A night with the ducks....

[steve sutton]

Wood Duck banding....

While in Florida recently I had the opportunity to do a night time capture and banding of Wood Ducks at the T.M.Goodwin Management Area in Central Florida...I've banded a good bit over the years, everything from picking individual chicks out of the nest, to herding, to mist netting to sweeping adults out of the air with hand nets but none of those compares to laying n the bow of an air boat thats roaring through a gator, and mosquito, filled marsh at 30 miles an hour and plucking Wood Ducks off the water, and once out of the air, at speed...

I didn't get the pictures I wanted because of the conditions...should have started out with the camera but wanted to participate in the "catching" and by the time I was ready to switch someone had put a foot through the holding pen and there were Wood Duck running all over the interior of the airboat....after recovering those we had to abandon the holding pin and go to the mesh bag which required both non-drivers to handle the birds with no chance to try to catch the action with the camera.....NEXT TIME I'll know to start with the camera AND to keep my big feet out of the holding pen....

We ended up with right at 100 birds for the evening....(98) Wood Ducks, (2) Mottled Ducks and (2) more "previously banded" Wood Ducks. Great fun and a truly neat experience....

Leaving the ramp....

Like tubes of duck sausage....Woodies in a bag....there was another one on the other side for (3) bags ofd Duck catching fun....

Somebody not so much...a hen Mottled Duck makes a break....Ducks have REALLY wicked nails for those who have handled only the expired variety...and they know how to use them.

And you are "who"?....the Bio get "personal"....

ahhhh nice to have one that doesn't fight....

and a much more co-operative Mottled Duck.....

one more Wood Duck.....

Now STAY AWAY from decoys.....

Great fun..even with the marsh lit up with the red eyes of an incredible number of Gators and clouds of mosquito's


Steve

 

[MHMT]

Awesome! looks like fun.

 

[highmountian]

Ok, now send them to Idaho so we have a chance! Thanks.

 

[StrutNut]

My brother has helped band honkers. He said they had a blast. Those woodies travel and not really in directions you think. My father shot one early October in MN that was banded the week before in Stutgart AR.

 

[tarheel]

My brother has helped band honkers. He said they had a blast. Those woodies travel and not really in directions you think. My father shot one early October in MN that was banded the week before in Stutgart AR.

You're right there. Woodies are about all the chance I have at duck hunting unless I go to the sound country to shoot sea ducks, as the mallards just don't come South like they used to unless all the flat water in the Chesapeake region freezes over, but the woodies move up and down the flyway with no apparent rhyme or reason unless to find acorns to feed on. I float hunt the serpentine blackwater rivers of the eastern part of the state, and you never know if you'll see five or fifty in a days float, but seeing one makes the trip worthwhile.

 

[cornfed]

That reminds me I should call in the band from a couple years ago.Bad on my part.

 

[genesis273]

Now if one would fly by me in a few months...that would make me happy.

That reminds me I should call in the band from a couple years ago.Bad on my part.

I only have 8 goose bands and that was one thing I couldn`t wait to do each time I got one, just to find out where they were banded. Call it in, it can be interesting. Even though mine were mostly banded in a relitively short distance from where I shot them.

 

[Moosie]

Send some Woodies to Idaho

 

[DaveHawk]

That got to be very rewarding and fun when all is said and done. The smiles says it all.