Humnoke, Arkansas January 16th through the 19th, 2009

In November the Muck Boy Crew received an invitation to visit the One Shot Duck Club for an end of season duck hunt.

After receiving the invitation in November and trading emails and phone calls and planning all the details we decided that this weekend would work best.

We left Michigan on the 16th at daylight and of course we had to battle snow from the Lake Michigan Snow Machine, almost all the way to Indiana, adding about another hour to the our trip. The only other weather on the way down was the cold in Illinois, a couple of spots measured -17 degrees Fahrenheit.

We agreed to meet our hosts Trey Johnson owner of One Shot Kennels and JD Plumley in Carlisle, Ar. at Nicks Bar-B-Q & Catfish after introductions, over a very good Bar-B-Q dinner we headed to the club. That evening we met all the other guys at the club and laid out the plans for the next days hunt.

Saturday morning before day light we headed to the clubs lease in a section of flooded woods about 2 miles away. The day before Trey and JD had gone to the hole and broke about one inch of ice, this morning they had to break more because it had got down to 22 degrees and froze up again. After a couple of hours and only seeing high flying ducks and hundreds of snow geese. We decided to return to the club, get some breakfast and decide what our next plan would be.

About 10:00am we headed to the clubs flooded field and again over one inch of ice had to be broken. This took until noon and by time the decoys were set out it was 12:30pm. The weather was mostly cloudy with gusty winds from the south. Right away we had ducks try and get into the hole that was opened for the decoys, but the birds were just not committing. JD had some business to take care of and left, soon after that we enlarged the hole and added more decoys and this was the trick that made the birds come in close enough for effective shots. The action was not fast and furious, but steady enough to make us want to stay, one here and two there. until we finished filling our limits, Or as Trey would say until we "Wore Them Out". Trey's dog Selah was a real hero because without her I don't know how we would have got to some of the ducks we took. She worked hard for every bird breaking ice until she could get up on top of the ice to run them down. Thanks Selah.

What was really neat for us was taking ducks in full color, normally taking birds earlier in the year like we do in Michigan and North Dakota, the birds color has not fully returned from the molt, I have got to admit even the few drake spoonbills we took were beautiful.

Sunday morning we returned to the flooded field, but the weather was not in our favor with sunny skies, warmer temperatures and no wind. But the birds still put on a show. Thousands of ducks and geese of all species overhead, all morning, was truly a sight to see.

Our return trip was uneventful except for the this time the Lake Michigan Snow Machine was piling up the snow in Indiana. And of course returning to 0 degree temperatures and a couple feet of snow, from the 50 degree temperatures we left in Arkansas, "Oh Boy!"

We would like to Thank everyone from the One Shot Duck Club for their hospitality and the great hunting, can't wait until next year.