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Finally: a goose shoot

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Finally: a goose shoot

Postby Lefty » 12 17, 2016 •  [Post 1]

I check the weather. 5:18 AM it was -12 F . Winds appeared like would they would be less than earlier predictions.
Expecting the worse I only put 16 decoys in the truck. After setting decoys and the 1/2 mile hike from parking the truck I was too warm.Crawling into my 1 man pit I tried lighting the small Buddy heater Literally 25 minutes later it started working. I think lightly drifting snow had plug the element.
A single honk. Three geese were coming across the field , a few her-ronks and the geese veered sharply towards the decoys. I then loaded my gun :roll: As the geese were back peddling. I fired three shots, all three geese were down and dead. I put the gun in the corner of the pit, squatted down: Holly my 14-year old lab bound out of the hole.. I jumped out of the hole stood up and a coyote bolted from behind the spread,..skirting the spread at 40 yards.
An empty gun, down in the pit, three feet away. I pointed and yelled "coyote,.. The race was on. Eventually the coyote began putting a bit of distance on Holly. I fired my gun twice and Holly trotted back to the blind.
We had barely gotten situated back in my spider hole, I heard a honk, I waved the flag, waited a few seconds and opened up on the call.
The wind had picked up a bit. The look of those 7 geese crabbing the wind was a neat sight. As the geese neared it appeared they were going to land on the pit, I stood and shot the furthest back goose.
A quick limit,four shots, four geese.

I live about 11 miles from the field in the pic. We had 10.5 inches of snow, this field is in the Portneuf gap. Last night the barometric pressure differences and general wind direction caused a unique phenomenon That produced a funnel of no perspiration about 10 miles long and 1-2 miles wide in the gap.
12 17 16 Pourtneuf Church Farm Holley limit geese (Small).jpg
12 17 16 Pourtneuf Church Farm Holley limit geese (Small).jpg (87.83 KiB) Viewed 2136 times
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Lefty
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Re: Finally: a goose shoot

Postby cohunter14 » 12 18, 2016 •  [Post 2]

Wow, awesome hunt! Glad you live so close to the pit...some of us have a much longer drive and to fill the limit that fast would be, well, disappointing I guess? :lol:

Well done!
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Re: Finally: a goose shoot

Postby Lefty » 12 18, 2016 •  [Post 3]

cohunter14 wrote:Wow, awesome hunt! Glad you live so close to the pit...some of us have a much longer drive and to fill the limit that fast would be, well, disappointing I guess? :lol: Well done!

In times past a large percentage of our goose hunts were the 17 minutes drive, transferring decoys from the pickup to a ATV trailer, to the field and pickup time and take down time. When my kids were young and not with me it was nice to be home in time for breakfast. A good traffic field we were done before the sun cleared the mountains.
With such dry hunts the past few years it was nice to have a "shoot".

I use to have a real short distance to one pit, 280 yards from my back door 8-)
Funny story with that field. Bad snow storm. I set up silos and told my daughter who was working with the horses. When you hear geese let me know.
From the barn she motioned up in the air. I ran out to the field, Holly was with her and didnt see me leave the house. As I was getting into the blind a group of 20 birds came in, I slipped two shells in the gun and dropped two birds. From the house Holly heard the geese in the air, then the shots and came running across the field, grabbed one goose, brought it to me then turned to retrieve the 2nd dead bird,. Another flight came in over her head, as they cleared my dog I dropped 2 more. . Holly turned around with the bird in her mouth and trotted back to the house.
That hunt it took longer to walk 250 yards out to the layout blind than to kill those 4 birds in two minutes.

Yep she can count,.. Ok she just knows that when Im out of the blind it was time to go home
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Lefty
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