Duck Hunting Tips: 6 Old Tricks that Still Work

Waterfowlers have proven to be some of the most resourceful of all sportsmen throughout history, with their combined approach of calling, decoying, and plain old woodsmanship. Here are six old-school tips worth remembering as you prepare to hit the water for ducks and geese this fall.

Add motion - Before motion decoys, hunters used jerk strings and pumped their legs in the water to send ripples through their spread. Another great trick is to mount an electric trolling motor to your blind or on a wood frame painted to blend in, set it near your spread, and let the propeller run just below the surface. The motion will provide silent but continuous motion to your decoys and keep water from freezing, too.

Fake a water hole - Virginia water fowler Kurt Derwort can be found most days of the season hunting geese on the stateâ€™s famed Eastern Shore, where on frozen mornings old-timers used to use large sheets of plastic-cut in irregular shapesâ€”to mimic a shallow depression of water in a field. To make the trick work for ducks or geese, Derwort says to find a depression, remove any big stalks and weeds, lay the plastic down, and put the weeds and a few decoys around the edge. Sprinkle the plastic with water to give it more reflection and shine. From the air, it will look like open water when everything else is frozen.

Muddy the waters - Ducks feeding in the shallows upset the bottom and make the water muddy. Clear water will look unnatural to ducks pulling a fly-by, so stir the muck up in your spread by stomping through it and grinding your feet around during slow, flightless periods. Skim the submerged soil with a paddle, or if you're on an ATV, drive it in figure eights to stir up silt, which will linger for at least a half hour. Read the rest of duck hunting tips here.

Interesting and I’m not a duck hunter. Here’s a story to go with duck hunting:
A guy goes duck hunting here in Virginia on the Eastern Shore. All day he is out there in the cold, wet, and wind. Finally he is giving up and walking back to the vehicle and he sees a duck. He hates to go home with nothing so he pulls up and shoots it. But he only wounds it and it goes over the fence of the farmer and into the open doors of a barn. Right in front of him is a sign, [No Trespassing]. But if he could get the duck he would not go home empty handed. He climbs the fence, enters the barn and finds the duck that had died by now. As he is leaving there stands the farmer and he is mad. What are you doing. Did you not see the sign.

The hunter explains and says is there anything he could do. Perhaps pay him for the duck. The farmer explains that in these parts they resolve issues like this with a game of crotch kicking. They will kick each other in the crotch and whoever gets up fastest after going down will be declared the winner. The hunter agrees.

The farmer goes first and really lets him have it. The hunter is down for several minutes until he can stand. When he finally does he says, Now it is my turn.

And the farmer says, Nah, you can have the duck.

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