This is the week 6 recap. In week 6, the weather changed to be much more favorable for the dogs. But my usual partners were unavailable due to injuries or scheduling conflicts. I ended up going twice by myself. I was able to harvest a bird on both trips, so things worked out.
November 21st - Stella
While the temperatures were good, there was a strong (20 mph) wind that we had to contend with. When the winds are strong I usually try to hunt areas with some shelter. On this trip my first choice was already being hunted by the time I got there so I went to another Waterfowl Production Area (WPA) nearby.
I started with Stella. Within 50 yards of the parking area, as we went through some willows she got birdy. She tracked and eventually we pushed up three hens that were in the grass on the sheltered side of the willows. (See video.) That was a good start. So we continued into the wind, moving from willow thicket to willow thicket.
On the northern edge of the area she got into a really big thicket. When I am by myself, there is no point in my following her, because if a bird jumps there is no way to get the gun up. So I waited on the down wind side in case a bird flushed. This is where the GPS collar and handheld are invaluable. I could tell where she was and when she started heading to an edge. I met her on the side of the thicket and she was really birdy. She tracked it out into the grass, with the strong wind. I knew she was relatively close to the bird by her actions. She eventually got too far ahead and either could not hear me yell “whoa” or chose not to hear me. Either way, she eventually busted the rooster. It was too far away for a clean shot so, I watched it fly away. (See video.)
We then worked our way back to the truck and it was Willow’s turn.
November 21st - Willow
I took Willow out into a more open area and she covered a lot of ground but no birds. Willow needs birds if I am going to train her into being useful so I drove back to the original area that I wanted to hunt.
There was no longer anyone there so, I took her out to a cattail slough near the parking area. She quickly got birdy, which I could tell by the handheld. I hustled over as she worked the bird. A rooster popped up and I dropped it. I marked the spot and saw that Willow ran to that spot. But then she kept going. I walked to the spot and the bird was laying in the trail. I called her back and she just sniffed it and started hunting again. What I don’t know is whether the bird landed there or if Willow had grabbed it and then dropped it there.
From there we angled across the field to another cattail area. She was just starting to act birdy when a rooster jumped about 30 yards out. I took one quick shot but missed.
From there, we worked across the field. She got kind of birdy once but nothing came of it. In the following picture, look at her Willow’s eyes. She was tired.
November 24th - Stella
Black Friday. When I got to where I wanted to hunt it was already taken. In fact, all of the fields in the area were in use so I started heading south. Using the Onx app, I eventually found a smaller WPA that was open and better yet, a new place to hunt. The WPA had a good mixture of prairie grass, cattails and canary grass.
Stella was first up and it took about 20 minutes before she got birdy. She tracked for a while and then lost it. We continued on and she got birdy again. We tracked this bird for about 10-15 minutes. I was working on controlling her by stopping her with a “whoa” and then releasing her with “easy” when I caught up. It worked well and I was in shooting distance when a hen flushed. (No, I did not shoot at the hen.)
We continued on and went into the cattails, She got birdy several times but with no birds. At one point, I called her over to me and just as she passed me, she locked up. Then she started wagging her tail quickly and started tracking. She had hit on a fresh track. I followed her through the cattails and a rooster flushed. I dropped it with a single shot. Stella retrieved it and we were on the board. (See video.)
Continuing on in the cattails, she got birdy again. We did a long track out of the cattails into tall canary grass. Eventually, she tracked and flushed a hen. She turned around and got birdy again. Within 50 feet another hen popped up. She turned around, ran 20 feet and locked up again. I was right next to her when a hen flushed within a couple feet of her nose. (See video.)
November 24th - Willow
After that we went back to the truck and Willow got a turn. She ran her butt off but we didn’t see another bird.
Video
The week 6 recap video has quite a bit of bird work and bird action. One thing that I did differently was to add some voice over to describe what is going on. Comment below with what you think. Is this something that I should continue doing?
Summary
The week 6 recap describes my trips and results for week 6. We continue to see and harvest some birds.
Commentary does add value to the video.