Oh, there's you know, there's still some really good public lands around, you know the people hunting by Amita White River Refuge and all that over there in Arkansas and real foot Lake in Tennessee and some of the WMAs in Mississippi But it's just you know in those in those days in the prayer There was no public places to go out there and still it aren't I don't believe so you you know The Katy Perry there was nothing it was all private land 24:24 Doug Pike Yeah The only the closest place you'd find public land was gonna be down on the coast or up on one of the lakes that prairie 24:30 John Gordon We've cried it from wall to wall. It was it was here's another one a place I really I like to hunt that it never got a whole lot of press was the East Bernard Lissy prairie 24:39 Doug Pike Yeah That was a little south of where we were and the guys down there who hunted it a lot Kind of liked it that way too. They wanted to kind of stay out of the spotlight El Campo Eagle Lake Katy Brookshire All of those places right off I attend see Lee even not there wasn't much connected to see me but all around see Lee there was some really good honey and Those were the the places that really loved the spotlight you start talking about Lissy the Lissy Prairie have people you talk to even the people who hunted didn't know how they couldn't have gotten to Lissy on a bet 25:17 John Gordon They didn't know where it was. It was right in the middle of everything. Yep. That's right, you know, Lissy words that it well Yeah, it's just northern Garwood Eagle Lake, you know Yeah, so you're talking about Eagle Lake and that you know, I think this sign is still there when you go into town Which says goose hunting capital of the world I believe if I'm not mistaken 25:35 Doug Pike Yeah, you know the self-proclaimed goose hunting cap of the world I would be willing to bet that if you stacked up all the birds that were taken off the Katy Prairie and Off the Eagle Lake Prairie and off say between from Katy to Brookshire and north 15 miles and then a little bit back east actually even if Katy when we started out out there All those places could hold their own against the others on the right day under the right circumstances Any one of those places you put enough rags in on the ground and you're gonna just wax those geese man. It was great 26:11 John Gordon Yeah, that's right It was you know, some of the some of the the the bags that were taken back in those days of you know And that's a lot of times you're talking about the five goose limit days to 26:22 Doug Pike You know limit shoots were pretty common. Oh, well, yeah the limits when the limits were higher We still had a good number of limit hunts but the average what we looked at more was the average number of geese per hunter because Nationally the average for the longest time and it probably is frankly still Was one goose per man right? One good per man on an average goose hunt across the country and we were doing like three and a half four Right in there per person right that was just nuts man. That's sunny days clear day didn't matter 26:57 John Gordon Whatever we were backing him up pretty good. Yeah, and I can just remember as being a guy though People's expectations started amping up when the limit went to 10 and it went to 20 and it was like people Oh, yeah, I mean, I'm gonna bring a case of shells. Uh Yeah, because the chances of us kill them 20 birds a man are gonna be a little slim 27:15 Doug Pike Yeah, all of you no matter how high they they kept taking the limit up and it made people It's bad in a big way because that expectation is there Well, if we don't get a limit, it's not a good hunt. But just last year it was 10 now It's 20 last year. You got 10 apiece and you were thrilled now. You got 10 apiece Do so good today did we know you you had an incredible Yeah, and most of us guys couldn't shoot anyway Oh lord, you got four guys and bring in 12 geese and you know darn well, you shot eight of them 27:52 John Gordon You know, the numbers were always a big game for the guys, you know, I mean The high kill of the day and all that was was something that you took pride in and you're right I mean if you had the high kill you shot half of them at least probably 28:05 Doug Pike I'll tell you a little secret about that though John We were able after so many years of doing it together The guys who were hunting with Larry Gore out there That's who I did all my guiding with and we were able to sit down and I started this game and we had a lot Of fun playing it we would bet like five bucks apiece or a couple of beers after the hunt Whatever on who could predict exactly how many birds were gonna come out of a particular field in the morning And we had done the scouting We knew what was in every field and you would try to get as close to the actual number of birds your hunters were gonna shoot And we didn't have to do it the night before Because it wouldn't be fair. You didn't know who your shooters were. So at breakfast we quiz these guys You know how long you've been goose hunting man? How many times you've been in this season so far? Have you done any competitive shooting and just just get all just asking them 20 questions? You know and then you established a number of birds you expected to bring back based on where you were going in the closest guy To the number without going over one. It was fun No, but we were surprisingly accurate that's what's amazing about it was all these birds flying in all different directions They don't ever have to they don't have to leave the ground if they don't want to and we could get within usually within 10% of the number of geese that were gonna come out of that field with those hunters 29:31 John Gordon That's pretty good man. Well, it's amazing too. You know what I'm talking about here as well that the particular fields Produce more than other fields sometimes. Yeah, I don't know what something in the dirt of those fields I don't know what it was wherever they were located. They just were better 29:46 Doug Pike Well, yeah, there were some that were just seasonally every season some fields were better than others As the seasons went on though in in normal weather the geese tended to go to the rice because For every time every time they bend over to pick something up They expend energy and then whatever they pick up gives them energy back So it's just a give-and-take thing and to pick up a grain of rice They don't get a whole lot for that, but they love rice now. I think it's super cold. They would go into peanut fields They would go into soybean fields. They would go into corn fields where every time they've been over They got a little more bang for their buck energy wise So it was just about energy conservation there and then at the end of the season in January they get in all this winter wheat and all this fresh green stuff and it just went through them like a Double dose of xlax and it then the amount it got all that fat off of them for the flight home This is an amazing lesson in biology and just animal behaviors But they were a lot smarter than most of us where we were still fat at the end of the season 30:52 John Gordon It didn't matter. That's right. That's right. Yeah, I mean I've had some epic hunts on wheat fields late that just Oh, yeah, you just couldn't shoot them out of it. They just they were so locked in on that wheat field didn't matter That's why they got to get that fat off of them Here's a couple of iconic places in Katy area and this is this is where I know Gore 31:12 Doug Pike Always met with his clients was the country kitchen. Oh man. Yeah, we Kept that place open probably at least in the winter We would push I don't know 40 50 60 guys through there in a morning and not be there for maybe 30 45 minutes It would just it would fill up real fast most of the guys would get there first and then the hunter was hunters would kind of trickle in and Then as soon as we could get them fed and get a cup of coffee in them off We'd go to drive anywhere from 20 minutes to maybe There was a place that I love to hunt down in Sealy that we kind of kept quiet one of the guys and I who went Down there because we were wearing the birds out and most of the guys thought well Sealy's too far from here We don't want to go there. We'll just take a spot up here And so we would deliberately not even come in to blaze this place to get the birds clean Until like 11 45 12, maybe 12 30 so that everybody else was gone 32:07 John Gordon It wouldn't see these big old straps we were bringing back and that's another place that I wanted to talk about It was so great because everybody would gather there with their birds and you know You had bragging rights there was blazes and that's a place that the old picking shack seems to be just gone forever 32:24 Doug Pike Oh, yeah, there's I don't know if there's another one anywhere really around here. That was the place though where we Just shoveled hundreds of birds through there probably every day and I'm sure that guy owned a couple of Cadillacs and Mercedes Yeah, yes, you be over the years Originally they would just throw all the feathers away and then at some point we started seeing these giant bags like the size of Porta cans these bags full of feathers They found somebody who wanted to buy all that stuff and so now they were truly using every part of those birds and And they made I'm sure way better money that looked like I don't know if you ever went to blazes But you're like a whole lot. No, it did somewhere in that somewhere in that house John was a really big really secure safe 33:13 John Gordon Yeah, you're right I remember those big bags of feathers because the pillow market they discovered and I think they probably made more money off the feathers and They were doing off picking birds. I suspect so, you know, because it seemed fairly reasonable for the bird picking Yeah, buck a buck and a half and bird something like that. It wasn't too bad. Gotcha. Yeah. No, it wasn't it wasn't it really You know, hey anybody who's picked a goose Completely and cleaned it that couple of bucks was was well worth the money 33:40 Doug Pike Yeah, I did that one time on the back patio of a townhome I was in once and had about six neighbors complaining because it's kind of windy Yeah, and I covered every one of their patties with feathers before I was done 33:52 John Gordon I was trying to put them in a bag. We just said no The wind especially in southeast Texas seems like it's always blowing most times 34:00 Doug Pike Oh, so how long did you guide with Gores outfit? I did 14 seasons out there 14 seasons and never been in better physical condition in my life. It's just amazing You talked about it earlier We did about marching across that mud and and you couldn't find anybody in your group who wanted to carry Strap of 30 or 40 geese, but that's what we just did We'd grab a bag of decoys grab our gun or shell bag and then pick up 30 geese and march them out of 200 yards of mud That's right. You know, yeah 34:31 John Gordon I mean, I really wish I wasn't anywhere close to that kind of shape again Across one of those fields with a bag of decoys long and much less a strap full of geese 34:41 Doug Pike I had so many guys just and some of the muddy bean fields and plowed bean fields were the worst and I'd have guys show up back at the trucks with no shoes on what so ever's man. Where your hip boot? Out there they just say out there and point at the field and that was it 34:58 John Gordon And people on another aspect of that you talking about being in shape was that people these days especially them You know I would call the modern snow goose hunter who's who's been involved in conservation season for the last two decades 35:10 Doug Pike Is that you had to get your wind up to blow a call all morning long? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah Yeah, that was important Well, you had to know when to blow and when not to blow too because there were a lot of times when the best Calling was no calling right and that was a hard thing for young guys to learn especially because soon as they figured out how to Blow a call without having too many sour notes. That's all they wanted to do. They'd start calling in the restaurant You know just like shut up, dude Little early but we and we had one guy years ago who would when his hunters would show up with duck calls And you should just drive him crazy. He hated it and He'd say hey man, the pitch of that call sounds a little funny You want me to pitch it for you and they go sure and he take it and just pitch as far as he could Out into the lake or mud or whatever said, okay, it's better now. There you go 36:00 John Gordon Yeah, I think every guy's experienced that you know there the car You know, they just they wanted to blow those calls man 36:07 Doug Pike One of the one of the game wardens out there kind of I wish I could recall his name right now because I was sitting In his pickup truck one morning on I want to say it might have been opening morning of duck season And I just I didn't have a group that morning. I just wanted to sit that one out It was a circus anyway, and we were parked at 529 and Katie Hockley Road, I believe Okay, and there were duck calls going off all around us and David Low Price was his name and He turned to me and we could hear him just Everywhere he turned to me and he goes Doug the duck call is the best conservation tool ever invented and Couldn't disagree with the guy and he may not have been the first to say that and I know he wasn't the last but he was Exactly right because it just sounded so bad and so horrible 36:56 John Gordon No duck in its right mind would go near that and especially in the Texas prairie But by that time there, you know, the Mallards were few and far between so every duck you saw whistled So there's no use having a mallard call 37:09 Doug Pike Way better to have a whistle in your hands I've got little widgets that hang out at that Lake I bass fish out on my golf course And it's just I just stand there and stare at them 37:18 John Gordon I miss more bites because I'm just looking at the widgets. I swear man. I love widgets I got a chance to go back down and hunt the Rockport area back opening weekend this past year 37:27 Doug Pike I saw more widgets than I've seen in years in Texas. It was it was fantastic. Probably my favorite duck I don't want I wouldn't tell a pental that out loud, but 37:36 John Gordon Yeah, and people don't know that either too, you know, that was a byproduct of the widespread pentails loved them 37:44 Doug Pike Yeah, that's what you really shot a lot of pentails was in a widespread that dumb that place I was talking about in Sealy Had pentails moving up and down I believe it was the Colorado River a lot and then coming off those off the river to feed in those fields around between Sealy and Eagle Lake and They wouldn't show up until nine o'clock in the morning you could almost set your watch by him and we take our guys down there and Set up and at 8 15 or so We've been hunting for two hours and we got two spoonies and a teal and these guys are going man I thought you told me this place was good. I'd say it is good. Just be patient No, wait, don't show up till nine o'clock and they start riding me pretty hard and I would designate one of those guys I said you get up go back to Sealy Go through the drive through at Whataburger and buy a dozen taquitos and when you get back the pentails will start flying and Nine times out of ten John as soon as we sat down and started eating taquitos You look way up in the sky. There'd be this tiny dot in that dollar clear day I mean they're up at 10,000 feet it seemed like and that dot would start making circles and then it would get bigger and bigger and bigger and it'd be Three four hundred pentails that would hit those flats every time Yeah, and that would just go on for an hour an hour and a half. It was incredible 39:05 John Gordon Yeah, yeah, and it's just man the pentail in this day and age and induction limited We've really put a lot of effort into really trying to understand why the populations are not the levels I used to be and trying to really improve habitat to to bring the numbers back up, but you know 39:23 Doug Pike Trying out there they're getting a little bit better I think 39:27 John Gordon Anyway, man, I have a lot of places that pentails frequent, you know, Arkansas, Mississippi, Texas So I see a lot but there's gotta be folks in the rest of the country who don't see any and it Because the population numbers they're getting the last count they were getting close to the season being closed on them I know nationwide so, you know Hopefully this next count that they've they've they've tattled the liver rebound a lot of it's related You know just like every other ductile water and that there's been some you know, some some more water In the breeding grounds this year with their big snowfalls Just occurred in the Dakotas and it needed to go a little farther than north in the Saskatchewan, but I Think you'll see a pretty decent count this year You know coming off the fact that a lot of the drought situations have been have been eased up on it Doug we're talking about different people and and Larry Gore being one of and I really in my opinion Larry was the the guy who really brought the goose hunting from a business standpoint Into the modern age With the way he approached it because you know the guys like, you know, Jimmy real Marvin Tyler loud Jordan, they were really all forefront of it. But Larry took it to another level Would you say that was correct? And he really took it to make it a really thriving business 40:50 Doug Pike Yeah, I would yeah He did that and he was kind of very careful about what he did about who he sent where and for example If we had guys coming into hump for three days We didn't put them on the best spot on the first day We'd let we try to build it up so that their last memory of the prairie was a great one Instead of it being maybe kind of a dud Yeah, sometimes it works sometimes it didn't but those were the kind of things that he was thinking about and that we as as Guys were thinking about to make sure that the experience was one that they wanted to replicate the next year and not one They wanted to go home and tell everybody it was horrible about you know, we he did a really good job There were some of the things that we tried to talk him out of that he was doing But he stuck to his guns to give him credit as a businessman and he he did very well for himself 41:38 John Gordon But I'm happy for him. Yeah, and I don't think people realized how young Larry was to be running that outfit He was he was a kid pretty much. He was very young. He had a good business sense about the hunting part of it for sure Yeah, that's for sure. He's the first guy that I can recall something and yeah, you know Borrowing from the Western term for guy the outfitter. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah nobody else used that and now you can there's all kind of outfitter Oh, yeah, now, you know business is all that sounds more uppity than God service I guess it does it sounds more formal. Anyway, yes, it does. It's a formality Here's jokes washing through the mud at the end of the day, man I just want to talk about a couple more guys real quick Guy that you got it with and I never got a chance to hunt with it, but he was almost like he was One of course guides and he was really kind of a legend man is Richard Smith 42:30 Doug Pike Yeah, I was looking right at his name when you said that as a matter of fact, I Richard worked for Lyle early on right? That's where he came from and when he came over to Larry's it was kind of like Okay Who are you buddy? What do you bring to the table and then we all got to kind of hunt with him a couple of times and and I knew Him and Jamie Prince knew him from over there at Lyle's place already. We've been around him So but we a lot of especially a lot of the younger guys had no idea who he was or whether he knew anything He was just somebody taking some of their hunters away and they didn't like that until they got to know him 43:04 John Gordon He was really good. He was kind of a quiet guy, but he was a really really good goose and duck guy. No question Yeah, yeah, I mean, we you know Richard, you know, everybody was one to know, you know, how many birds he got that day You know because almost without fail seemed like Richard was bringing in in the big kills Consistent basis. He got some pretty good spots People don't understand that either when you're really good and you're high on the pecking order you get better fields You know, and that's that's part of the something as a young guy You have to realize boy you have to pay your dues and you really have got to work hard You know to get those fields and they're not gonna be given to you You've got to earn them and you've got to be good with people too. He earned every field he got Last guy I want to talk about and I don't think it's on that list that I put on there I thought about him later on because he's one of the true characters of the of the West Side goose hunting scene 43:57 Doug Pike The owner in those days of Texas hunting products Chuck Berry. Oh god. Yeah, I hadn't thought about Chuck in a long time Man, I wish I had a nickel for every time I drove all the way to his place to find out 44:08 John Gordon He was out of what I wanted. Yeah, yeah, sometimes his stock was a little sketchy. Yeah The inventory it wasn't like just going into a sporting goods store modern day and having shelves and shelves stuff Some days you you'd get there and the guy before you just can't have bought it all, you know, right and Chuck would sell it Oh, yeah, he would no matter how close you are And he was and I really we all enjoyed it when he started offering pre-built Windsocks, you know, you know I was having to do it build them ourselves That was a big deal and I know he he used You know, I think he had a deal with a school That he would you know get some of the kids to build those Decoys and it saved us a lot of time. He wasn't timing himself. He was job now It's Chuck was not timing himself. Yeah, it was good man. I'd like to start out with about 800 You know to a thousand windsocks at the start of a season because you were gonna work really well You were gonna break or blow out or something at least a couple hundred over the course of the season So you really you know had to start out with some fresh stuff But anyway, I want to close on this we're talking about Unforgettable hunts and clients is there is there one hunt or one? You know set of guys that that you hunted with over the years that really stand out 45:23 Doug Pike As far as guys who stood out It was always the guys who were good shots because you knew that if five geese came over In range all five of them were coming down instead of one with a broken wing landing 300 yards away or something. So that was fun. The one guy I think who was kind of a I'm gonna try to squeeze in two characters. Okay, I gotta make a little note here So don't forget because I'm that age So one guy was the most braggadocious guy you could ever be around every time he opened his mouth He was bragging about how much money he had how much success he had in business All of this stuff and he calls me one day and he says I've got a new dog I want to bring out there. I paid a fortune for this dog He's the best trained dog on the whole prairie and I want to go hunting with you and bring that dog You leave your dog at home and I've got I need you to go by the I think it was an osman store or maybe I don't know if academy was around back. Yeah, maybe probably would have been around anyway He sent me up to this store on the north side of town because he had gone in and bought every Full-body goose decoy they had and I needed to pick them up because we were going to hunt with them with his new dog No kidding. So I'm not kidding you and he said you can have the decoys afterward. That's your that's your tip for the day That's cool. Okay, so I went up like 30 dozen full-body goose decoys Maybe more and we get out to the field the day or two later We get them all set up I already bagged them up and we get them all set up and he goes back to the car and he lets this dog out and we're hunting in a A cut bean field so there's a pretty good stubble in there and this dog gets out of the car and he runs around on the on the asphalt for a couple of minutes and We start walking across the field and the dog takes 10 steps into that field and stops and now he's tiptoeing He's never been off st. Augustine in his life and The guy literally he's paid thousands of dollars for this dog 25 years ago Maybe more and he literally picks his dog up and takes him out there They dig a hole so the dog can sit in the hole with him So help me the first bird that comes through we knock it down He shoots the bird falls down. He unleashes the dog and the dog runs straight to the car And never would go back into the field he said i've had enough the only other real character was a dude who showed up From he was from italy, okay? And we show it's a rainy morning and we drive down to ceilings actually that place I was telling you about with the pentails and we're all standing in a barn and he gets out of his car And comes hustling over to the barn real quick And then this other guy gets out and goes to the trunk and picks up a couple of shotguns Caged in a shell bag And all this other paraphernalia and comes over and I said I thought you were by yourself You're the only hunter we had on I had like four guys, but he was he was a single and he goes Oh, no, that's my helper. I said really So this poor guy in the rain is out there loading this dude's gun for him He's doing all this and all that and so help me he leans over to that guy once and says i'm a little chilly And this guy we named him the green hornet in kato and poor kato Takes his jacket off and gives it to that guy while they're sitting in the rain So I went back to my truck and got kato a jacket so he didn't freeze to death I just never seen anything like he had a manservant basically That was the one and only guy we saw guys from over in europe several times across the you know across the years There'd be a couple of them a season come in but nobody like that guy man 49:13 John Gordon The characters you run across man Yeah, I honey with people from every experience level too You know guys you would love to hunt with again the guys you can't wait to see leave it just kind of as I went 49:25 Doug Pike We're gonna tear up rent cars like our guys did. Yeah, right. Yeah, they did They tore plenty of rent cars The next grand marquee I see going down a rutted muddy road in about 40 miles an hour 49:38 John Gordon Sliding sideways close to the ditches won't be the first i'll guarantee you that yeah Yeah, and you know you were talking about great shots and I can just yeah that triggered a memory for me I had a couple of guys from from louisiana one time They were fresh out the swamp man. They were they were they were serious and they both had old Browning auto vives that had you know, their grandpappy had probably shot, you know, they passed them down They were well worn and this is before bismuth became a big thing This is when they the first bismuth shells first really hit the market and these guys were shooting them And man if you could get a goose within 60 yards it was going down and I thought those guys said man You sure y'all just can't stay around and like go with every party No kidding. Yeah, so That'll lift my numbers up. You know, I just couldn't believe it You know the two and three quarter inch old like 12 auto v's and they just man they were those guys could shoot And so it it ain't the gun. It's the man behind it, you know, that's how that goes But anyway, well doug man, I sure appreciate you being here man. This has been fantastic my pleasure Yeah, i'm sorry i've yapped on my wife says I can talk the bark off a tree so i'm sorry about that You're a radio host for a reason right doug they wanted you to hire you because yeah, you can talk a lot about the outdoors Right gq's never called for a cover sheet. I can tell you that well you found your niche in life, you know Yeah, thank you john. I appreciate it man. I appreciate you having me on this has been a really nice experience for me Man, I appreciate it very much folks and and once again Thanks everybody for supporting ducks unlimited and wetlands and waterfowl conservation