If you are snowed in....

[Snipe Hunter]

....you ought to be down here shooting birds in Florida. Other than very stiff winds the days have been nice over the last week. Yesterday it warmed up into the seventies but the humidity was low and with a good breeze I didn't break a sweat. I'd give just about anything to see some snow but I also know there are others that would give just about anything not to have to deal with more of it anytime soon. It seems like the grass is always greener somewhere else, especially when yours is under two feet of the white stuff.

Skip











Below are my birds from Friday. I got into something of a slump and it was really frustrating me. Hunting in the open the flushes are long and many of the birds leave going down the shoreline. It's either shoot very fast or not at all. With them catching the wind and darting from side to side I was missing horribly. There were a couple of times when a bird rising after a flush switched from a slight angle right to a right angle left (or vice versa) just as I was swinging through it. It was too late for my brain to stop my trigger finger and the results was a horrible miss, perhaps as much as five feet. I finished out the day with all sorts of gremlins running around in my head, something that never helps matters any.

Yesterday I started off about the same way, letting both the wind and the birds get the best of me. When I had three in my bag I stopped to talk to a father and son that I have run into a couple of times. I think taking the break helped get my mind off the way things were going. After a good chat I seemed to be just shooting instead of thinking about it. A few crossing shots didn't hurt matters either. They can do all the jinking they want to when on a hard angle and it will have little effect on either the vertical or horizontal plane. I used the second barrel a couple of times but ended up only missing two birds while taking my last five.

[fox-admin]

Is that a flooded pasture you are hunting over? Snipe move through Central New York in fairly large numbers in mid October. Last year our marsh was almost dry and they stayed. Very cool pictures, how do you find them in the grass without a dog?

[Chukarman]

Skip -- nice photos! The top one is stunning. Looks like you had a good day on the marsh.

I am south of you - in jamaica - for a respite from holiday fever.

[R.R.]

Hi Skip,
Thanks again for sharing your hunting photos.
So when does the snipe season start down there? Are the birds mostly migrants... so later is better? or not?
My grouse grounds are deeper in snow than my dog's head right now, with a layer of frozen crust between the storms.
We're still recovering from/cleaning up the icestorm in my backyard. Icestorms followed by high winds equals lack of power, internet, tv, phone. What a mess.


Good luck with that Sterlingworth and those 'jinking' birds.
Rick

[mc15426378]

I've been thru 2 major ice storms and hurricanes Camille/Katrina in Mississippi where we went many days without power. Luckily mine and my families homes were not damaged and no one was injured. Did not seem so at the time but God blessed us during those trying times. Hang in there.

Mike

[Snipe Hunter]

Craig, that is something of a mix between pasture and lake, if that sounds possible. The lake borders a plantation and they own to the water. They mow as much as they can for the horses but if they didn't you would see chest high broom sedge. Our water has come back some but we are still low for the last handful of years. They like it when the water is low because you end up with land dividers and it creates ponds of up to perhaps 100 acres or so that only they have access to just off the main lake.

Finding them in the ankle deep stuff I have hunted the last month is fairly easy even considering how well their plumage blends in. In the "wilder" places that I hunted in November and most previous years it can be much more difficult to find them. I have a setter but he has never been much of a snipe dog because they won't hold and because their is a reasonable level of risk out there for a dog. I see a number of cottonmouths and few gators that like sunning along the edge on nice days. Two guys that were out there in the same area Saturday told me they saw one they guess at 10' in the area I was walking.

I don't know what a reasonable percentage to sacrifice would be. I am hesitant to use the word "acceptable" because I can't accept losing any birds. However, in spite of my best efforts I have left three out there this year. One was a broken wing bird that went down immediately no more than thirty yards away. I took my time going toward him because I had a solid mark and I wanted to be ready in case another bird flushed. Had I hurried instead of taking perhaps a minute to get there I doubt if he would have gotten far enough away to evade me. I made a poor decision and I realize it.

The other two birds were long gliders because I didn't break a wing. One went perhaps one hundred yards max and while distance wasn't locked down exact I had a pair of small pines lining up behind the bird that helped me keep line to within no more than a 5'-6' window. The bird landed high up on dry ground and used its legs. I couldn't have done anything different that would have changed the outcome.

I also couldn't have done anything to get the other bird I lost except swim for it. I didn't break a wing on it and watched it glide out over the water before succumbing to the shot and falling down to the water. It isn't that cold here on many days in December but it's too cold for me to swim a hundred yards out and back for a bird.

With those three losses I am recovering just over 97% so far for this year. The good thing is that each day for the last month that percentage has gone up. That is horrible in my opinion but since I don't know how well other people do with or without dogs I can't say how it compares to the norm. Prior to losing the first one this season I had recovered every bird I knocked down since the first month of the 2005-2006 season. That includes all snipe including ones that sailed or poorly hit birds that flushed and flew again after I knocked them down. I guess five hundred-sixty consecutively recovered snipe plus a few handfuls of dove and soras isn't bad for a dogless hunter.


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Mike, I hope you are having fun in Jamaica. There should be a package waiting for you when you get back home.


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Rick, go ahead and rub it in. I'm always jealous when I see snow, probably because I've never shoveled any of it. I can live without a phone because I'd be happy if mine never rang. However, my internet and TV are important to me. It's good to see that you are connected with the outside world again.

The birds show up here around the end of September or early October depending on the weather along their migration route. We have them until sometime in March when they disappear completely. The season runs from November 1 until February 15. I seem to hit a lull the second half of December bur January tends to pick back up a little bit. After the new year is probably my favorite time to hunt them. I don;t have the excitement that comes early with the anticipation of a new season but for some reason I enjoy it more after the new year has started. Maybe it is because most of other people I usually run into have had their fill and are doing something else.


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Mike, I remember Camille. That was in or around 1969. I lived in Panama City and even though the eye was two states east of us we still had storm surge damage. We have had a number of hurricanes since then in the Florida panhandle but for that storm is still the one people talk about.

Skip

[R.R.]

Mike,
Yes, I consider myself blessed. Not much more than clean-up at this point. Spent a few hours dragging and sawing today.
Others were not as lucky. Thanks.
Skip,
Nope, not rubbing it in, although I love the winter season, this years hunting season has been cut short. I did get to spend some time sledding and skating with my youngest relatives... without guns. My nephews always had jealous friends at school when they headed north over Christmas. The ice does have the remaining geese and mallards moving.
My nephew has decided to get married the first weekend in October... prime time grouse/woodcock season... yet in Florida, and not within snipe season. I'm thinking about a real nice potato pealer from Walmart as a wedding gift.