It's been a while since the alarm clock heralded 4am at our house. My watch's beep, beep, beep beckoned me through sleepy haze as I considered staying under the covers just ten more minutes. An elbow shot to the ribs courtesy of my beloved, startled me to consciousness and I was up and at 'em. I quickly donned shirts & a long sleeve t-shirt (forecast said it was going to be 60 degrees and I was going to put waders on anyway) and slipped into ninja mode, attempting to sneak out of the bedroom without further aggravating the aforementioned elbow throwing beloved. "Be careful. I love you." said she and I grinned to myself thinking about the progression we had made after nearly fifteen hunting seasons: First it was"Honey, don't go. Stay home." Followed by, "Have a great time." Then we had the "It's 4am, you're crazy" years. And finally we are at our current stage.
An hour later I was sitting in a blind with Mark and Ken awaiting the arrival of some ducks. 
The decoys were strategically placed 20-30 yards in front of us. There were fake mallards, ring necks and even some canada geese wobbling in the waves of the lake.
The decoys were strategically placed 20-30 yards in front of us. There were fake mallards, ring necks and even some canada geese wobbling in the waves of the lake.A couple minutes before legal shooting time shotguns were loaded, ear plugs were put in and the blinds inhabitants went into stealth mode. Surely when the clock struck LST we would be bombarded by feathered fiends. Alas, the dreams of sportsman seldom become reality. So we continued our camouflaged vigil, occasionally spotting ducks or geese and although a couple groups checked out our spread, none would commit to landing amongst the decoys.
Around 9 I heard the distinctive but faint of hrrronk of a goose in flight. At first it sounded like a distant hound barking but the rhythmic honking grew louder and louder. Mark and Ken both said "geese" at the same time and subtle glance over the front of the blind revealed a flock of eight Canadas flying straight toward us. Closer and closer they came, dropping as they approached and looking more and more like they would soon kamikaze right into us. Grips tightened on shotgun forearms and even with ear plugs in I heard someone whisper, "They're coming."
I'm not sure what the signal was, usually Mark growls,
"Take 'em!" or Ken will just start blasting, but this time we all stood up simultaneously and began shooting into flock. After months of anticipation and preparation it came to this; eight prey and three predators. I made the rookie mistake of flock shooting, firing at multiple birds rather than picking out a target, and watched as Ken and Mark each dropped a bird and Ike was sent to make the retrieve. Usually such a poor performance brings about mental self abasement or at least blaming the Benelli however looking across the blind and seeing the smiling faces of my two friends immediately squelched any disappointment.
We stopped at a truck stop for breakfast on the way home. It had been a slow hunt but hot coffee, warm grits and sharing the morning with a couple of buddies made it a banner day.
I'm not sure what the signal was, usually Mark growls,
"Take 'em!" or Ken will just start blasting, but this time we all stood up simultaneously and began shooting into flock. After months of anticipation and preparation it came to this; eight prey and three predators. I made the rookie mistake of flock shooting, firing at multiple birds rather than picking out a target, and watched as Ken and Mark each dropped a bird and Ike was sent to make the retrieve. Usually such a poor performance brings about mental self abasement or at least blaming the Benelli however looking across the blind and seeing the smiling faces of my two friends immediately squelched any disappointment.We stopped at a truck stop for breakfast on the way home. It had been a slow hunt but hot coffee, warm grits and sharing the morning with a couple of buddies made it a banner day.
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