Walking barefoot across red-hot coals or lying on a bed of spikes are fairly rugged forms of endeavor, I was thinking moodily, but both of them pale beside the sport of hunting ducks in New England. Sport? If some director of a slave-labor camp were to subject his charges to such suffering, it would arouse the civilized world.
I crouched in wet marsh grass while a northeast wind stabbed me through layers of canvas and wool. My friend Lenny huddled beside me, his face an interesting mottled purple. I couldn’t see my own face, fortunately, but I could hear my teeth clicking like a high-speed telegraph instrument. I wondered why we thought we were having fun- here on this desolate river bank shortly after daybreak, staring at a flotilla of decoys. Why had we long looked forward to this day, hailed with glad cries the radio’s grim forecast: Storm warnings from Danport to Sandy Hook?
I burrowed deeper into my parka, hunched my hands up into the sleeves and scanned the gray skies, deserted save for the dawn patrol of scavenging crows above the dead brown marsh. Suddenly, a thud of gunfire rolled across the stillness like someone far off hitting a big bass drum.
Boom. Boom. Bd-Zoom. Boom.
“Watch it,” Lenny whispered.
We tensed, staring into the east. Presently, four black specks hurtled into view, streaking high across the sky. As we riveted our eyes to the speeding birds, trying to will them toward us, a whicker of wings tore the air behind us and a pair of blacks materialized out of nowhere and swept
overhead. They streaked across the river, banked sharply and headed back, wings set. Suddenly I was warm to my toes.
“Let’s go,” Lenny murmured, struggling up.
Over the twin barrels of the 12 I saw my duck cupping in. When the muzzles blotted it out I pulled the trigger, just as Lennys gun crashed beside me. Nitro curled into the frosty air and two ducks splashed among the decoys.
And as I waded out to pick up the fallen birds I knew the answer to my earlier question. It’s the same thing that makes a wary brown trout more exciting than a pumpkinseed, that ranks a wily old buck above a cow in a pasture - it’s the satisfaction that comes from pitting your stamina ann skill against a tough, smart opponent who makes you earn every victory.
New England gunners have plenty of opportunity to put both stamina and skill to the test in hunting the native black duck, to many the most prized waterfowl of all. In the early morning he flies out of the swamps and marshes to spend the day sitting on open water far from shore. In his travels to and from his resting places he flies high in the air at a speed that tests the mettle of the man with the gun. He regards all decoys with suspicion and his keen-sightedness is phenomenal.
One day another friend, Robert, and I were shooting at the mouth of Mill Creek. Our decoys lined up perfectly in the current; our parkas matched the brown of dead marsh grass and our thickly woven blind provided complete concealment. Yet time after time the blacks circled overhead, almost on the point of coming in, only to Hare suddenly and streak down the river. We couldn’t figure it till at last we happened to notice the vacuum bottle I had placed beside me in the blind. The glint of sunlight on its chrome top flashed like a warning beacon as the birds passed overhead.
Faced with wariness bordering on human intelligence, gunners have to display considerable ingenuity in hunting black ducks. One of the simplest and most popular methods is jump-shooting-walking or floating the creeks and blasting at birds that get up ahead of you. This was my introduction to duck hunting, and old George who showed me how to do it was a master of the art. I can well remember sitting in the bow of George’s battered skiff with my single-barreled 16 across my knees, staring tensely through the mist which curled upward in a thin November dawn. The old man sat in the stern, his big 12 beside him, steering with a paddle as we slipped noiselessly downstream.
Muskrats splashed beside the banks and great blue herons ghosted away at our approach. Then, around a wooded bend, suddenly there were the ducks dabbling in the shallow water. No grouse ever whirred up from the forest floor more swiftly than those black ducks catapulted off the water. I jerked up my gun, trying to remember all the things Lenny had taught me about proper lead and “hold.” His big charcoal burner was already roaring behind me and ducks began splashing into the river. Desperately I put the muzzle on a big bird as it beat upward and saw it crumple and splash. It was one of life’s great moments. In my book, jump-shooting remains the sportiest gunning of all.
It has its limitations, however. By the time the sun is high most of the ducks have left the creeks and jump-shooting is dead, There are two choices left. You can sit in a blind and wait for the birds to come in or follow them out to open water. On warm, still days the choice narrows down to the latter course, for on such days the ducks won’t fly.
You want wind for black ducks, wind with a spit of snow in the air. Otherwise, the birds will raft up on the water to sit out the daylight hours. To counter this discouraging tactic some long-gone gunner invented the grass-thatched sneak boat, a craft brought to a high degree of development along the New England coast today. The sneak boat is a kind of seagoing coffin. The gunner lies like a corpse in state, while his guide, also lying down, sculls from the stern. It’s a highly successful device for getting within range I of black ducks on bluebird days.
On such a day some years ago I sat with my guide, Ben, in a duck blind on the shores of Open Bay, in Maine. It was mid-November but so unseasonably warm that we had stripped off successive layers of sweaters and were now practically in our shirt sleeves. Butterflies hovered about our blind, the only creatures on the wing, but far out on the blue bay we could see a great raft of black ducks riding the placid surface.
“Look at ‘em,” Ben said in disgust, “setting out there laughing at us. But we’ll fool ‘em. Come on.”
He led the way up a salt creek to a heavily thatched sneak boat hidden in the marsh. He briefed me on my role as we hauled the boat to the creek.”Just lay quiet till I give you a poke. Then set up and pour it on ‘em.”
Custom and the design of the sneak boat demand that the gunner insert himself between its decks much like a shell being slipped into the chamber of a gun and with a like amount of tolerance. Lying helpless on my back with my gun thrust through the thatch, I could see nothing but matted grass and a small patch of blue sky. Ben, also on his back, managed to scull the boat and see where we were going.
Time stood still for what seemed like several hours. Then I felt Ben’s nudge. Heaving like a swamp-bogged bull moose, I finally managed to achieve a half-sitting position. Instantly the air was filled with a great whoosh of rising wildfowl, but for a moment I had no idea where they were.
“Starboard!” Ben was shouting and I looked around in time to see a black cloud streaming away. I swung wildly at a skimming black form and pulled. By some miracle the duck folded in mid-air. The shot had about it an illusion of quiet deliberation and I waited modestly for Ben’s accolade.
“You got to shoot spry,” he declared reproachfully. “I could of killed three or four of them birds with my paddle.” We sculled home in thoughtful silence. A lot of people shoot a lot off ducks from sneak boats and it has saved many a bluebird day, but by temperament and by choice I prefer to do my shooting from blinds. Seeing ducks circle the decoys, set their wings and scale in-that, I submit, is one of the greatest thrills which gunning has to offer.
On cold, stormy days when high winds whip open waters to whitecapped froth a nervousness grips the ducks. They are uncomfortable bouncing about on the waves and they fly restlessly back and forth above the marshes, dropping into coves and creeks where others of their kind are resting. These are the days for shooting over decoys. The wilder the day, the better the ducks come into the stools, and at such times it’s amazing what a variety of subterfuges will bring even these vigilant birds within range.
Old-time gunners invariably used wooden blocks painstakingly carved and lovingly painted in the likeness of a duck. You’ll still see a few of these beautiful works of art in use on the marshes today, but canny New Englanders have found that one of these heirlooms sold to summer folks or antique dealers will bring enough to buy a whole set of modern plastic or rubber decoys. Kapok-stuffed canvas bags are popular black-duck decoys, and along the coast cork blocks have a wide vogue, but the most amazing spread of all was that used by Rod Marcus on the wide Orleans marshes on Cape Cod. It was Rod’s custom on occasion to shoot from a barrel sunk into the tide flats, companioned by crabs and eels and odd bits of flotsam cast up by the tide. There, he used to scoop up stiff gobs of mud and fashion them roughly into the size and shape of ducks. The first time I saw them I didn’t believe it.
“Do you mean to say blacks will come in to those things?” I demanded incredulously.
“Always have” Rod said laconically. “Let’s get down in the barrels and see.”
We didn’t have long to wait. A northeast wind whipped tattered shreds of clouds across the dunes and out of the gray curtain a pair of ducks came skimming the marsh. They circled those mud decoys and dropped in like barnyard fowl coming to a feed trough. Long before noon we left the blind
with two limit bags of ducks.
“They work pretty good days like this,” Rod said as we tramped home across the marsh. “Seems like when blacks want to decoy you just can’t stop ‘em.”
Blacks are hard to call in except by an expert. I’ve known a few, a very few, who could talk them into a rendezvous, but most gunners soon give it up and rely entirely upon the decoys. Blinds, like decoys, are products of improvisation-clumps of marsh grass or screens of brush. There are few of the deluxe installations with benches, roofs, and gun rests which one sees in other localities. One of my favorite blinds is a 10-foot strip of chicken wire l thatched with grass and set in a semi-circle with poles thrust into the mud. The important things are to have everything look as natural as possible and, above all, to remain quiet. The temptation is great with a whistle of wings in the air to look up and follow the circling flight, but such a course is fatal. The white of an upturned face, a sudden motion in the blind, or the glint of sunlight on a gun barrel will cause the ducks to leave you quicker than a summer romance.
If you remain completely motionless, ducks will often come in whether you l are concealed or not. Only a few days ago I went out to retrieve a dead duck. I was standing in full view on the shore when my companion called out, “Ducks-heading in!”
There was no time to return to cover so I bent over and froze into a brown statue. I heard a whicker of wings, punctuated by the blast of my partner’s gun. The black which fell landed almost at my feet.
Ducks are easy to hit over decoys. It says so in all the books. Yet . . . somehow hunters continue to miss them. One reason for this is the deceptiveness of distance over water. I’ve seen skybusters on the Cape Cod marshes blast away at ducks that only a guided missile could reach. Another factor is the great speed of ducks in flight, particularly when they’re riding a 40-mile tail wind. I shan’t soon forget the blustery day on the Eastham marshes when four blacks whipped over the decoys in single file. I swung my gun with the first bird, led him a good 10 feet, and pulled. It was the third duck that crumpled. At that time, it was beginning to get dark as the sun was setting. I was fortunate to have my Surefire UA2 Optimus flashlight to safely locate the game and return to my truck.
In time this judgment of distance and lead becomes mechanical. Some of the old-time marsh gunners have developed uncanny skill. Back when the limit was 10 ducks, Rod used to set 10 shells beside him in the blind and when they were gone he quit. Quite often he had his limit. If you don’t think that’s a trick try it someday. Set out four shells (the 1953 limit on the Atlantic flyway is four ducks) and when they’re gone see how many ducks you have.
“I expect there’s no reason for me to ever miss a duck,” Rod once told me solemnly, and he wasn’t bragging. He’d fired so many thousands of shells at so many thousands of ducks that the whole deal had become second nature. One reason why you and I use up so much ammunition today is because of the incredible lead-carrying ability of ducks, especially big, husky birds like blacks. Too many ducks today are shot at over-long ranges or are struck only by two or three scattered pellets from the fringe of a poorly aimed shot pattern. They drop, stunned, but too often pick themselves up and have to be shot again, or else wing away, dying, to hide themselves in deep brush or marsh grass. The crows and hawks that float on silent wings over every marsh indicate how many ducks are left to scavengers. At the close of opening day last year a friend of mine in the Fish and Wildlife Service took his Labrador retriever for a walk across the Parker River marshes and in four square miles the dog recovered 13 crippled ducks.
Besides being the wariest of all ducks, the black is also the hardiest. Not for him the soft comfort of tropic skies. The big, red-legged blacks which come down from the north stay with us throughout the cold New England winter. Banding operations have shown that the native birds migrate only a short distance from home. One of the fastest shoots in which I ever took part occurred on the Orleans marshes one freezing December day when great blocks of floe ice lay in jumbled heaps along the beach. The bay was frozen halfway across and there was no place to set out the decoys. It seemed hopeless to hunt under such conditions but as gray daylight came on, Eddie Atwood and I saw streams of black ducks funneling down behind Sand Island.
“They must have found open water there,” Rod said. “Let’s take a look.”We sneaked across the ice like 21 pair of Eskimo walrus hunters and came at last to a spring hole some 20 yards across. Its surface was black with ducks. Others waddled across the ice quacking and jostling for their turn at the open pool. They rose in a cloud as we came near, but as soon as we lay down behind the ice cakes others quickly took their places. We didn’t need decoys as ducks from miles around pitched into the spring hole. An hour later we were back at camp with limit bags of ducks.
The black lives on aquatic plants and crustacea by choice and hence needs open water in which to dabble for its food. Failing this, it will still get along. Only last winter a Fish and Wildlife Service warden on Plum Island Refuge in Massachusetts came across a black duck which waddled along the frozen beach unable to fly. It appeared to be ailing, so the warden dispatched it and took it to the research laboratory. An autopsy revealed its difficulty-it had eaten 50 salt-water minnows after ice sealed off its customary food supply. Very early in the spring the migrant redlegs head north and native pairs prepare to breed in the swamps and marshes, often close to civilization where cats and dogs as well as foxes, skunks, crows, and owls break up the nests and destroy the baby ducklings. But despite this predation and heavy gunning pressure, the ranks of black ducks are increasing.
Thanks to strict management, to federal refuges, and to private agencies, it seems likely that future generations of New England gunners will enjoy their heritage of black-duck hunting. And l hope, for years to come, Lenny and I can keep our frozen vigil in lonely marshes with whistling wings in the dawn skies overhead.
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