“Tag: goose”

I was catching up with a friend of mine, who for whatever reason prefers hunting deer to waterfowl, when he mentioned his freezer full of ducks and geese.

I've never been a big fan of coyotes, but new info released by the American Bird Conservancy (ABC) may change my tune: Apparently they eat a lot of cats.

Penn State's University Park airport has developed a widlife hazard management plan that's due, in part, to a 2010 collision between a mallard and a private aircraft. Nobody was injured, but the duck managed to do a whopping $45,000 in damages to the jet—sure makes hitting a deer with your pickup seem not so bad, eh?

Recent trends indicate that waterfowlers are ditching their duck blinds for deer stands.

One evening many years ago a wise old man was sharing the secrets of life with me over cold drinks. "Tell me, Frank," I said, "What's been the key to your long and healthy marriage?" "Oh, that's easy," he replied, a twinkle in his eye. "If I give up, my wife wins."

For some reason professional chefs seem to really underestimate my ineptitude in their cooking instruction. They include ingredients I've never heard of or can't find at my local grocer. They use fancy equipment that I don't own and don't care to own. And they employ such fancy techniques and swiftness with their knives that my feeble brain can't keep up.

California Waterfowl board member and long-time volunteer Jay Goble shot this tremendous video of wood ducklings (or is it wood duck ducklings?) plopping from their nest for the first time. I don't normally use the word "cute," but friends, this is one cute video.

Federal duck stamps go on sale today and, while competition for the winning artwork is always fierce, I think Joe Hautman's woodie drake is as pretty as they come. Therefore there's no better year than this to join a growing waterfowl conservation tradition: buying not just one, but two duck stamps. I like to frame one stamp, and tuck my signed stamp (the one I hunted with) inside my duck journal as a memento.

We duck hunters are prone to irrational optimism. How else do you explain a group of people who can spend an entire day freezing our butts off in windy, pounding surf for just a duck or two (if we're lucky), only to go home, convince ourselves tomorrow will be better, and do it all over again? All we need is the slightest indication the duck hunting may improve.