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Duckfellas: Season Date Debates, ND Road Trip, & Birthday Banded Cackler · DuckFellas Podcast

0:03
This is a duckfellas podcast your weekly dose of waterfowl wisdom blind banter
0:09
and hunting stories that might just be mostly true hosted by tyler cave and austin,
0:32
Why you got to be clapping your hands like that, Austin? No, I was just proud of you.
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I mean, second tank, you hit it right on, you hit the nail right on the head,
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like only took two after a week off. Little impressed, but.
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It was a long week off. It was.
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I got more along the lines of that. That was just a flare up. Kind of like chlamydia.
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All right. Here we go. This took a turn south very quickly. No longer family friendly.
1:07
Damn, it'd be like that. Let's get into it, fellas. This week of hunting.
1:15
You mean this week of driving? Lots of driving.
1:19
But your name's not Cade, so that's who I wanted to ask first. Do it.
1:26
My week of hunting was very uneventful on the one day that I did hunt.
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We shot one duck. Still no birds. No.
1:37
Yeah, but didn't you have to like paddle back?
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Oh yeah, my dumbass. I went out Sunday afternoon by myself in my little 12-foot boat.
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Burned up a prop bushing on the way out. Didn't know it.
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Fired the motor up to go back to the boat ramp and it locked the shaft up backfired
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the motor broke the pull cord so i paddled about 1100 yards back to the back
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to the truck see don't sell yourself short it was exciting,
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it was not exciting,
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it was dumb is what it was i mean it's too bad you couldn't talk hank into helping
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you pull it back i know he's just sitting in the front of the boat staring at
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me like what's taking so long dude,
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hurry up oh yeah that night I shot zero ducks too by the way that was just the icing on the cake.
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That'll happen. All right, Tyler. Let them have it this week. North Dakota.
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I will never go on a road trip for eight days in a row with Austin again in my life.
2:47
That's crazy, dude. We were just talking about how we literally did not fight the entire time.
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Actually enjoyed each other's company for eight days straight.
2:57
Yeah, no, it was actually pretty good. It was a good time. Got to listen to
3:01
some Pink Pony Club. A little bit of jamming out.
3:04
Watching No Birds, I would like to preface that two of the days that we played
3:10
that song in the morning were two of our better hunts of this trip.
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Is it a coincidence? I don't think so.
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I also don't think so. It directly ties into your success.
3:23
Okay. Well, just note to self then.
3:28
Play Tyler's favorite jam on the way to the boat ramp. We're going to have to
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make it happen every day. Okay. I don't know about that.
3:36
No, it was, dude, it was a long week. We did, we drove over 3,000 miles.
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Didn't find very many birds. The birds we would find were so concentrated in
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one area, just from, I think mainly from hunting pressure, and then also because
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the week before, they had some ice in quite a few areas.
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But it's, compared to 10 years ago when I used to live up there,
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it is a whole different ball game now.
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Just the amount of people that go up there and then it's just hard to get permission
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from landowners to hunt anything.
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Just wild compared to what it used to be.
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Old enough to have the glory days. Back in my day. I hate it here.
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We did get to celebrate Tyler's 50th birthday on this trip so that was so exciting.
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All right, let's not get carried away.
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Shot a banded cackler on his birthday. Like, how does it get any better? That was pretty cool.
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That should have been your sign right there that it was just time to go home.
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Yeah, we should have immediately.
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I mean, I can't complain. The first two days that we hunted, it was pretty fun.
4:54
We shot some snows, specks, cacklers, ducks on the first hunt.
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And then the next hunt was all snows. I don't think we killed anything but a snow goose, did we?
5:04
Nope, we did not. We just eat down the snows.
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Yeah, and then I think the third day we hunted geese and we killed five,
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I think it was like two or three cacklers and two big honkers and a snow goose.
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And then we went on a hiatus for two days.
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Went out one night, met up with some guys from Maryland. Austin tore down the
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town. It'd be like that sometimes.
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And then we hunted the last day we were there.
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And we put a hurtin' on the honkers that day. That was a really fun hunt.
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I was, it started very slow and I was getting very worried for a minute and then I ran out of oxygen.
5:50
As far as non-snow days, hunting in the field, like that was probably one of
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the better cooler hunts that I've had.
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It was cool. It was a blast watching them crawl across that field to us.
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I mean, there, it was just enough wind where them geese stayed like 15 yards off the bean stubble.
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But Then we packed up and head home,
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Had them all done by 1030 And loaded back up Should have been done before that
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But I don't know Some people couldn't shoot It was kind of wild You'll have
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that on them bigger jobs You know.
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I'm guessing it was the lefty. The lefty did have some struggles. Yeah.
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He's got to get his safety switched around. That's the biggest thing. Mm-hmm.
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I found out that hunting out of a layout with this new X4, it's so tight in
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there that I tend to pull one off.
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And when I do, I click the safety back on. Less than ideal.
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Damn. Well, you guys got anything else for the week of hunting adventures?
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Not for last week. when you do switch that safety over we should do a cool little clip yeah,
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post it on the socials let people know how to do it I mean I don't know if I'm
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going to do it I'm really not that smart but if I do do it you can YouTube anything
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you want we'll figure it out we'll figure it out,
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The three of us will combine knowledge, and we will get it figured out.
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That gun's never going to fire again.
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I was going to say, if we break it, we'll just take it to someone that knows what they're doing.
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Could be worse. I could see that happening, too. Brand new gun.
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We're like, yeah, let's switch the safety over for him. Totally just destroys
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everything. Just wrecks it.
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Why not? No more shells through that gun. Nope, never. It'll buff.
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All right, let's get into it. This week, season dates.
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Iowa zones and limits very controversial topics.
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Widely talked about throughout the waterfowl community how they could,
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couldn't be changed what people would, wouldn't like to
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see so on and so forth so a lot of these questions I'm going to have for you
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guys I'll just rip them off at you guys would love to hear your responses see
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what you guys think on it I know I have my opinion our opinions kind of almost
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go in line for the most part with a lot of these questions that I've thought up,
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but our listeners, they need your guys' knowledge.
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I don't have much to offer. Yeah, there's nothing here.
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I get it. I get it. I got rocks for brains, monkeys banging cymbals.
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They'll be taking my monkeys. Should duck season start so soon? Let's hear it.
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I'll let you rip this one off, Tyler. This one's good for you.
8:42
No. I mean, our seasons are rough. And it always depends.
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Every year is different. So, I mean, we've had years where our seasons are fairly
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accurate, but those are very few and far between.
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I would say more and more as we get later in the years here.
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It seems like it gets colder later. We don't get snow until December anymore, it seems like.
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And that's if we do get any.
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Honestly where we hunt i mainly the biggest
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thing for me is i want to see a different change we'll get to but if
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they could if they wanted to keep it started at the same time it'd be nice if
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they would put a longer split in it just because at least then the guys that
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hunt out of sneak boats or walk in kayaks stuff like that could still go do
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what they want to do and honestly after that The first two days of that first week of season,
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whatever birds we have are burnt up anyways. Yeah.
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To me, I'm okay with where it starts if it would just have more of a break,
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like a two-week break or something.
9:49
Yeah, because like you said, it doesn't get cold until almost too late now.
9:54
Well, I mean, we're almost to Thanksgiving here, and we're just now getting
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our first real cold front.
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It was 60 degrees today. And you were sweating in your Rogers pants. I was. I was indeed.
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That's all right. We'll be goose hunting after duck season ends in t-shirts again.
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That's usually how that goes. Yep. Fighting fog every morning.
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It's fun. Oh, I hate that.
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When do you think it should start then, Tyler? If you want to change the start date.
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If I was to change the start date for us, it would only be by a week.
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I'd push it back a week and then have a two-week split.
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And, I mean, honestly, I would just have the season run until right at Christmas for ducks.
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You know, that 22nd to 24th range or 21st to 24th, I don't see a reason for
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our duck season to be open later.
10:48
Yeah. The only reason we see more ducks or a lot of ducks when we're goose hunting
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late December like that or early January is because, well, nobody's out there
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shooting at them or chasing them around.
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And they get pushed out of the marshes that do have some sheet ice on them.
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Yeah. I mean, if you go too late, you're really just going to waste a lot of days.
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But this year we've wasted so far about 35 days, it feels like.
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Yeah, we've had a couple good ones, but nothing to write home about, I wouldn't say.
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No, no. But you're going to have those years. I mean, that's not every year
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is the same and sometimes you're just gonna have an off year either way.
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We just got spoiled with last year. Last year was easy. It was easy last year.
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Everything timed out perfect.
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Like our ducks, we get stale and we get new ones and just so much fun.
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Yeah. I've had to hear Austin say something about last year,
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like 30 times in the past seven days.
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You just lost your touch. You lost your touch. Yeah.
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I sent you a Venmo request for my guided hunt in North Dakota.
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I would like to receive those funds back.
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Yeah, I could definitely do that. Just keep on the watch out for that.
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It's in the mail. If he's lucky, he'll get something in the mail. It's crazy.
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I was thinking about sending you a Christmas card and everything.
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Heavily debating that now. Please don't.
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All right. Back on topic, fellas.
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Is early teal and Metro Goose worth it?
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This probably goes a little bit more towards Cade because every once in a while,
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Tyler doesn't always make it back depending on where work is and whatnot too
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during those early seasons.
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Well, I could give less of a shit or couldn't give less of a shit about the early teal season.
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I might go one day just to go run the dog for a bit.
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It's not like I go every single day and it's like, if we lost it,
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I would be pissed about it. Like it doesn't make a difference to me.
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And then the metro goose season, like where we hunt, it doesn't affect that
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at all because it's not even in the zone.
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So that one is kind of fun to go pick on some city birds when you get the chance. You get to shoot five.
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I wish they would make that metro season in the statewide instead
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of just the metro zones yep because we always get a shit pile of geese like
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right when that season starts and we just gotta sit there and look at them so
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hey hanging out on the golf course and then like the first day that you can
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actually shoot them they're like yeah we'll go back to the city pond going back to casey's.
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I think the teal season's all right. I mean, it doesn't affect our duck season dates.
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It's just a bonus day. It's just a little bit of target practice if there are teal around.
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I mean, as long as they're going to give it to us, if I have a time to go, I'll go.
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As long as you can stand the mosquitoes along with the teal out there,
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it's just nice to get out and start your season.
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Yeah, I think we need to stock up on the DEET if we do that next year.
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Nah, I'm out there to feed the mosquitoes. they got to eat too.
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They can eat anything that's not me. Yeah, the day that Cade and I did go out together, we felt it.
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There was just a constant buzz all morning long.
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It sounded like somebody was flying a drone over your head, but it was just 30,000 mosquitoes.
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It can be rough out there for a teal hunter. Even during, if you're goose hunting,
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sometimes it's, even in the fields, it can be rough.
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I do know that we should not be seeing alive spiders right now out in the marsh.
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That's starting to piss me off.
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Oh, dude, I was fighting them off in North Dakota in my layout blind the other
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day. They were everywhere.
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Yeah, we went from mosquitoes to spiders, and the spiders still haven't gone away yet.
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No, they're in it for the long haul.
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Alright, Tyler's favorite topic to talk about arguably the most controversial
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is the Iowa Zones and should the zones be reconstructed?
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Yes. Yeah, grab your popcorn. We'll be here for a while.
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I mean, the zones aren't really that bad.
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It's just the only thing that I think they missed on was not including...
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Red Rock in the South Zone.
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Yep. But the biggest fight on that is going to be where the boundary should be.
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I think we can get it changed or something changed.
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But you've got to have a hard line. You can't just use gravel roads and zigzag
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roads because it's too hard for the officers to patrol and keep track of, they say.
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But it's going to take a lot of people. Yeah, it's way easy right now.
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It's been, is this the fifth year, I believe, on this zone structure we have? Yeah, correct, yeah.
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Yeah, so this is the season that we can push to try and get that line changed
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or adjusted to include it in the south zone, which is where it should be.
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I mean, it's Iowa's largest lake.
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We stay open almost as long as the rivers, the Missouri River or the Mississippi.
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And honestly, the Missouri River, it holds geese, but don't really hold much ducks.
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And the Mississippi doesn't hold the ducks it used to. It does at times,
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but not near as much as it used to.
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What would you think about going back to two zones?
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We weren't two zones before either, that we had the Missouri River zone.
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That is true, yeah. North and south.
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I wouldn't be opposed to going to that, but the south zone was the same as what
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the central zone is now for season dates.
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So you go back to the season date problem and they're not going to match the
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south zone season dates to the Missouri River zone unless they just got rid
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of the Missouri River zone and did two zones.
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Which is, that's a possible, but there's another guy out there.
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They're going to fight to do that and make sure he gets what he wants.
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It takes a lot of people to make changes and it's something very hard to do
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with people that waterfowl hunt is to get them to group together and agree on something,
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yeah because everybody wants to just sit there on Facebook and bitch about it
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and not put in the work to actually get it changed,
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yeah that's the Facebook warriors are out in force right now on that stuff,
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I am I do have meetings set up with ISC on Tuesday Iowa Sportsman's Club to
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talk to them, and work on coming up with something,
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a group to give the waterfowlers a voice compared to Delta or Ducks Unlimited
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because, I don't know, my opinion on them is not the best. Yeah.
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I feel like it only takes one dude to actually put in the work to get people
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corralled up and talk about it.
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I mean, it's not, it's so easy to do on Facebook, but when it comes time for
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them to actually like voice their opinion when it matters, they're like, nah, I'm good.
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Right. Like, what? Yeah. And that's something I encourage people to do Is if
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they are listening And they follow us on social media Is to reach out to us
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on their opinion On the fact of the matter,
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I have a Google Doc I haven't shared it with you guys yet But I gotta rework
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it It's from 21 Craig Kaufman built it,
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And I talked to him tonight I'm gonna rework it, update it And it's a petition to get the zone changed,
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To match what a lot of people in our area want.
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Not everybody, but you're never going to please everybody no matter what.
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But as long as more than, as long as you can get about 70% of the people,
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which honestly shouldn't be hard to agree on it, it's easily doable. Yeah.
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I feel like it's a general consensus, at least of the people that we talk to
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that the same way and would like to see that made happen.
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So as long as the blur will when the time's right as well and then concerns.
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Robot boy. Yeah, the robots have taken over in the little household.
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Oh no. That's the internet. My connection not good.
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You're coming back. It's tough out here. You're good right now.
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It's tough out here being poor. oh come on this dial up internet stop it,
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I don't know. I look forward to seeing what we can come up with working with ISC.
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And I mean, they have a lot of connections with the DNR and the state,
20:05
the government in general.
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So that can help us to have a voice.
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And that's what we need right now is somebody with a voice with everybody to
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make the changes that most people want.
20:18
Yeah, I feel like you're like the perfect guy to lead that because you're not
20:22
afraid to argue with someone about something. What do you mean, not afraid to argue?
20:28
You don't go looking for an argument, but if someone wants to argue about it, you're not afraid of it.
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It's all about entertaining the people. A lot of it's facts,
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too, that people don't, they either don't think about it or they don't understand it.
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No, and it's hard to, there's a lot to it, though.
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I mean, unless you've really been doing it for a long time or dealt with the
20:49
stuff before, there's so much stuff that goes into it that you just,
20:52
a lot of people don't know about.
20:54
I don't know a ton about it I know enough about it to work my way around it but I mean I know,
21:01
I've dealt with it years ago when I was pretty young my dad did a lot with it
21:06
and he still does do a lot with it in Illinois changing dates and working with
21:10
the state to get zones fixed,
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not an overnight process either they which honestly
21:17
is good that it's not just an overnight process because that would
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we would see way dramatic
21:23
yeah yeah we'd end
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up getting backdoored and just railroaded by
21:30
something that doesn't benefit absolutely anyone yeah yeah which i don't know
21:37
we'll see it's gonna be a big off season for for me at least trying to work
21:43
with different people to get changes done i guess not for me or you kade we don't mean anything.
21:52
Oh my gosh he'll call us when he wants help yeah that's all right you know what i meant,
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turd stain he's just got to be a smart ass It was almost as bad as Zach calling
22:04
us not friends this week Dude that had to cut deep.
22:10
It did,
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season dates, Iowa zones, that pretty much wraps it up.
22:17
Again, like Tyler said, like we would love to hear from you guys,
22:20
like what you guys think would benefit us. I mean, we obviously can't think of everything.
22:25
Maybe something that you guys bring to our attention is something that like
22:29
we would 100% agree on and ultimately like to bring to the table when we're in those discussions.
22:35
And even if not, it's good to know like your, your ratio of people that think
22:41
the same things that we do and the people that want to fight mosquitoes all year.
22:48
Hey, the mosquitoes got to eat. They do. They do.
22:51
They eat plenty during teal season in the first month of duck season, though. Yeah.
22:58
Well, our duck season starts about the same time North Dakota's does, so it's kind of rough.
23:04
Make that make sense for me. Yeah. Alright,
23:08
let's transition over to the second part
23:11
of the podcast and limits thoughts
23:15
on the pintail limit change for the year wild it is wild I was I did a little
23:23
research into it this evening I tried to so there's it's hard to find a lot
23:27
of facts about it though but I did see it kind of came out of California,
23:32
as to why we went to a three pintail limit from the one after we had two years ago,
23:40
I still got it pulled up here. I do.
23:45
Trying to find where, what exactly it came out of.
23:48
It basically says that they, the water, the hunters themselves don't affect
23:53
the pintail population like they originally thought,
23:55
like what we harvest as a total in a season, which is, I think wild because
24:01
there's, again, got these here.
24:04
I think 2025, there's 2.2 million pintails on the waterfowl survey from DU, which is not very many.
24:15
I mean, that's down 41% from the long-term average. Yeah.
24:21
So to me, it just seems wild that we'd go from three to one.
24:24
I would have thought we went back to two, maybe, but I was fine with it at one.
24:29
I know most people weren't, but I was okay with one. Especially the luck we have shooting them.
24:35
They don't work anyways. I don't know why somebody wants to try and shoot three of them.
24:42
I did have one day this year though that I shot my three. I was kind of surprised.
24:47
When they do it, it's fun. It just has to be their idea.
24:52
Otherwise, if you think you have them convinced, they'll work in,
24:56
drop down, and get like just outside of range and then they bust up another
24:59
200 yards and it's just a nonstop process. Right.
25:04
Like right, looking at the survey, the year we were at one, we were at 1.975, so basically 2 million.
25:12
So we only went up like 250,000 pintail in a year.
25:16
And we jumped up, we tripled the limit on them.
25:19
To me, it just seems a little wild.
25:22
Yeah, it's a big jump when you think about it. Massive. I mean, massive.
25:27
Think about the amount of people that hunt, you know, on the day in and day out.
25:34
To, you can put a hurt on some pintails if you can somehow trick them.
25:38
If you can trick them, reach out also. I would love some tips and tricks.
25:44
All goose floaters, no mallards. Something. Maybe Spoonzilla is the ticket.
25:50
Dude, maybe. Bingo. Maybe.
25:53
Little needs to invest in one. I'll do it.
25:57
Put me in coach.
26:01
That'll play. Alright, that just rolls us into the next question should limits
26:05
change during the season what so what is what do you mean by should limits change
26:11
during the season like yes so like should,
26:15
should they I mean essentially exactly what I asked but that's that's fine I
26:19
can explain it even more like should people be able to shoot like more or less
26:25
please pause we'll be back in a minute.
26:33
I hate it here that was awesome of course internet's been working fine all day
26:42
basically you're asking if we should be able to shoot more ducks later in the
26:46
season or less yeah or less ducks like should the limit go down and shoot less ducks,
26:53
as the season like progresses mm-hmm You know, that'd be a tough one to do.
27:01
I don't think that necessarily is a thing or should be a thing because every five,
27:07
basically every five years, I mean, they can change it whenever they want,
27:10
but every five years they look at the numbers and they adjust accordingly to
27:14
that, what the waterfowl numbers are.
27:19
I think it's going to be a big thing coming this offseason because the waterfowl
27:25
numbers are down big time from in the past five years to ten years,
27:31
especially in the ten year.
27:33
Why do you think it's down so far? Is it all, obviously, we'll pretend we don't know.
27:39
Is it all people shooting them, or why are the numbers so low?
27:44
I don't think it's, I don't think that waterfowl Hunters do enough to affect
27:51
the population to a point like that.
27:53
And I don't think whether you shoot your two hens every day and your two drakes affects it either.
27:59
I mean, that's been proven online or by whatever, you know, biologists.
28:06
But I think it's got a lot to do with the droughts we have. We don't get the snow.
28:10
Well, we don't either, but they don't get the snow they used to in Canada and
28:13
on the tundra and in the Dakotas.
28:15
So they used to rely on that snow to fill the potholes up in the spring.
28:21
And we just don't get it anymore.
28:24
Not what we used to. Then you have the bird flu rolling, and that definitely put a little hit on it.
28:32
It's continuing to put a hit on it. We could, you know, there were signs of
28:35
bird flu while we were up in North Dakota last week.
28:38
Not as bad as it was, what was it, two years ago, I think. Yeah.
28:42
It was real bad, maybe three.
28:43
But there's still signs I mean I just saw something on Facebook they had like
28:49
10,000 snows land on this pocket of water and they were just the next morning
28:54
dead all over the bank darn it.
29:00
Peace out snow geese this goal or this hole hadn't been holding birds at all
29:06
and they finally got a push of like 10,000 and there was just dead snows all
29:11
down the bank Did they have like a cripple point like we did?
29:17
We had a pothole we were hunting. We called it Cripple Point because there was
29:20
probably a hundred snow geese standing on the point.
29:25
Are you sending that over to us? Is that what you're looking at? I'm trying to find it.
29:29
But so like on the topic of waterfowl numbers too, another thing that a lot
29:34
of people don't think about is all these party hunters, which I mean,
29:39
we party hunt sometimes, but we're not party hunt with limits,
29:42
but with groups of people.
29:44
When you're all these guides and outfitters and then just
29:47
groups of friends that go out that are hunting 10 people and shooting
29:50
into groups of 50 60 100 ducks at a time or geese think about all the birds
29:56
that are getting peppered with spray and everything and they are fine but they
30:02
fly off and eventually die yep that's a big thing that a lot of people miss
30:07
or don't think about either,
30:10
something that I obviously had no idea of going up to North Dakota but then
30:15
realizing that you could only hunt geese past 2 o'clock on two days of the week
30:22
which was completely foreign to us down here so that was just wild to me.
30:29
I personally like it. It's different, but it's nice because it forces,
30:34
one, us out of the field, along with everybody else, gives the geese a break,
30:38
and also makes us go scout for the next day so we're not just lost the next day.
30:44
It was nice picking up while it was still light, getting out,
30:49
and still being able to see the evening flight of birds and making our decision for those next days.
30:56
I will agree with that. Right.
30:59
I don't know. I look to see whether it's limits change, which I don't know if
31:05
that will happen right away, but I look to see the seasons get shorter for us sooner than later here.
31:11
Do you think we would ever go to a tier system like Nebraska?
31:16
No. No. No.
31:19
I look to see that kind of go away, honestly, even though they just brought
31:22
it like two or three years ago, I think they introduced that tier system. Right.
31:27
Just because, I mean, there are ducks out there that, Is it canvasbacks you
31:31
only kill one of right now?
31:32
Or is it two on those? I thought it was two, but it could be one. I don't know.
31:37
They flip-flop back and forth on that a lot through the years.
31:40
If it's not a mallard, Tyler's not calling at it.
31:47
I'm going to waste my breath on trash. It is two canvasbacks.
31:51
Yeah. But right there, the tier system, it says there that you can kill three of any species.
32:00
And I'm not sure if it does restrict you on certain ones that are lower than
32:04
that three but I don't think it did.
32:07
Like the trend of, I probably have a bunch of waterfowl surveys pulled up here.
32:11
The trend for, I'm just going to go with mallards because that's all I care about anyways.
32:17
So from 2016, we had on the estimate, which is all they are is an estimate, 11.8 million mallards.
32:27
And then in 2017, we went down to 10 and a half.
32:31
You lost a little over a million in just a year from, who knows what,
32:37
I'm not sure what happened that year, a lot of various things.
32:41
And then the next one I have here is 2018, which was 9.26 million.
32:48
And then we had a little bump up in 2019 up to 9.4.
32:53
2022, we're all the way down to 7.2. And if you look at now, we're down to 6.5.
33:01
So somewhere, someplace, it's going south. And it's probably a mixture of a
33:06
lot of things, some things we can't control, some things we can,
33:10
whether it's limits or just the amount of people hunting.
33:14
I don't know if that's that much of an effect compared to mother nature.
33:19
Yeah, I don't really feel like with the number of duck hunters that we have,
33:23
I don't feel like we could put any sort of a damper on a duck population compared
33:28
to what just natural things happening to them does. Right.
33:33
I would like to know the amount of waterfowl hunters there are now compared
33:38
to there was just say 15 years ago. Yeah.
33:42
Because it seems like everywhere you go, there's people everywhere,
33:46
but there's less public access nowadays too.
33:50
Yeah. Everybody's kind of confined more. Yeah.
33:54
I mean, there's just so many different things that goes into it.
33:58
What are you doing over the Cricket Wireless?
34:02
Nothing. Not doing nothing. I'm actually talking to a guy right now that just
34:07
got done listening to our first episode.
34:10
He's tweaking out that we drive 50 miles an hour in these boats.
34:15
60. That's what I told him. Don't worry. Get clarified. I clarified.
34:21
Let's get that fixed ASAP.
34:23
So off the google search it says that this one's saying in 2022 to 2020 2023
34:31
that season that was the lowest tally since 1962 that's wild yeah so it's all
34:39
just basically confining people,
34:43
just it's hard to believe that it's all confinement i agree i mean i remember
34:50
when i was a kid which seems like, I don't know, 40, 50 years ago, according to you guys.
34:55
That's correct. Maybe 60. Yeah, it could be 60, either way.
34:59
When I was a kid growing up in school, I didn't have any friends that waterfowl
35:03
hunted, nor did I know anybody that waterfowl hunted.
35:07
By the time I was getting out of high school, it seemed like almost everybody
35:10
waterfowl hunted, which there's nothing wrong with people getting into the sport.
35:14
That's awesome. More money for doing projects on wetlands and stuff like that.
35:21
I find it hard to believe that there's not more people than ever now.
35:25
I agree. And you see it everywhere you go. It's not just like our normal hunting
35:30
spot, which it always, every year, it seems like there's another freaking 15
35:36
boats that try to put in there.
35:38
But I mean, like you said, even with North Dakota, it's, it's everywhere you go.
35:42
More people are, honestly, that might just be
35:45
more people figuring out that you can
35:48
typically kill a good number of birds there and then they
35:51
finally make the the jump to go but i
35:55
agree i find it hard to believe that it's on such
35:58
a decline still yeah there's just
36:01
people everywhere well and everybody's got a boat
36:03
now too that's i mean that's one big thing is people like for one there's less
36:08
there is less marshes i mean that's just a fact and everybody does have a boat
36:12
now it seems like but it's consistently everywhere like the three of us talk
36:17
to people from all over and it's nothing for one of us to either see on social media or receive,
36:24
snapchat from somebody and constantly every boat ramp is just bumper to bumper
36:29
well look at look at youtube and tiktok i mean yeah on facebook too but those
36:35
two there go insane with the people that take a gopro with them and think they're
36:38
professional waterfowl hunter,
36:41
It's everywhere you look. So it's fine for you to do it. When do I do it?
36:49
Semi-professional. Far from it. Yeah. Field staff. Amateur hour.
36:56
At least, it's like a circus, though, hunting with Austin. Three-ring circus.
37:01
Typically is. Yeah. You guys would be lost without me.
37:06
Wouldn't be as entertaining. I'll give you that. That's for sure.
37:10
I give him plenty of shit i give him plenty of shit
37:13
of not being the decoy guy and being the boat guy but i
37:16
really appreciate his his boat work definitely makes
37:20
it nice when we get done setting decoys i almost
37:24
have just the entire process down now
37:27
like as soon as we get pulled in i'm like all right get out of the boat like
37:31
i got this taken care of and if it's cold out he's got the heaters ripping for
37:36
us when we get in oh yeah it's all nicely roasty toasty it ain't not mine but
37:40
it's honest work Tyler's hanging out the back of the boat about the throw up from heat.
37:48
He always has something to complain about dude you guys just always have the
37:54
heaters ripping laughing,
37:57
our problem, that you don't get cold. Yeah. I get cold. Just not at the warmer
38:04
level. Not when it's 60 degrees outside.
38:07
Well, what do you guys think? Talk about the last couple weeks here,
38:11
what we're looking forward to.
38:12
Looks like it might actually get good.
38:16
Looking forward to weather. We haven't had weather all year long.
38:22
Not any. Oh, come on. We had two days of weather.
38:26
No, we didn't. It got cold-ish. I've seen skim ice in the willows.
38:32
Until it starts freezing the river up, it's not cold.
38:36
But I thought it was cold when we turned the heaters on. Well,
38:40
I'm not saying it's not cold to a human, but... Not our feathered friends? Yeah.
38:45
Feathered friends definitely need another 20 to 30 degrees colder than what it was.
38:51
Need some mother-loving snow, too. That would be ideal.
38:55
Which it does look like that's going to happen. I think it actually might be
38:59
starting now up in Canada and the Dakotas. Yep.
39:04
Hopefully. Fingers crossed.
39:07
And short of hijacking Tyler's boats, I think Cade and I are done hunting together
39:13
for the season, for the duck season, at least.
39:17
I'll be gone with the holidays.
39:20
Hope to see the in-laws. Shoot some ditch chickens.
39:23
Of course, as soon as it gets good. Wah, wah, wah.
39:27
Unreal sad I think you're gonna miss a good week here I think it's gonna well
39:34
if it doesn't get good what a waste of a season we had then there's really no
39:39
ducks still alive or gone yeah,
39:44
I mean, you talk to a lot of people, but not many people say they've had a good season this year.
39:50
No. I've got a lot of people I talk to on the daily, and everybody says it's
39:54
one of the worst they've seen in a long time.
39:56
That goes back to just no weather, no snow, no ice yet.
40:00
I mean, the Dakotas froze up and had a dusting of snow for a day.
40:06
What was the average temp up there? Did you even keep track,
40:10
the average temp while we were up there?
40:12
45 to 50 degrees for highs.
40:16
I don't think we got below freezing but one night.
40:20
I think it was 28 degrees. The fact that I only had to use one hand warmer that
40:24
entire week, that's how you know it's not very cold. That is wild.
40:30
That dude usually goes through a case of hand warmers in a week.
40:36
Honestly, I wish... You name it. If it's Hot Hands brand, he's all over it.
40:41
Bro, I wish they'd sponsor me because I use the most out of them.
40:47
I would not let you guys down. Your product works. I love it.
40:52
I stay strapped with hot hands.
40:57
A guy like you has to. I have to. Dude, my hands torched. End up with hypothermia out there.
41:06
Nobody needs that. Then you gotta listen to me complain all day.
41:09
And we do enough of that already yeah that is also fair ain't that right.
41:17
We'll see what the weatherman does this week. I'm looking forward to the forecast,
41:23
but I've also seen it where they forecast this the day before it changes or the day of it changes.
41:29
At least you guys will have a scout up north. I'll tell you exactly what I see
41:33
moving every day. Pheasant scout? No.
41:39
They're on the way, boys. They're on the way. Tuck in, tuck in. I'm pushing them all.
41:47
Cupped up from Quebec oh boy,
41:51
hopefully hopefully for a good week here because I think I have to go back to
41:55
work I mean it looks like it's going to freeze up anyways for at least a week which will be the last,
42:01
little bit of season might thaw out on the last two days like normal then be
42:05
open all the rest of December and have ducks everywhere,
42:09
it'll just be nice to see that they didn't forget about us though I'll have
42:14
to take the camera out goose hunting for sure.
42:18
Hopefully you bring the camera this week. Oh, I will. I will.
42:22
Hopefully you get rained out all week. I was about to say that.
42:28
Nah, even if I get rained out, I'm going to work. You're an idiot.
42:32
No, never mind. Take that back. You're not an idiot. That makes sense.
42:38
That checks out. Oh, no. I got to work. I guess I gotta get back to work.
42:47
Tomorrow night. I do. Gotta go back for a couple and off for another week. Just gone.
42:55
Yeah. Unreal. I can't believe you'd leave us when the hunting gets good. I know. Possibly.
43:00
Not saying it's gonna get good, just possibly.
43:04
Talked to my wife, but again, we did just get back from being gone for eight days.
43:10
Yesterday, or no, this morning, technically. So, maybe wait a couple days,
43:16
because I don't want I want her to bite your guys' heads off or mine.
43:20
Well, I didn't take it in North Dakota, so why is she going to bite my head
43:24
off? Yeah, I nominate Cade to go over there and talk to her.
43:27
Guilty by association. That's how she sees it.
43:31
I'm cooked. Yeah. Oh, no. I don't know. We covered a lot really quick on this episode.
43:39
There's a lot of things that I hope to see change, and I hope that we can get
43:43
people to agree on also. So, but the big, the biggest thing is,
43:48
though, if the duck numbers keep going down, it's not going to matter when you change the seasons.
43:54
Yeah, for sure. I mean, and like you said, it's, it's a lot of the potholes not having water.
44:01
Yeah. Which I will say they had lots of water in the central to Eastern Dakota, North Dakota wise.
44:10
I don't know about South Dakota, but North Dakota looked really well for water.
44:13
But out west it was fairly dry so hopefully we talked to a couple locals that
44:19
said they had 60 inches of rain in the past two years which is a lot for them
44:26
yeah so hopefully that keeps happening and that that'll help,
44:31
because apparently it doesn't snow anymore oh I miss making snowmen.
44:40
Good lord quit shaking your head over there. I'm sick of it.
44:46
Depending on the trip, Austin. That's your first waterfowl trip out of the state.
44:50
That's actually, I mean, other than hunting pheasants out of state at my in-laws,
44:56
that's my first out-of-state hunt period.
44:59
So I don't know. It was definitely a change of pace, definitely a grind for a week long.
45:05
I mean, long days getting back up early, whether we were hunting or scouting
45:10
and just trying to figure out
45:13
if, I mean, just finding birds and trying to get on them when we could.
45:19
I don't know. It was fun, though.
45:22
Having three good hunts, and especially the last day, just being our quickest
45:28
hunt of the day and shooting a four-man out of that and watching those geese
45:34
do it was definitely cool,
45:36
even though I still would much rather prefer to hunt over water and out of the
45:41
boat, I can be a lay out blind guy every once in a while.
45:45
I think the best part of the whole trip, funniest part at least,
45:50
had to be that last day when we were just shooting geese left and right.
45:56
They wouldn't leave us alone.
45:57
And Zach just stood up and said, guys, give me a minute. I gotta kill these
46:03
geese. I'm like, what is he talking about?
46:05
This dude rips out a goose out of his blind that's just beating the shit out of him.
46:10
And as he's pulling it out of his blind blood's just spewing like a gallon of
46:14
blood came out of this goose all over his jacket arm i think it got on trevor
46:19
i don't know there's blood everywhere and he's like i got geese beating me up
46:23
my blind he had two more in there that are alive.
46:27
It's just yeah we we fully expected to hear him just trying to like stomp geese
46:32
out and there after that we're like dude are you okay,
46:37
It was that fast-paced Saturday that we didn't have time.
46:42
We got the birds to make sure we didn't lose them, but he just stuffed them in the blind.
46:48
He had geese walking all over him and slapping him with their wings and everything
46:52
in the blind while we're trying to kill the next bird.
46:55
That's fun. It was a blast. It was fun.
46:59
We shot all but one were big Tonys, too. So it was just us, two of them.
47:06
Yeah. Yeah, all but two of them were big Tonys. So a struggle for the dog trying
47:10
to get them back at times too with some of those big birds.
47:13
And we're trying to get the dogs back and get people, get their doors back closed
47:20
because we got geese coming in on the same lines that they were all morning too.
47:25
So it definitely did get western there for a solid hour straight.
47:30
They were some big geese too. These were giants. Yeah.
47:37
Appreciate how easy we have it at home Austin yeah a little bit like I mean
47:44
we put in a lot of work don't get me wrong too but like just do,
47:50
watching them do it over water I think is so much more satisfying.
47:55
Anyways now I mean we did have a couple like center us up perfect feet down
48:01
and do it too and that's always cool and I mean it's still cool to watch geese
48:06
like maple down to you and hit those hard banks and come right in.
48:11
But, dude, I felt really, really bad for my guy because he was on those geese constantly.
48:18
They loved being talked to.
48:21
And, I mean, we know that he's not an athlete anymore.
48:25
So him running out to get geese and then trying to call us as soon as he ran back.
48:31
Like, dude, I thought about slipping an O2 tank in his layout.
48:36
Just to get my man some relief. We could have used it.
48:39
That would have helped. Yeah, a lot. 2%. We need to start using that anytime membership again.
48:46
Actually, it's expired. So, yeah, I'd have to renew that, possibly.
48:50
Yeah, after that, that's not happening. After Saturday, I might need to renew
48:54
it. I've realized how out of shape I was. I mean, holy.
48:58
It was fun, though. I mean, he's right.
49:01
You had to call at them fast, loud, and hard all the way till they...
49:06
Well, until we said shoot him.
49:08
I mean, it was nuts. And then even on the flags, we flagged him.
49:12
Like Austin and Zach were running flags until they were within 50 yards almost.
49:17
Otherwise, if you stopped, they just lost attention.
49:21
I mean, constantly. There were multiple groups where Tyler would already be
49:25
tucked in, still calling.
49:27
And I'd have the door up to the side that the geese were on so I could still
49:32
flag them to keep their attention. and tucking in at the last possible second.
49:39
No, it was fun. I mean, the first two days were a blast, too.
49:44
Like, the first hunt, we shot, I think 10 of them were snows.
49:48
So we had a mix of cacklers and specks, and we had a few mallards.
49:51
We should have had a few more mallards, but just not the best shooting,
49:55
and they just didn't finish the best either.
49:59
It was a little tougher shooting that day. But watching them snow geese,
50:03
I mean, they were all juvies.
50:05
Them juvies this year, they were just dumb. they weren't even we were mouth
50:10
calling at juvies and they would just come we did,
50:13
yeah yeah that day that we shot all just snows that was really fun too like
50:21
just mouth calling at them and you'd have a single or a pair like Zach and I
50:26
were standing on the edge of the water and just had a juvie laying,
50:31
five feet away from us while we're standing there like I wish it was this easy all the time.
50:39
Well, we called the shot one time on some snows, and as we were shooting,
50:45
snow geese were getting up out of the weeds within five feet of us.
50:48
Like, almost hitting the barrels of the guns as they're getting out of the weeds.
50:52
Like, well, when did those get there?
50:56
Raining them out of the sky, and then they're getting up five feet away from
50:59
us, and nobody has shells left, so we're just watching them do their thing.
51:05
Crazy it was a lot of fun I look forward to doing it again.
51:10
Thanks, but like the people I take probably won't take Austin next time. Don't blame you.
51:17
That's cute that you think I would come again. Damn.
51:22
That's what's up. Straight roast session over here tonight. I love it.
51:26
I'm here for it. It is. It is.
51:28
It's too bad Cade wouldn't go, though. He was too scared to leave home.
51:32
You know, I get it. I'm getting homesick. Yeah, homesick. Yep.
51:36
No, I just have this crazy thing called a job. I had to work. Whoa. I choose income.
51:44
Over spending money to hunt. It's overrated.
51:48
That's this thing called vacation where you can get paid to hunt.
51:52
Yeah, I don't have that yet.
51:54
Starts on 1-1, my boy. Oh, so you're taking off through the 10th to finish up goose season or what?
52:03
Hell no. That would be crazy.
52:06
What if we have like eight inches of snow on the ground? then I probably won't
52:10
be working anyway. Oh, fair enough.
52:14
Kate, push the dirt. Where do we find this guy?
52:19
I don't know. Timu. I don't even know if he's Timu quality.
52:24
No, come on. I'm like the great value brand. You'll have that.
52:29
There's a mouse in my garage that is absolutely having a party right now.
52:34
Is he hanging out in Hank's new blind?
52:36
Not quite. He's right in front of the garage door and he just keeps going out and back.
52:43
He doesn't have any idea what's about to happen to him. Oh.
52:48
You about ready to take him to the club? Oh, he's going to get it.
52:52
Oh, never mind. He heard me. He went somewhere else. You're going to have a
52:56
mouse hole in that brand new Mo Marsh.
53:01
That would upset me bad. How much did you pay for that thing?
53:06
With a friend. I got the 15% off discount. You have friends?
53:14
Right here guy um pouncing uh it was 250 at bass pro so I got like 40 ish bucks
53:21
off so a little over two hondo,
53:24
that ain't bad no it'll get used too for sure Hank loves that thing absolutely.
53:33
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The maple kind?
53:39
And I fed it to the cat. Banana bread? At work, bro?
53:45
Whoa. Well, I think, I mean, unless you guys got anything else to add here,
53:51
I think that's going to pretty much do it.
53:53
No, yeah, this is by far enough time with you in the last two weeks.
53:58
All right. That's a little ridiculous.
54:01
I think Austin should do the closing thoughts now. Just for that? No.
54:04
100%. No. I would have him do it, but with his cricket wireless internet tonight,
54:10
I just don't know if he could get through it.
54:14
Joke's on you guys. You think my internet's bad? I can't even read.
54:20
Not surprising.
54:24
But no, once again, I look forward to this week here as we come to the end of
54:30
hunting season. and it's going to be going to be interesting to see what happens.
54:35
I hope you guys burn them down that week I'm gone.
54:39
Well, your attitude's really changed since last night when we were driving home.
54:41
You know, I'm really trying to be nicer to you guys.
54:44
That doesn't mean that I'm going to not ignore you guys for a week because I
54:50
don't want to see it. That's crazy. But I hope you guys burn them down.
54:53
Because last night, Cade, Austin the whole way back from North Dakota is like,
54:57
I hope you guys don't kill anything
54:59
and you guys don't just have the worst time of your life out there,
55:05
what I did to him. I didn't even get to go on this trip and talk shit for eight days.
55:11
That's why I have so much animosity.
55:16
Man, I think he missed his own bed. I think that's a problem.
55:20
Maybe he got homesick. I think so. No.
55:26
My wife definitely listens to these. He missed his heated squad car.
55:32
Heated seat. Yep Sitting in the media And sleeping all night I wish,
55:39
I gotta Hot people For window tent No that's fair enough Good thing I don't
55:45
go out In the middle of the night No more That That is fair No No No,
55:51
Anyways I think we'll wrap This episode up Cause I'm tired of Also talking to Austin,
55:58
I've enjoyed talking to Cade But Austin I could care less about I did really
56:01
miss Cade I'm not gonna lie I appreciate it.
56:04
I wish you would just talk less shit when you finally see me again.
56:08
I'll work on that. Slap him a little bit. Yeah.
56:13
He'll eventually get over it. Anyways, we appreciate you tuning in.
56:20
As always, please subscribe on your preferred podcast destination to keep up
56:24
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56:27
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it for real reach out we'll help you find it don't forget to follow our social
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media accounts duckfellas one word podcast on facebook at duckfellas underscore podcast on.