GREAT RETRIEVE

  A big flock of snow geese was circling the decoys, slowly losing altitude. The little blond lab was watching intently, quivering with excitement, and quietly whining each time the geese passed right over the blind. I gently put my hand on her back to keep her still and whispered for the umpteenth time for her to, “sit, sit, sit…hold still”. White in the muzzle at nine years of age, she looks old but the eyes and her desire still seem young.

If you don’t think hunting dogs get into the sport as much as the hunters, you have never spent much time in a duck blind with retrievers. They live for the action.
 “Let’s take them this pass,” I whispered to Wayne and Jimmy. We slowly reached for our guns and then waited for that magical moment when the birds would pass the closest.
“Take them now!” We jumped up and began shooting.
Jasmine (I call her Jaz) lunged off the floor of the blind with a bark and out to see where the geese would fall from our shots.
We managed a couple of birds and watched as the flock flew out over the Snake River about a quarter mile away.
The flock was right over the river when one bird fell dead into the swirling water. That is the reason you always watch birds into the distance once you shoot into a flock.
Jaz was bringing a bird from the decoys to the blind. I took it from her and then took off running for the river.
At the river’s edge I found the goose, not floating in the center where it looked to have fallen, but on the far side of the river in the water under the brush. That is a long, long ways for an old dog to swim. The downed bird was in the brush enough that it was not floating down stream so we had all the time we needed.
 I looked at the current rushing by and knew I could not send Jaz from where we stood.
 I walked Jaz up river a long ways and then sent her on a “blind” retrieve.
As a puppy I have worked with Jaz to find things by following my voice and arm commands. I can send her “over” to the right by saying, “Over” and pointing with my whole arm to the right. I send her “back” by saying, “Back” and holding my arm straight over my head. She has retrieved hundreds of birds with those commands, but never one this far away.
At nine years old I did not know if she would have the strength to make such a long swim, but I would watch her closely and if it looked like she was tiring I would call her back.
“Jaz, Back. Way Back!” I commanded the little dog. She took off swimming like a little muskrat.
 She looked back at me twice and I just kept sending her “back” as I walked down river to keep pace with the current sweeping her down. If she turned back I would let her come, as I felt she would know her limitations. If it seemed too far for her, than I would not insist that she try, she is much too good a dog to push her beyond her limits.
 It was going to be close as the current pulled her down stream to where the goose lay.
She was pretty much on her own now as she was so far away. I could see when she caught sent of the bird, her head came up and she quickened her swimming pace. At last her feet hit the far shore and she raced over to the goose. She stood for a while catching her breath and resting, then she picked up the goose and began the long swim back to me. The snow goose was all I could see, just a white dot getting larger and larger.
 I walked down the river bank once again keeping pace with her and giving her encouragement as she made her long way back. I was bursting with pride as she just kept a slow and steady pace.
At last she made her way to the bank I was on and I made sure I was right at the water’s edge to take the goose from her. She had worked hard enough and I did not want the old dog to have to carry the heavy goose up the steep bank.
“Good girl! What a great girl!” I kept telling her over and over.
 What a great retrieve! I just could not stop petting her and telling her what a great dog she was. At nine years old she had just made her longest retrieve of her life.
 I raced back to the blind to tell Wayne and Jimmy. We all petted and made over her the rest of the day.
That whole hunt was secondary to that one retrieve the little blond dog made that day. It is burned into my memory. Jaz will be one of the best dogs of my life, if not the very best dog. I am so thankful to still be hunting and doing things with her.
 What a good girl you are Jaz.

 

SNOW GOOSE HUNTING

I purchased a sewing machine. Not for my wife, but for me. In the course of several years I have just about worn out that machine making snow goose decoys.

Hundreds  upon hundreds of white decoys have been boxed up, taken from my “man cave” and stacked in the garage. My shed out back is already full of decoys.
 I can’t figure out this crazy fixation with snow geese. I hunt Canadian geese all fall, and even though it is quite a rush it has not addled my brain like these little white geese.
I was watching a you tube video and the warning flashed across the screen telling all to be aware that snow goose hunting was a contagious disease, causing grown men to learn to sew! Hmmm… wonder who would do that?
Opening morning found Jimmy, Wayne and I on Wayne’s farm early in the morning setting out nearly six hundred decoys. Much too large of a job for three more than middle age men. Jimmy passed me in the breaking daylight with sweat dripping from his face.
“How many more do we have?” He questioned.
I glanced at the trailer and gave him the disappointing news, “only three or four more boxes.” Of course that equated to over one hundred decoys.
Way past daylight we finally managed to have all the decoys set in the field and the motion spinners spinning, the flyers flying, and the sound system blaring out squawking snow goose sounds.
 We collapsed into our chairs in the blind for a nice cup of coffee and some rock hard doughnut holes Jimmy had found in his hunting bag from a month’s ago Canada goose hunt. Nothing like quality to go with our quantity! The dog seemed to enjoy the morning snack more than the rest of us.
The snow geese came trickling in most of the day, making all our hard work almost worth it. We tried our best to melt our gun barrels each time a flock drifted into shotgun range.
We learned very quickly that snow geese just don’t decoy like other geese. They come from an altitude that would make astronauts proud, slowly drift down in spiraling circles gaining flocks of geese from the distance on each pass. Snow goose hunters refer to this as a tornado, and it certainly does resemble a white tornado descending on the decoys.  The snows just keep circling and circling slowly dropping altitude. It is nothing to be fifteen, twenty, or even up to a half hour working these crazy birds.
All the time they are circling the wary birds are looking every inch of decoy spread and blind area for anything that does not look real. The closer they get the more wary they become.
 Many times that opening day we would whisper to each other, “Should we take them this pass?”
“No they are just a little too high, let’s let them go one more turn.” On that last turn those wary birds would spot something they did not like and just drift off into the distance leaving behind three frustrated hunters and a dog that kept looking at us like she would have shot them the pass before. I’m glad we fed her stale doughnut holes just to keep the peace.
 We did manage to shoot our fair share of the little white geese, but after such hard work we always feel like we should have had a few more.
 One of the geese had a leg band and getting the information back from fish and game we found that it was more than ten years old and had been banded way up in the artic tundra.  
 The reason for the spring snow goose season is to thin out the vast flocks of snow geese as they are eating the tundra grass down so much it cannot recover and is creating a big problem for nesting migrating birds.
 We always use the excuse that we are just doing our part to help out fish and game by hunting these geese.
Every person I have taken snow goose hunting has been amazed by the sight of hundreds if not thousands of white geese tornadoing out of the stratosphere into the decoys. It is a sight that makes your blood pump and your eyes bulge, and causes perfectly good grown men to buy sewing machines and learn to sew!
 I think snow goose hunting is like chucker partridge hunting, the first time you hunt them for sport, every time after that you hunt them for revenge!
After my sore muscles recover from the last hunt, I think I’ll go after those crafty little white birds again... for revenge, of course!

DO OVERS

  Have you ever had one of those days you’d like to do over? Me too.

I pulled into Wayne’s driveway in dense fog. I dropped over the hill onto the farm groping my way to the river bank. We had planned on setting out our goose decoys for a morning  goose hunt.  The problem is that with it being so cold the geese just won’t fly in the fog.  Once again the thermometer was showing a chilly zero to three below zero. Very cold.I wanted to check out the river. It has been flowing ice for a nearly a week and the ice ledge on the edge was making its way to the half way point of the flowing river in places.Sure enough, the Snake river was flowing ice like crazy.  I watched it for a while listening for the sounds of geese to see if they were still on the river. I could hear little goose honks down river giving me a little hope for hunting if the fog ever broke.I drove back to Wayne’s house and enjoyed a morning chatting with Wayne and his wife, Mona and their son-in-law Tyler. Tyler was there to hunt with me.We waited until nine and the fog still had not broken so Tyler took off  home.

“I think I’ll go set out the decoys and just stick it out,” I told Wayne.
“How about helping me drop hay to the cows first,” he asked.
 I hooked up to his trailer with my already warmed up truck and with Wayne riding the trailer, drove through the cow pasture dropping hay to the cattle herd and the few horses.
 I unhooked the trailer and drove out to the goose blind. I only set out a few goose decoys due to the cold and being by myself, and then drove back to the farm house to park the truck.
Walking back to the blind I watched some hunters on a neighboring farm make a sneak on some ducks in a drain ditch. I walked as they sneaked over the edge and jumped a bunch of ducks. Bang, bang, bang they shot. All the ducks they spooked flew right over the top of me. Of course, I had left my gun in the goose blind not thinking I would need it until the fog lifted.
  “You lucky ducks,” I said out loud to them as they flew low over my head, “I’ll get you next time.
 I had walked straight across the field to the goose blind just like we always do. When I reached the edge of the blind something caught my eye out in the decoys. Movement!
I stood, stunned, to watch a flock of about twenty geese take off out of the middle of my decoys. They never made a sound.
“You’ve got to be kidding!” I shouted to myself, running for my gun inside the blind. Of course, it had no shells in it and the geese were long gone before I could even get to the gun.
I stood in the cold in total dis-belief. How could I have walked all the way across the field and not once glanced at the decoys? I was so riveted on the guys sneaking the ducks I had been totally distracted.
I called Wayne on the phone and told him about my stupidity. He got a good laugh at it. We have an easy way to sneak into the blind from the back side for just that reason.
 I loaded my gun and was still grumbling to myself when I heard a honk in the fog down river. Geese coming!
 I gave a couple honks on my call and watched as a flock of four geese came out of the fog straight for my decoys.
I was ready. I crouched low in the blind and just let the big birds come. Something caught my eye ahead of the four geese. A lone goose right on the ground low coming right into the decoys!
He was very close to the blind and dropping right into the decoys, and easy shot for sure.
As his big wings back peddled him down I decided to let him land and then try for the four following him in.
“I might get a couple of geese instead of just the one,” I reasoned.
I was glued to the four dropping closer and closer, but still out of shotgun range. I heard a honk out by the decoys and turned to see the loner take off and head for the river.  He was leaving. He should just circle one more time and then land I thought.
Not so. He took off into the fog, and his warning honk spooked the four coming behind. They flared out away from my decoys and blind and followed the loner into the fog and across the river. Gone!
A few minutes later Wayne made his way into the blind.
“See anything more?” he asked.
 “I don’t want to talk about it,” I replied, sitting in my chair like a pouting child.
I told him about my second blown chance at geese for the day. He stood there laughing and laughing.
I looked up at him and then asked, “Can I go back to bed and just start this day over again?”
 We still had a good time talking and telling stories about all the ones that got away while fishing or hunting and made a great morning of it. Thinking back like we did it is amazing how many times in life you would like to have a moment back or just start a day over again.
 We did manage to shoot a couple geese and a duck before freezing completely out.
 It was a good day… but… I’d still like to have that morning as a do over!

SWAN SONG

It was bitter cold. The thermometer on Wayne’s shop showed a chilly one degree. The snow squeaked under our feet while setting out the goose decoys

After setting the decoys and moving the trucks out of the corn field we settled into the blind for a hot coffee and doughnut breakfast. Not the Hilton, for sure, but the reed blind broke the biting breeze drifting off the ice flowing Snake River.
 We could hear the geese lightly honking on the frozen river, and we all knew it would be mid-morning before they warmed up enough to fly to the fields.
 About ten in the morning we heard a strange goose honk.
“Some coming off the river,” Wayne whispered, making his way to his gun.
Jimmy was craning his neck around the blind brush trying to see where the funny honking geese were flying.
 “Swans!” we all whispered in unison.
Two big Trumpeter Swans lumbered their way out of the frozen river and over the corn fields making a funny sounding peeping honk.
“Man, that’s a high pitch sound… like a snow goose,” I thought to myself while enjoying watching the huge birds circle the field next to ours.
 Snow Goose! Around my neck was a snow goose call I was hoping to call in speckle belly geese.
 I dug in my shirt and pulled out the white call.
“Per-peep, Per-peep,” I tried my best to sound like the swans.
The two swans immediately answered me back. I kept on the call, doing my best to make the same sounds the swans were making.
They cruised directly toward our field and then over our goose decoys. As they passed over the blind they made a purring sound. I rolled my tongue in the call and the big birds locked wings in a long glide.
Peeping and purring into the call I was actually calling to the big white swans.
They made a slow glide right at the blind. We crouched low to not spook them, and the big birds came head on drifting over the blind so close it seemed we could reach up and touch them.
 The wind buzzed in their wing feathers as they soared over and made a tight turn.
I purred and peeped in the call and the big white birds gracefully settled into the snow just outside our goose decoys.
 We were stunned. This is the first time we have ever landed swans in our Canada goose decoys. We crouched low and enjoyed the amazing sight.
The big birds strutted around the field until Jimmy had to leave for work. As soon as he stepped out of the blind they peeped their way off into the distance.
We hi-fived ourselves at such a wonderful experience, and I now have the brag of being able to speak Swan!

MUZZLELOADER ELK HUNT

Warm Hawaii vacation is over. Rene heads back to Alaska, while I opt to fly to Idaho for some hunting with my family. I have a couple nephews just reaching hunting age for big game in Idaho. It is always nice to be able to help on their hunts.

My brother, Gary, informed me that his middle son, Nick, was wanting to try to bag his first elk on a late season muzzle loader hunt.
Anyone who has hunted elk knows it is not an easy animal to puruse. Those big animals can cover miles of ground with seemingly no effort. The terrain they live in for the late season muzzle loader hunt can be nothing short of intimidating.
 The area we will be hunting opens to snowmobiles after Dec. 1, so that is our target time. We load the sleds, pack the camp trailers, and head for the high country.
 Arriving in our camping area we are greeted by very warm temperatures and rain, not a good sign for a 10 day hunt.
“Maybe it is snowing on top of the mountains,” we say consoling ourselves.
The first day we head up the mountain towing our snowmobiles to find heavy driving rain. Not a drop of snow.
That’s alright, we reason, maybe the elk are high. We spend the drippy day scouting for any elk sign. Nothing at all.
At camp that night, we learn from hunters who have been hunting for a week  that the elk are down low on the mountains even though there is no snow. These guys are packing elk on their backs nearly  four miles, after harvesting them. That does not sound fun at all.
When the rain clears, we decide we have to go down after the elk. Five of us split up and head down the steep mountains.
 My brother is hunting with his son, Nick. They take the middle, I take one edge and a friend, Jimmy takes the other edge.
About half way down the steep mountains we get into a good herd of elk. Muzzle loader range is just a bit more than a bow and arrow, so you have to get close in order to line up a good shot.
 Idaho muzzle loader hunting requires you have an exposed cap (the primer the hammer hits to fire the load of powder stuffed down the barrel with a ramrod) and an all lead bullet. Not ideal in rainy conditions.
I run into an elk at close range, about fifty yards and try for a shot. My gun misfires. The hammer hits the cap but it fails to fire. Too wet.
The elk take off running towards the guys in the middle, but like the crafty animals they are, they dodge everyone without being seen.
Jimmy gets into elk on his side and manages a shot, but has a clean miss. He is struggling with misfires as well.
This time the elk run right to Gary and Nick.  A big cow (this is a cow only hunt) breaks over the ridge and Gary whispers to Nick to take the shot. “Click!” Nick’s gun fails to fire the cap.  Gary also clicks on a cap. The elk are moving up the ridge but still in good range. Nick cocks the gun and fires a great shot.The  big cow falls and rolls down the ridge till she stops against a tree.
Gary radios to us that Nick has an elk down and gives us directions how to get to them. It takes us an hour to reach Nick. We congratulate him on his first elk, take lots of pictures, then get to the real work.
 We bone the meat out and stuff our pack frames. Each of us takes more than we really want to carry but that is how it divides an elk into five packs.
We continue down the steep mountains working the rest of the day to get to a truck we had dropped in the morning. At dark we break out of the mountain and to the truck parked on a lower road. We are all exhausted but very happy to have one elk in camp. Thanks to Nick.

 

CAMP FIRE KITTY

                                                           

Our big annual muzzleloader elk hunt was in full swing. Each day all the guys would pound the steep hills in search of elk. The weather threw every curve it could at us, mainly rain.
As the bedraggled, rain soaked hunter came off the mountains we would gather around a roaring fire each night. The fire is our common meeting place, and most importantly, a place to dry out the days hunting gear and clothing.
One evening as we sat around the fire we heard a meowing near one of the campers. We all shined our head lamps in that direction and picked up the glowing eyes of a small cat.
“That cat was here last year,” Jimmy commented. “Has rings on it’s tail like a raccoon."
 The cat seemed very shy. If we shined our lights in its direction it would simply vanish into the darkness outside our little light beams.
 We all tried to coax it into our little fire area but the cat would just hang in the darkness and meow.
 One night most of us had gone to bed except Jimmy and his son, T.J. They sat quietly talking in the darkness when the little kitty came right up to them. T.J. left his hand dangling near his chair and quietly coaxed the kitty to him. To his surprise, the little cat loved to be rubbed and petted.
The next night the little kitty once again made its appearance in the darkness under the trailer.
“Turn off your head lamps,” T.J. commented and just be quiet and see if the cat will come to us.
We did just that and here came the little gray kitty with the raccoon tail.
 Oh how it loved to be scratched around the ears and head. It would bump the bottom of our camp chairs if we got busy with conversation and failed to hang an hand near the ground.
When you petted the little kitty you could feel only tight muscle. That little mountain kitty was a survivor of tough times. It was soft fur covering rock hard muscles.
T.J. commented that he needed to get a cat for his wife and how loving this one was. He was thinking of trying to get it home to just spoil it and fatten it up.
The cat would never be around during the day. It showed up only in the dark of the night, right on schedule,  when the evening haze darkened into the black of night, the little kitty made her appearance.
 One night one of the guys tried to gently pick up the little kitty to place it on his lap to give it lots of love. That little kitty became a monster. Fangs out, claws ripping the little kitty was clearly saying, “pet me on the ground but don’t you dare try to pick me up.”
We all got a laugh at the episode but agreed the little mountain kitty was clearly at home around the camp ground, living in the hills all by herself, and no one was going to place the cat in a car for a peaceful drive home.
We are all hoping to see the little raccoon tail kitty next year as we sit around the fire.
We will do our best to fatten it up next year, just like we did this year with scraps of meat and fish.
Kudos to you, our little campfire kitty friend.

Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad

I am still in Idaho for the holidays. Rene and I have been very blessed this winter to have one of our great friends, Patsy and her daughter, come over from South Africa to visit for a while

  New Year’s night found Rene, Patsy, and I dining with my parents for their 57^th anniversary.

 In order to have a 57 anniversary my folks have had to put in quite some time on this earth. Dad has rolled around 93 years and mom is just ten behind him.
Each day you will find Leo and Estelle eating lunch at the Senior Center down town. Like clock work they are there to eat and help in any way possible.
On Sundays you will find them faithfully attending Valley United Pentecostal church. Once again very faithfully and doing what ever they can to help out.
 I have been so very blessed to have these parents. All my life they have been so steady.  From Alaska I call them every morning as I drive to the harbor. It is one of my daily pleasures to be able to speak to them. Of course, Dad is more interested in the fishing than other parts of my daily guiding life. I have to give him my daily fish report!
My brother and I participated in sports during our school years. One thing we could count on every evening we competed, was our parents sitting in the stands. Our folks were at every game, every track meet. Not many of the other kids could say that. Even now you will find this elderly couple at some youth football and baseball games rooting on their grand sons.
 I am very thankful for these two Godly and wonderful people, my parents, Leo and Estelle Tuttle

Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad!