Well, after a good night’s rest and sleeping in, Cletus and Ollie decided scouting was the plan. They had found a cornfield that had good duck traffic and made it an afternoon hunt so the morning was set aside to find a honker hunt. They made the trek around the Missouri River on Highway 1804 and found a rye field with close to 300 big honkers on it. They pulled off and watched the small family groups coming off the river one group after another.
Cletus and Ollie are old guys, so the new OnX app confused them more than trying to use the ‘talk to text’ app. Finally, Ollie “The Band Whore” decided he had narrowed the owner down to a gentleman named Steve Barber. So they decided to call Clyde and see if he knew Steve, and if he could help them get on these birds. Luckily, in most small towns farmers either are great friends or bitter enemies. It’s that way in all farming communities, but whether friends or enemies they always have each other’s contact numbers. This time it was easy because Steve and Clyde shared some business interests. Clyde called up and Steve said hunting the field was fine with him but another older man had asked a few days before as well. But, they could hunt the field if the other guy wasn’t there.
As they were watching the field, a truck with blue plates pulled up and an older guy climbed out of his truck. He comes over to say, “Boy that’s a pile of birds in there.” He asked if they were hunting it in the morning. Cletus and Ollie reply they had just got permission and planned on it. The other old-timer told them he also had acquired permission and was thinking about going in the morning and he was hunting solo, so if they would like they could all hunt together.
They got out, opened up a thermos of coffee and all shook hands. The man introduced himself as Randy Bartz. Cletus and Ollie introduced themselves and a friendship has struck up. They look at the field and figure they will use an A-frame blind and hunt smack down in the middle of the field. There was lots of cloud cover so shadows wouldn’t be an issue.
Randy had more damn equipment than anyone they had ever encountered, he had all kinds of motion thing-a-ma-jigs, he had all different kinds of flags and poles. He kept pulling stuff out of the back of his truck showing ‘em all these contraptions, so if the wind wasn’t blowing they would have artificial wind.
Being the gentlemen they were and like-minded, they asked Randy if he would like to join them for an afternoon duck hunt. They told him they had a cornfield with lots of green and dry with natural cover. Should be an easy shoot with lots of traffic. He said he would have loved to but had a friend who was driving through town and that had already committed to shooting ducks with him somewhere.
After breakfast and coffee, they had convinced Randy and his plus-one to join them instead. The alarm hit 2 pm, the naps were over, checked his phone to see what he had missed in Buffalo – Kansas. It’s game time. They meet Randy at the cornfield and his friend shows up with more blue plates. He was a few years younger than them. He was a stocky fellow who was very friendly and had a big shit-eating grin. He introduced himself as Dave Reese who runs a hunting camp in Minnesota.
Everyone got set up and it was pretty evident that this young man knew his way around a set of decoys. They threw out 5 dozen Dive Bomb mallards and added a few full-body mallard dekes plus another dozen Canada Bigfoot just for confidence. Dave took over the whole operation and had them hiding in willows on the edge of the field on tundra stools.
They got settled and Ollie broke out a thermos of hot chocolate. For an old-timer who wants to be a Sitka model, the man has some old-school swag. Hot Chocolate with a Stormy Cromer red flannel, it could have been 1965 all over again. They didn’t even get the first slurp of the chocolate delight when Dave hit the old chuckle on the RNT daisy cutter. A quick little wisp of a “ratt, tatt, tatt, ratt”, over and over. The fat old leader cups a wing and barks back with the “quack, quack” and all those old red legs drop down.
The guns roar and BOSS bismuth take down 3 drake mallards and they all let the ladies fly off to meet a new man. They all smiled and Ollie does his job. Everyone toasts with some warm drink and a little baggie of Dawn’s chocolate chip cookies. Dave tells them those are damn good cookies. He said he worked in Texas for a man whose wife Chelle made cookies that might be just as good. Otis asked if he had worked in Knox City, Texas, to which Dave replied, “Yes sir, for the Stanfield’s for 6 seasons.” A small world and some damn good cookies.
They didn’t even finish a cookie before the sound of wings whistling ripped again. A seasoned hunter knows you just move your eyes, not your body. You find them and when they swing you have a chance to put the cookies down and get ready. Dave hit the chuckle on the call and Randy had some motion kits in the decoy spread. Randy pulled a rope and this winged thing jumped up and down. The mallards tried to pile in on this spot and the guns roared to life. Ollie started his job again and brought back 5 more green-headed trophies.
It went like this for an hour straight. Shoot, let Ollie get the birds and then stack ’em up. They had 20 green heads, lots of stories, and great memories of new friendships. They talked Dave into hunting the next morning with them. It was damn nice to meet someone else who appreciated and respected the birds and the hunt. It made Cletus feel good to notice the true friendship that Dave and Randy had between them. To know the world is a better place when we have memories with men like this. Now it’s time to clean some ducks with a nice snort of Maker’s and some more of that Texas stew and cornbread.
The next day they woke to zero wind and a low ceiling. They decided to put two A-frames together for the blind. Lucky Duck had added new tops to the system and they were the cat’s meow. The crew added some willows and grass and the set-up looked like a big natural clump of brush in the middle of the field. As the sun broke to the east, you could see the craftsmanship they had achieved in the dark. Damn good looking piece of real estate and there would be no reason they couldn’t entice some big honkers. For the day’s hunt they went with all full body goose decoys, plus another 5 dozen mallards with two-dozen widgeon Dive Bomb silos in case they got some duck traffic.
The sun came up and now an hour after shooting time. The hands were cold. Their backs were sore. It was as quiet as a church before the prayer. No sounds of geese, no whistling wings, and no shooting. Just letting mother nature sink in and enjoying the quiet. They talked about politics which is a complete shit show. They talked about the old days, the lack of respect of today and they talked about how fortunate they are to live in small-town America. Where it was still the America they understood and related to. By 10 am they decided it was time to pick up and plan for tomorrow. Cletus apologized to Dave who laughed and told him, “I have guided from Texas to Minnesota. I hunt 100 days per year. I had just as good of a time today with Randy Bartz as I have when we shoot a limit. It’s God’s blessing to be able to be with friends and be outdoors.”
Cletus remembers when he lost a good friend in Vietnam. Died in a foreign land surrounded by the smell of war. Diesel, sulfur, and the rotten swamp. He has had 50 years of memories and great days. His friend lost all of that in a moment. What he would give to be sitting with his friend, talking about what has happened in the world since he passed. Make the most of the days you have. A day not shooting a bird is a day to make up for the lost conversations and times with friends and loved ones. RIP Randy Bartz. You made the world a better place.
