Skunked. At least I was. I got to the blind a little late this morning; 5:15. Eric arrived even later at 6:30 after dropping his son off at basketball practice. We had just enough time before shooting hours to put some finishing touches on the spread. We sat down and five minutes before shooting time, a pair of mallards dropped into our decoys. We waited, hoping they would remain still until we could put them down. No luck. They got nervous and vacated the area. Soon we had another mallard hen drop in. Eric scared her up and knocked her down. All was quiet for about a half hour until we worked some birds in. Two, to be exact. We raised our guns but my hands were so cold that I could not manipulate the safety off. Eric shot and missed. More ducks and more misses for me. My shooting has become a point of humor in the blind. A hooded merganser drake zipped across our spread. Another shot from my Benelli and another miss. We called at more ducks in groups of 4 to 6 and they sped by for a look but kept going. The time had come. We needed to leave. This was a short day, but fun nonetheless. We exited the blind and like so many times before, the birds wanted into the decoys while we were standing in them, without our guns. A small group started circling to land. I stayed out in the decoys while Eric hurried back to his gun. He shot at a duck as it zipped by. A miss. Again, a group of ducks circled. This time Eric stayed in the decoys and I grabbed my gun. I fired a shot at what appeared to be a bufflehead drake. Another miss. As we continued to pick up the spread the ducks continued to circle. We finally ran out of time completely. I had to work some overtime, so the day ended at 10:00. Being an optimist really took some work today.
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