(EP:29) Field Hunting Mallards -Tips, Tricks and Bird Dogs.

In this episode we just finished up an awesome Mallard field hunt. We go over strategy and how we did it. We also talk about gear and the dogs. Hope you guys enjoy and can glean some good information from this one. We only had three mics, but four people, so I apologize in advance for any audio that is not super clear.  Enjoy everyone and good hunting! 

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Transcript

0:35

Hey folks, welcome to the bird dog podcast. My name is Tice. I will be your host today and today we got a pretty fun show. Uh, we got the Utah bird dog training team here. Um, and, uh, we had a pretty awesome hunt this morning. Uh, and so we wanted to kind of share that with you guys and, and, and bring you guys along on the journey a little bit. Um, first we're going to kind of introduce everyone. Uh, if you want to, Give a little background a little bit to yourselves. Uh, we got Josh on the podcast, Josh Bartold. Told, yep. Told, yep. Josh has been working. How long have you been working for me now, Josh? Maybe like three months. Been with me for about three months. Been with the team. He is been awesome. Uh, it's been fun and, uh, to have him on board. Josh, why don't you give us a little background about yourself and about, uh, I guess your love for dogs and hunting. Yeah, I'm 20 years old. I grew up in Spanish Fork, Utah. Um, I've kind of just had a really big passion for hunting. And, uh, as I got an older, I kind of just drew a love towards waterfowl, especially. And I got my first dog when I was 17, 16 and trained them all up myself. And I didn't, uh, heck, I didn't know what I was doing, but I sure had fun with it. Um, And then I just really got into fields and just started killing a lot of ducks and having a lot of fun with it. Getting all the friends out in the field and, um, it's just kind of been my passion now and my love is to chase birds for sure. It's been fun. Yeah. Yeah. It's Josh. Josh is doing awesome on, well, he really knows his stuff. He, today he supplied the decoys for the field hunt. Um, I haven't done a ton of field hunting myself, so it was fun to be able to get on a good. Field hunt. Most of the stuff I'm generally doing is kind of over water. So, um, Orlin, you want to say anything? Yeah, I'm just here for the ride. It was a great shoot this morning. I feel like everybody was beat on and it was, uh, ducks were falling from the sky. So it was a lot of fun, but yeah, we're, we're pumped that Josh is part of the crew for sure now. So, yeah. Then we got Jeff here. He loves talking. So we're, we got three mics here and, uh, And so he doesn't have headset on, but we're going to kind of let him say something. Jeff. Hello. Um, I've already introduced myself on previous ones, but no, it was, it was a good hunt today. My first field hunt. And, uh, it was amazing, I guess. There's a lot of birds and never seen them come down on us like, like it was today. So it was awesome. It was, uh, so kind of, um, kind of give an outline of what happened. So we, uh, found a, there was a cornfield that we had access to and, uh, it had been cut. So there were some over spilled some grain in there that the ducks, obviously ducks and geese love to, to get into. And, um, and we thought with today was a really stormy day, uh, a lot of just, it was super windy and stormy. And we thought we haven't really we saw the birds We've seen the birds touchdown once or twice in the field, but they haven't been really hitting it real heavy But we thought with the weather they're probably moving around uh coming off the roost and so we thought we would Uh put a big spread out and see if we could traffic or guide the birds in uh to the to the decoys All right. So we had to kind of read the mics were off a little bit. So we just had to realize we weren't talking real close. We need to talk a little closer to the mic here so you can hear us. But anyway, so the birds were not really hitting this bill, but we thought we'd see if we could traffic them in. Um, so we got out there at first light. Uh, Josh, might you tell us about our setup? Yeah, I'm talking the whole time. Um, for sure. We got out there pretty early this morning, you know, and me and Orlin kind of came up with the game plan last night that we had, uh, Good spread idea and kind of depending, of course, on the wind and where we need to set and brushing the blinds and everything. I mean, it all comes into play. But yeah, this morning we got there throughout all all the decoys and everyone started helping setting the spread up and we just kind of ran a big W with big family groups and I mean, I'm not a big pattern guy, but I am really big into just big family groups and kind of look as natural as we possibly can. So, I mean, that's kind of what we try to do. We threw out, uh, five mojo's this morning because there's a pretty stormy, rainy day. See if we can get some, uh, pull the attention into us and Uh, pull, pull all the birds down, but something cool we kind of did this morning that we don't usually quite do is we put two mojos just super low on the ground. And I think that really kind of helped them. Uh, kind of, what was your thought process behind that? Putting those mojos. Yeah. Talk about that. Put them at different heights and what you were thinking there. Well, most of the time, you know, all the mojo pulls come in just one length. And so this morning I wanted to break, um, them fully down and just have one super small pole because When I'm watching these fields, I'm seeing them just flutter over the dirt for a while instead of just having five modules all the same length. So, um, it kind of looks a little bit more realistic, realistic when they're all at different lengths and stuff. And so I thought, well, let's throw some super low cause I mean, sometimes in water and stuff, you'll see people throw them high, but I don't quite as often see them go super low. And so I'm like, let's throw two of them super low so it looks like they're just fluttering over the, uh, corn. And I thought maybe that would Give us a little bit better of a shot Just make it look natural because we've only seen them hit this field a few times And I mean, but when but when we have seen them hit this field it has been pretty hard And so I was kind of pretty excited going into it because I knew The two times I have seen them hit this field It was a super stormy day, and I knew that to a day was gonna be a stormy day So I knew that we had to give it all and And yeah, I mean, Orland helped set the spread up. He, he kind of had a big play in that for sure, too. Yeah, we were planning on going on a different spot and sitting in a different area, different angle, everything. And then looking at the weather forecast, it was just kind of a Northwest wind. And so we're like, well, we got to make do with what we've got. And so we kind of just pulled off to the side, got a nice open pocket of corn and Um, stuck the decoys out, but the mojo is, I feel like we're the key. Like we had the, the smaller ones in the back because when birds typically go down, those back birds are letting in first. And then those, those ones that are following are going to land in front of the feed. So that's kind of what we were thinking is like, Oh, you got to stand out, do something different in your spreads. Um, and we've been doing a little bit different stuff on the water too. That we've seen kind of some more success, like putting a wing on the water, having that motion, um, you can also put like zip ties on and put it real low to the water, get that motion. Um, and we've seen success on that just on the local lakes. And yeah, for sure. I mean, I mean, it's definitely hard hunting all these local birds. You kind of, I mean, just everyone kind of throws a mojo out and I feel like they get pretty used to just seeing those mojos. And I think they're really good if you use them, right. Um, You got to definitely use them at the right time because I mean on a sunny day, I don't think I think we would have flared birds having five mojos out for sure. Because I feel like it's, it's a little bit more like aggressive, aggressive. The, the ducks are going and they're, they're fighting over that food. They're getting ahead of the feed rather than, you know, being at the back of the feed where there's no food on the ground. So, and then as well, it's like, there's that we're not hunting when the geese are. or we can shoot geese, you know? And so keeping those mojos running is, is key to, to get, draw attention to it. Cause some, some people say that geese don't like mojos and I don't know. I haven't really. Seen it, but we usually just say, Oh, pull the Ojo's when the geese are coming, like turn them off, turn them off. I mean, the other day we kind of experienced something too with Mojo's. It was kind of cool. Cause like Orlin said is we're usually running out there, pulling Mojo's when the geese are coming, but the, the goose hunt's not open here in Utah, but we had probably 40, 50 geese fully cupped up. And. The mojos were still on and they landed there fully in our face and I'm like well that kind of proves to me It's like on the right day. It doesn't matter as long as your spread is set up good and looks realistic Probably if the birds want to be there too, you know, that probably obviously helps, you know Yeah being there they they're used to it safe like they know. Yeah, there's food there. Yeah. So yeah, it was a fun It was a fun, uh little spread we had I don't know how many You Quite how many decoys we had. I know we had like about four or five dozen. Yeah, I bet we had brought around right around five or six Yeah, five or six dozen with a couple mojo or four or five mojos Yeah, and then we just brushed the heck out of the blind with some tumbleweed and it was real windy So the tumbleweeds were just ripping around so we kind of just laid down and just Um, right at light, they were circling and it was the coolest thing. Yeah. Just seeing those ducks silhouetted against the morning sky. It was definitely a little bit chaotic, right at light. Weren't quite fully brushed or we're just finishing up the final, the final details. And I mean, man, it, and it, The birds just started coming in hard it was crazy It was gonna be a good day when you had a flock about like what 30 or something right at first light Coming over the deke wanting to get into the decoys like oh, this is this is on And uh, it was on we uh, we shot we limited out within I think it's just under around an hour or just less than an hour and uh, All all these guys all of us here Not trying to be you know, we're pretty decent shots. We like to think at least so they You The birds that came in, we rained them and it did help that they were sitting there floating, you know, floating in the wind too. Definitely. 20 yards. They're pushing into that wind. I mean, that doesn't get much better as a waterfowler. Ducks just, mountains. I just remember everybody going, Oh, three for three, three for three. Yeah, we're. It was pretty sweet. Yeah, there were many times you just, they're sitting there, you just pop, pop, pop, pop. So. Yeah. Um. Josh, you said something on you field hunting quite a bit around here, just being a little more local and hunting some of these fields. But what do you, do you use mojo's always in field? Don't use them. What do you find there? Just kind of give people, cause some people are really experienced listening to this. Some people are really new tips on kind of decoys and stuff or Orland, whatever you guys want to chime in. I guess the biggest two tips or three that I can think of right off the top of my head is, um, Definitely spend some time watching that field and pattering those birds and know how they're set up. Um, when they land into that field because, I mean a big thing that I've been trying to hit hard this year. That is a little bit different. And I think is worked super good is anytime a lot of people in Utah, they want to ha ha on a field, they throw out every single decoy that, um, that, uh, they have in the trailer. And I think that works if you're trying to traffic birds, but if you already have birds hit in that field and you know what they're going to do, you can, I don't think you need to throw out every single. Decoy, I think you need to watch to see what the first two to three groups are doing and how many and then try to Try to I guess just copy what those birds are gonna do if they're going in a line if they're going in a just a big blob, you know just Try to make it, I guess, most natural as you possibly can, because like a lot of, a lot of times you'll hear people, they just do V's or U's or just simple shapes like that. And those local birds though, they will see that and they will flare. And so it's like kind of just make it as most natural as you can with the decoy, I guess that the decoy spread. So you're saying when you're scouting them, just kind of watch, look at the bird pattern on the ground and kind of try to mimic. Yeah, just kind of mimic that. But I guess it's kind of important to watch the first, like the first and second group go in because, and then match how much, how many, uh, ducks or geese are going in. Cause if it's only 10, I'll throw out two, two dozen. But if it's like a few hundred, then maybe, yeah, you can throw throw out everything that you have. But I mean, if you're only having a hundred, like a hundred birds hit, um, going into that field, then I think it's hard to throw a hundred decoys. Cause they're like, what the heck? Like they're not used to seeing that man in the field. They're used to seeing five, 10, 15 type groups. You know, it just, I guess it just depends to come in. It just comes down to pup. Putting in the work to, uh, scout for sure. And then I guess on mojos, uh, big thing that I, I, I, I like to think about is, um, just, just the weather when it's raining, they can't see as well. So once they see the motion, they want to drop down in and when it's sunny, then it kind of maybe looks more fake. And so then they flare. Yeah. I don't know. Orlin, what do you think? Yeah. I don't know. It's, um. If it's not going good, it's kind of hard to know, like these days, like should I use them or should I not? Cause like back in the day, I remember when they first came out and I started using them, like you'd kill one duck, like you'd kill three ducks over one for sure. Like throwing deep mojos out in the beginning, they were literal game changer. But I mean, this was, I mean, how long have they been out? 15 years, 20, you know, something along there. It's been a long time. So when I, I mean, when they, I remember when I was hunting them and they first started coming out, we were using, we were just blown away. But now I think young birds still, if they're by themselves, first season birds, it tricks, you know, it definitely works or migrators. I think my graders are young birds. Yeah. Stuff like that. But the, those educated birds, I just, I don't know. I just, I sometimes on water, I just, I don't use them a whole lot. I prefer it almost like a swimming, but. I like that idea like you're saying put the wing in the water To create, I've seen that, but I've never actually done that, but to put the tip of the wing and make it get a spin in the water and just add some motion to the water. Yeah. I mean, if your hunt, if your hunt is just going to, to paw, I mean, I would just, we always say pull the mojo. Like that's the first thing everyone does. Yeah. If the hunt's slow and nothing's happened, birds are flaring. That's a big key too. I know you're brushed in. You know, your hide is good. You're looking at the birds. They're, they're coming in, but then they all, they flare. So they don't like something something's wrong. So I would say yeah, mix up the decoys. Yeah, don't pull the mojo Don't be scared to change something if they're flying if you're having group after group flair Change some something up brush more like I mean just yeah for sure. Yeah Yeah, you gotta imagine from a bird's eye view kind of what there's I mean, we've all you guys have all you you've hunted enough Um, you've been on a cliff or something like that. Look down, seen birds, see what they look like in the water. You're right. And so, I mean, if birds are just stationary on a calm day, that just doesn't look natural, you know? So you gotta, obviously you're trying to mimic nature. So, um, you gotta do whatever you gotta do to one, like you're saying, Orlin, keep your hide really good. Make sure they are not seeing you first. Obviously that's going to be your number one thing is like, okay, are we hidden? Is the dog hidden good enough? And then two next is going to be your spread what they're seeing, right? Yeah, I feel like two guys that are scouting fields or they're hunting and they see some birds and they just want to lock in And they're you know got their binos out and they can see them and they're like, oh just just in Uh, these birds like, Oh my gosh, there's so many birds, but they're not really keying in to, Oh, where are they landing? Oh, what is the, what do they look like? What does a natural feed look like? So when you key into those things and you apply them to your hunt, you're gonna, you're gonna shoot birds. Yeah. And another thing too, as I'm just talking about it, your blinds, I mean, you're, you're laying deep in those blinds. You're not, your heads aren't pock popping out. You have, you know, like a, a camo top on, you don't have like a, a red beanie sitting up or something. So I've, I've seen that. Yeah. Yeah. So cover the face. We always say, don't look at them, but I always look at them. Yeah. It's definitely hard not to watch the birds work you, but I mean, that is a big key is to keep your heads down. I've noticed on, I guess it. Weather too, obviously is huge. Like if it's stormy hailing, I mean, you're blind. I mean, some of this morning, my blind was halfway open. And we were standing out there and the birds were just walking in, you know? So those weather days do make it fun for sure. Yeah. They make it because they just want to put down. But you guys had, I mean, just the other day, you guys had an evening hunt on a bluebird sky, right? It was pretty, pretty clear sky and you guys totally smashed them. So, yeah, I think that was just dude, the scouting and then just the hide. The hide was so good that they had no idea. We definitely had someone, uh, watch those birds for two weeks straight every day, morning and night. Yeah, that was one of our friends. Yeah, I saw your blinds in the pictures, like, dang, I can't even, I mean, I can see they were your blinds coming human, but they're, you know, they were pretty dang Yeah. It's like, how do you You can tell a bird would have a struggle to see this. How do you hide seven guys, ten guys in a field, a wide open field? So it's It was hard. Gotta have some Some creativeness to the to the hides for you guys next to a brush line or so we were yeah We were up against uh, yeah a brush line behind us. So I mean the Sun was setting to our back. That's another Something you could think of is always have the Sun to your back wind to your back Yeah, just the Sun will blind them as they come in Yeah, and yeah, that's, well, I agree with that. I try to think of this. Yeah. I think of the sun and thinking of stuff like we can help like people that are new to hunting. I think, uh, wind is a huge part of this game. How to set your decoys. Yeah, absolutely. Exactly. And where you want to set your, uh, kill hole. And I guess the distance away from your blind to your, uh, decoys, if you're hunting in the decoys, just, I guess, just the wind is a huge part of where you want your kill hole to, uh, be, I mean, wind. Yeah, for sure. Cause those birds are coming into the wind. They don't generally want to, they're not lining with the wind. Cause they just like anything, like a plane, right? They got all that comes in and kind of lifts up. It's. You know, it puts his wings out, catches that airflow and slows down, slows the bird down and drops into the decoys. Tailwind is, they'd roll over and do a somersault as a tailwind. So ducks don't do that. It's not normal. It's not normal for them. So you want to make sure your mojos are facing in, you know, um, into the wind, just like a duck would land. Cause if you have them off light, they're like going sideways in the wind. Ducks and that's not natural. You can get flaring birds, you know, from that, from that too. Yeah. Um, as you guys are thinking about any other tips we can share one, I want to talk about the most important thing to me is the dog. So is the bird dog podcast. So obviously we talk about hunting dogs, everything, training, uh, gear, stuff like that. So, um, today was really fun for me. We just ran one dog today. Um, Just kind of, I was kind of a rarity. So I was kind of like, where's all the other dogs? But these guys, we have some dogs in training and stuff like that. Some up and comers and we kind of let the guys let my dog kind of run the show. Um, so I had a young dog Creek that we're, I'm filming kind of a whole movie series on her from, uh, I've filmed, I think a hundred and close to 180 videos of her. Um, from six week old puppy till today. And, uh, today was her third hunt ever in her life. Um, which is, which is really fun. Uh, we hunted, actually it was her fourth hunt. I've done a dove hunt with her. I did the youth waterfowl hunt. I did the opening Utah waterfowl hunt and then I've, and then this hunt. So this is her fourth hunt. Um, So it was so fast and furious. Some guys get a little caught up on their dog. Um, you know, depending on your situation, I feel the ducks aren't really going anywhere, right? They're, if you're hitting them dead, they're just kind of out there in your decoys. So, um, what, so it's okay if it gets fast and furious, leave your dog in the blind. And that's what I did. I don't want to run it out, grab birds, coming back, you know, I could have. But the birds were coming in heavy so the game we just kind of played was obviously make sure the dog was nice and steady that it stayed in its blind, um, stayed concealed, stayed hidden so it wasn't scaring the birds but she could still see, she had her head out so she could see the game. Um, very beginning, um, the very beginning, uh, we uh, Jeff's falling asleep over here because he doesn't have a mic so we're laughing at him here a little bit but, um, in the very beginning, uh, The bird, she did have one control break. She got excited. We shot one, I think it was that there was a mallard that was like right off the deck at like 20 feet or something like that. Yeah. We just nailed him. She saw him and got excited, but I just, I just told her, you know, no here, brought her back kenneled and then she was fine the rest of the trip. And we were hammering them and shooting multiple times, you know, uh, many, multiple birds out of the group. So, um, steadiness was really cool with her. And then after that, we basically. Um, when it came to handling her, how I picked him up, if I could see him, I'd just run a blind retrieve. She's, she's run into that, that what we call our complete retriever level where it's kind of that senior hunter level, um, ish dog up where they run blind retrieves and whistle, sit them, handle and guide them to down birds. So we just use that to kind of pick up the field, um, when it kind of got to a slow handler to those down birds. And then also, um, there were some, we couldn't see that, uh, crippled in some cover. And so we just had her kind of hunt them up and have her. Uh, searched the field and picked them up and, and, uh, it was pretty slick. So she, she held way good. Um, I remember when she broke and you were just like, yeah, get back in there. And then she was super obedient. Like I didn't even tell her I have to tell her kennel or the whole time. She just stayed in there. And usually I'm like half, I'm nervous that my dog's going to go. And so I'm like, sit as the dog, as the birds are coming in. So she did really good to mind and be obedient. And I think that's. That's a key to a really good waterfowl dog is just the standard obedience and having a good obedient dog that you can, um, you know, verbally release and on their name. Yeah, she's, I've done a lot of denial work with her and I think that's really paid dividends and she was a puppy or started setting her up, you know, and we talked about denials is not, not every retrieve is the dogs unless we allow them to have it. So. That looks like, you know, you may throw a bumper, you go pick it up. Then you throw a bumper, go pick it up. Then you throw and you release the dog. Throw a bird, you know, you just keep them kind of guessing and just realize, cause if every time you send your dog on a bumper, a bird that you throw, they're going to try to one be one step ahead of you and they're going to want to try to get that bird. And so if we can kind of just keep them guessing and do a lot of denials, it really helps with steadiness. Um, and that's, and we saw that today with being such a hearing dog in such an exciting moment with a lot of gunfire calling. Wind. The wind some too that I've, I've learned over the years, these dogs is, when it gets really cold, kind of gets that crisp new cold in the ground. It just gets dogs on fire. Like, and then that's very, it just, it's like really comfortable weather for'em. Like they're energetic. Yeah. They're just energetic. It's just, it's like there's something in the air that when you get that little, a nice little cold wind, they just get amped up and so. So that's a factor too. So I was happy that she stayed steady, even though that it was kind of the perfect pattern to really get them excited about things. Yeah, for sure. I thought it was super cool. Cause you know, I'm pretty new to all this, uh, this, uh, dog world, but, um, to see how, uh, young she is and her just not break and just be steady. I mean, there was quite a bit, there was quite a few gunshots going off and birds dropping and it was just awesome. It was, it was fun. But I mean, just to see her, Worked just oh obey and work. So Awesome was cool to watch all of that happen and come into play because I've kind of actually been helping Tice film on This dog just a little bit not a lot, but it's cool to kind of see her finally hunt So it was my first time to watch this dog hunt and it was it was a neat experience to watch for sure Yeah, I always wonder what the dogs are thinking, you know, when they're not obedient, you're like, what are you thinking? But again, the dogs, they're seeing these birds drop and that's like their favorite thing. That is the highlight of their life is those birds. And so just thinking about all that dog, I could just the conscious effort of that dog not to go, not to go and remembering the hours and hours of training. And it's pretty cool to see it all come, come together. Yeah, it's cool. Cause it's teamwork, right? Like the dog's really respecting, like, okay, I know, like I've been trained, I've patterned, I've been learned these things. And so I, I mean, Obviously, you know, doing this for so long and having pups like I'm a dog junkie. I just love seeing that all come together and the trainings is so cool because it's like you take this puppy and it's fun actually for meeting and go back because I've trained so many dogs, but they just over time they kind of blur together. Um, and Orleans been with me for over a year now, had his hands on quite a few dogs. Jeff's. He's had his hand on a ton of dogs too. And so, um, he's been with me for nine years. And so it's seen hundreds or thousands, I don't know. We'd lose track, but anyways, it's fun to go back and look at a puppy and see like that recording and like, Oh, like I remember when I did that and that, and then you can go and you kinda, you start watching them together and it's just fun to see the process up until where she's at today. You know? So. Pretty dang, pretty dang cool. If you're, if you're a dog lover, so like we are. Yeah, I think, I think two dogs, dogs, you kill more or you, you harvest or you shoot more birds, you're more successful when you have, you know, a well trained bird dog. I, I don't think I used to hunt without a bird dog. I'd go out there and pick the birds up myself. And I just thought, yeah. And then I had a dog that, you know, wasn't trained and it would just go out, pick the bird up, kind of prance around and come back, and I'd have to go pick it up anyways, but, anyways, the, uh, I feel like having a well trained dog, they're in and they're out, they're back and they're blind. They're in there laying down, ready to go for the next group of birds. So rather than you waddling yourself out there to pick them up, you're standing there. You're way bigger than the dog. Dogs are low to the ground. The ducks aren't going to see them nearly as, as bad as you, as you're walking around. So you're going to shoot more birds. You're going to be more successful. And. Your dog is just there because they love it. You know what you think? I mean, that dog is running to every bird. I sent it on, you know, she's not walking as humans. We're generally not running to every bird. I mean, that's, it's tiring. It's hot, you know, to, to do that. And so she can just run up, grab that and grab that and grab that, grab that. When you'd run her on blind trees, handle her way out there, you know, a hundred yards out, grab that bird coming. And then at the end I made a sweep and she found two birds. I didn't even know her there. One was a cripple that had buried itself down into the brush. She found that one. And so, I mean, it really is, it's really a good conservation tool too. I mean, you're, you're not, I mean, some guys want, might want to, Oh, I, I don't, you know, I shot a bunch of birds in the weeds and I just left them there, you know, and they're really shooting more than they typically really should, you know, but if you have a dog and you're treating those birds, you're really conserving. It's the species of, you know, waterfowl and not really taking more than you're supposed to and kind of being honest with that too. You know, so, yeah, I feel like if we were to run out of our blinds, every couple of ducks, we'd be a lot fitter, uh, waterfowl hunters in general, because I feel like waterfowl, waterfowl guys, they're typically a stereotype where they're just, you know, monsters. Donuts and they're bigger, but I think it'd be a lot more lean, more like an elk, elk hunters, elk hunters run after the ducks, chase them down. Yeah. We'll let you, we'll let you chase him down. No, it's, it's fun. It was, uh, yeah, we just kind of wanted to share this podcast. You guys, it was a great experience. I'm shooting these ducks. We're really excited. It's been so, it's been so warm. There hasn't, I mean, I've seen, I've heard, it seems like people are getting into birds, but it hasn't, which kind of surprised me is honestly what the weather's been like, but I think we're on the forefront of hopefully good stuff to start happening. Yeah. I think we should let Jeff talk about the morning, uh, uh, the first light when, like that group of three, we've got to get them back on the speaker. Yeah. Yeah. It looked like blackbirds. I'm like, what's going on? What's that swarm? I was like, there's no way those are ducks, but Yeah, I've never seen that many, you know, that close to the ground. And I thought there were blackbirds, but they're like, Oh, I guess they're not. They're, they're ducks. They're coming in. So get ready. And they just started peeling off and the groups from that massive, massive flock. And so it was, yeah, it was a lot of fun. Oh, it was super cool. I mean, they really worked us and they, it was awesome. What was your guys thought on shooting? Cause the first group was like, 150 birds or so it was a big group and I was a little, we talked about it a little bit. We're like, do we want to shoot this big group? Cause we were worried, you know, you shoot a big group like that. You're worried they're going to educate their buddies and maybe not come back. But I don't know which the weather we broke them up or whatever, but they kept, I mean, we shot multiple, those other groups. I mean, We had some threes, fours, but there were lots of eights, nines, tens, thirties. Yeah, it was, it was hot. It was really hot at the beginning and that giant group. I always, I always like to sit back and kind of just watch the birds come in and land because we landed probably 15 birds before the huge group actually came in and finished. And so, I always like to watch them and let them land and just, cause you don't see that very often, like, just that natural flock of ducks and you're right there in them, you can hear them quacking, their, their feet are chuckling, like, you know, all the sounds they make, the wings, everything, so I always sit back and just watch those giant groups come in because half the time I'm scared to even shoot because you might shoot more than your, your limit just in one go. But where it was the first group of the morning, we were all kind of amped and I could tell it was just going to happen. So we just called it and said, all right, let's let it happen. Yeah, no, it's definitely cool. I mean, I probably enjoy watching the birds actually work us than shooting them. Like, I mean, that's what I've told everyone is. I think I have more fun set. Setting up the spread and watching those birds actually work. I love watching just birds work and, and it all comes together. And then sending dogs out. I mean, that's one of my favorite parts too, is working birds and working dogs, you know, and sending dogs out and watch them actually work us and cupped up and land, I mean, to get, I mean, we probably landed four or five 50, 75 birds. And I mean, that was really cool. Yeah, it was fun. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. I, um, I just had a, I just forgot what I was going to say. I was going to say something. Yeah, I was going to say, what was the, like, I don't know. I feel like every hunt, there's like an item of gear that you kind of really like, you know, like, I don't know for me today, my gloves got absolutely soaked and I don't, they're waterproof, but we also forgot we got a banded bird. Oh, so we got a banded bird and, uh, I said the dog, I said, well, I don't want to talk about gear too, but I want to come back to that. But we, that was, that was, that was something pretty cool. It doesn't happen a lot. Yeah. I mean, in Utah, at least in our area, there's no, I mean, I've shot one banded bird and I've killed. Hundreds or thousands of birds. And I've only killed, I've killed lots of geese, quite a few geese with bands, but ducks, just, I don't know. We're just not in a band. They're more rare for sure. We're not in that area. And the one pinned, it was a hen pintail and I killed it years ago and it was banded in Alaska. So, I mean, I mean, there's not a lot of heavy banding in our area for ducks, I feel like. She saw some country for sure. Yeah. That pintail. I'd be curious to see where that one's from. Yeah, we got to look it up. Um, yeah, we were just sitting there and we kind of joke every time we go hunting, like, oh, bandit, you know. I feel like everyone does that. Um, but when Tyce was like, dude, it's bandit. I'm like, what the heck? And so we all ran together and did a little celebration and that was cool. Cool. Cool. I didn't even check all the birds. I just happened to retrieve that one. I like grabbing like, Oh, there's, Oh, sweet. There's a band on that one. So it's funny when it's like, when you're looking for them, it seems like they. They're not there. And then when you're like really not carrying that much is when they're, they're there. Or you bring a new guy and it's the first time hunting and he shoots one of his band and you're like, like, what are the chances? But it seems like it happens all the time. I don't know. Yeah. Talk about, let's talk about gear though that we, yeah, we were kind of, you liked, didn't like, felt like you needed. No. Yeah. My gloves got absolutely soaked, but. Um, I feel like that would be, it'd be good to take another pair. I just didn't prepare for the, the weather really. I didn't, I didn't think it was going to rain that much. I thought it was going to be more of like a, a light rain and more wind. But I, I don't know. I liked the, all the gear I was wearing kind of just, um, the Sitka bibs and the, um, the Hudson jacket just keep me wet or not wet dry. Um, but I mean, it's kind of unavoidable when you're just laying there getting soaked. But I really like that my shotgun ran well I was running the Benelli super black eagle 3 She shot a lot of birds. So I I like the I like the gun It's ran really good for me. We always we all run different guns. I feel like yeah So that was what were you shooting for shells? Just some federal blues. I think it was four shot Um, yeah, and honestly, I felt like I, there was a few of them that I shot and it was my, maybe off a little bit and they didn't go down and, but I feel like I beat it up on all those birds and just, they fold. So it was cool to watch. I'm a diehard fan of the Brada A400 Extreme. I love that gun. It's a little bit heavy though. The thing is like packing around a mule or something, but I mean, that gun is amazing. It's never clicked on me. And shooting that for? Probably since I was 16. Okay. So four years now, but I love it. It's never clicked on me at one time. And I've been in some mud and been in Utah Lake and it's been a great gun, but, but I also treat it super well and try to always shoot good shells. Yeah. I think that's key to just, uh, maybe new hunters, uh, I didn't mean to cut you off there, Josh, but new hunters, uh, when you take, you know, when you take the guns out in this kind of weather, you definitely got to clean them up after your hunt. If you, if you put them away and don't dry them out, you're going to get some rust on them or have issues. So, I mean, it's kind of common sense, but I mean, I've been guilty of it before I put my gun away and I'm like, Holy crap. And I look, I'm like, Oh, where all this rust come from. It's because I forget to get that water off. Yeah. Sometimes you gotta break, learn, I think whatever gun you do have, learn to take the action all the way apart. And get down in there, put some oil, clean it up, take care of them, and then you'll have a gun that'll last a long time. Yeah, I use this, uh, it's called quick scrub. It's kind of like break cleaner for guns, shotguns, all guns. Um, I just looked it up. I was like, there's gotta be a better way to clean these dang shotguns because I, I hate cleaning the gun. So I just take that, that break cleaner. And literally I just, you know, go outside or I sometimes do it in the house and it smells terrible, but like spring break cleaner in the house. So I, I dose that up, scrub it really nice. And it, it just sprays all the dirt and dry me stuff off. So I use that and it, it's game changer. Where did, where do you get that at? I just got it on Amazon. I think it's called quick scrub. Um, and then there was another one. Is it, is it made for guns? Or is that four guns? Okay. Yeah. I'll have to look into that one. Yeah. I made four guns. It's good on plastics and metals, so you could spray it on everything. Um, but I'm usually just like a WD 40 guy. I just kind of, yeah, I'll put that on the rail afterwards. Like I'll strip all the oil off, get everything clean. And then put a little WD 40 on it, and then it runs smooth. Yeah, it seems like, Josh, have you had yours in real cold weather? Mm hmm. And it's been good for you? Yeah, I was, I'm, I've hunted a handful of times in North Dakota, and there's been some super cold weather, and it's been Some hard times, but I mean I've definitely seen the gun slow down like last year We were hunting on Utah Lake and just a bad snow storm and everyone's guns were clicking and not ejecting shells and It was just kind of, they were trying to clean guns and get the mod off and everything was freezing up and I, and I felt like my gun actually ran super well that day. It definitely, you can see them slow down and not eject as good. I mean, I'm always, and everyone already, Already gives me crap and says that I am hitting them in the face with, with my shells because they eject so, so, so far. But so you're, yeah, the a 400 is gas operated. It's not inertia. So we were talking about the other day, we were looking at shy. I'm like, is that a gas or is that inertia? And, and it's a, yeah, a gas, my Browning silver hunters, a gas. Do you have to clean that one a lot? Or not to, or how do you feel about that? I clean it. Gas is generally a little dirtier. So yeah, I definitely try to clean and about every time after I go hunt, if it's a bad hunt, you know, I'll pull the gun apart and just let it all dry out. And then I, Try to for sure clean it about every hunt if it's like a good hunt, I guess But I mean if i'm just walking out and shooing some doves, I might not clean it right away Yeah, what shot what shotgun shells were you shooting today? Black clouds two shot. Yeah I'm a big fan of black black clouds and migras my gun. I I love shooting migras I mean, they're a little bit more expensive, but i've seen it I've seen bb. Do you like to shoot two shots? Yeah, two shot So I was always, for me, I've always, honestly, until just kind of probably last year, I always shot kind of two shot, you know, BB, but I've gone to four shot and I just feel like it just, I don't know. I don't know if there's more BBs or whatever, but I just feel like I just, there's less holes and I just smashed the ducks. Yeah. Yeah. I switched. I switched that too. Yeah. I just feel like, I mean, I shot tons of like plenty of, but I don't know. I think if you haven't tried for a shot. Leave some of the storage for us, but yeah, I don't, but four shot I feel like is, uh, just has, that's what I, that's my go to now. But, um, Jeff, tell us what you're shooting. Uh, I guess I'm an old schooler guy, but I have an over, under, um, CZ swamp Magnum. Uh, I've had some issues with guns not performing in the field. So, and I think they were just, they just, the actions were just too slow. Um, Or I wasn't shouldering great or I don't know but um, I never never had a problem with the you know, the two barrel so there's always a couple clicks and I get one last round, but He does not need that last round. Uh, probably super x and federal blue federal. I think I got a mix but uh I think I had I think it was beat anywhere from bb to four shot. So some twos and some threes and fours. So The mixture. Do you run like, uh, you run two pattern masters on both of those barrels? Yeah. There's yeah. Two full choke pattern mastered. It works well. Do you feel like those are like, I don't know, I've, I've been looking into getting some, but do you feel like your shot is more right on the beat or. Well, I mean, yeah, your, your groups, you know, you're tight, but I mean, decoying like that probably modified. It's just open up a little bit more because there's coming in so close to you. But. Um, you know, passing shots and you get more, I think you get more BBs where you want it. Yeah, it just depends on where you hunt, I guess. I mean, if you have birds at 20 yards, Jeff only needs two, two, two shot. He's a good double in a month. He just doubles everything. He needs a single, single barrel. He's insane. Greatest shot here. Two for two every time. Yeah. So I was shooting the Frankie, the Infinity, the three and a half. I really like that gun. Um, I wanted the super black eagle three, but for like 900 bucks I was like I can buy two of these for the price of one of those I would I would say that I like the feel of the the or the benelli but The franchi or franchi, however, you say it. It's been an awesome gun I've been really impressed for the price point and it cycles. It supposedly has the same Mechanism inside it's just kind of the grip and the barrel and a few other things are You Or a little bit different, you know, but, um, if you guys are looking for a new, uh, overrun or side by side or, uh, semi auto, that's really, and any of these guns, obviously, they all shoot the same stuff, I mean, even if you're just shooting an old Benelli pump or a Remington 870, I mean, you're still gonna kill birds, I mean, I grew up with a Browning BPS and I shot a ton of birds, just, you know, I mean, just go out and hunt with whatever you have, you know, but, I think when you're picking shotguns just choose whatever, you know feels good feels feels good in your hands But I really like the the if you're looking for a price point. I i'm a big fan of the federal I think those the federal four inch four shot three inch Um is something i've i've had real good luck with that. So Yeah, I I agree. I I switched I did some I couldn't find any bullets the other day So I grabbed, um some two and three quarter You Uh, Winchester, I think they were two shot or four shot, but I was using some of those on the opener. I could definitely tell that my range wasn't as quiet as far, you know, on the, on the opener or whatever, on the lakes and stuff, you're kind of sky busting and leading them a bunch. And I just wasn't seeing the, um, repetition on those. Yeah. So the three inch for ducks. Yeah. Yeah, I think that's like anything, right? If you're shooting a bow or whatever, you want to stay consistent, ideally consistent because you're learning how far to lead your, you know, how far to lead the shot, you know, your patterns. And so if you're shooting the same type stuff, that's only going to help. But if you switch it up a lot, that could throw you off a little bit, but. But you shoot what you can, you shoot what you have, I mean I'm not above like say shooting, I shoot double BB a duck sometimes if that's what I have left in my bag, you know, so. Send them. Yeah, yeah, just send it down, down range, um, well we probably wrapped this up here pretty, any, any last thoughts or anything like that that you think we kind of missed out on or gear or tips or, I was wearing waders today, I mean I was wearing, I had my sick waders on and. I was, I was warm, man. I felt great. I had a couple, I had a hoodie on, a down jacket and a Hudson ticket jacket over that. And I, and just a hat on and I was toasty. Yeah, the only thing that got cold on me was my hands cause I was, yeah, out in the wind a bunch but, I mean. Yeah, it was great. My feet were freezing. I didn't wear any waterproof boots. I didn't wear any waterproof boots. I had the cowboy boots on and I only got a little wet and they got cold. So make sure you take the right gear and go prepared and look at the weather before you're going to go hunting so you know what to prepare yourself. And I knew it going into it and I had the muck boots in the truck, but you know, I just didn't throw them. I didn't put them on. I should have. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Yeah, he's busy setting up decoys and you're already muddy and you're like, Oh, whatever. The next thing it starts soaking through probably. Yeah. Yeah. When you can stay dry, it definitely helps. Jeff, any last thoughts you want to share over here? Jeff's an excellent dog trainer, but he doesn't like talking on the podcast very much. So, but it's fun having him on. It's fun. Grateful for each of you guys being part of this team. These guys are awesome. I mean, we, we, uh, it was pretty stormy rainy. So we hunted and did a little bit of training and then we kind of called it puts and these guys helped me out. We're remodeling my basement and they came and helped me scrub the floor. And that's, I really appreciate that even though it's not training, but I really appreciate them going the distance there and. Um, and helping keep this whole thing alive. So if you guys need help with, uh, getting your dog train, uh, feel free to, uh, uh, uh, look us up and check us out at utahbirddogtraining. com. Um, we're also on Instagram at utahbirddogtraining. Also on Tik Tok, utahbirddogtraining. Um, we're trying to get out some podcasts here and there as we find time to do it. So thanks for your patience. If it, if they're not coming as, as consistent as you would like. Um, Uh, but if you have any questions about training or anything like that or hunting stuff, uh, you can send us an email at the bird dog podcast at gmail. com. And we'll try to answer those, uh, questions for you on the podcast and, uh, kind of make conversation about it. It kind of makes it fun for us to have a topic and something to address and kind of help, help you guys out with. So, um, thanks for listening. Hope everyone's, uh, hunts are going well. Stay safe. Uh, and enjoy training those dogs and, and enjoy that journey. They're a pretty amazing animals and we're grateful to be able to train them and have them as part of our lives. And, uh, we'll see you guys in the next show.