A Panhandle Hunt

-Steele Zinser

On Friday, 11DEC Dave Mahn gathered his charges for the next 3 days; Doug Dubois, Larry Navjar, Shawn Harrison and Steele. We rented a large van in Round Rock and set out for an 8-hour drive to Amarillo. We brought munchies and drinks of choice, non-alcoholic I must add. I knew Doug, Larry and Dave a little but not well, Shawn not at all. As hunting and fishing trips will go we made a point to learn a little about one-another’s priorities in life in the ensuing days. A topic of conversation as we were packing was Larry’s large bottle of Tide detergent. It made us wonder about his fetish for sanitation, (do laundry on a hunting trip?) Turn out it was empty; he planned on filling it with water to clean birds.

On Saturday morning we hooked up with Mike Southerland, our duck-hunting guide for the day and his black Lab, Goliath. Goliath is but 3 yrs old and unfortunately is already plagued with hip dysphasia but that was difficult to imagine as he madly ran wind-sprints for warm-up.

It was cold, of course, 30’s, but the area had a period of 9 days of sub-freezing weather prior to our arrival, which had driven the ducks south temporarily. We drove into the playa lake in darkness, then opened our doors to loud goose music, way cool!

We set up decoys and “coffin blinds” – a long boat of sorts with a wide board over the bottom half, and then draped camo material over the whole thing. One then lies with butt on a cushion and a cushion for the head and shoulders which is in a semi-raised position. Yes, you shoot from this position as well. It worked for most of the group although foolishly forgetting ear-plugs I reacted to the first few volleys of 3 ½-inch 12-guage shells exploding in goose guns. That’s deafening, Podnuh.

As light dawned, ducks in singles and larger groups began to arrive, swooshing right in front of us so close you could hear their wing noises. Most shooting was in the first 30 minutes of light. I am happy to report that we limited with 36 Mallards, Green-wing Teal, Pintails and Widgeons!

Lots of geese flew over but too high. I commented that geese are schooled in the maximum range of every shotgun manufactured. Turns out that to hunt geese effectively we would need stay a third day and hunt from blinds and decoys in a grain field.

We bade good-by to Mike, he is a very good duck guide, but I will cherish memories of Goliath’s running across the ice, slipping and sliding, then diving into the ice water to retrieve ducks. It was all about being a Lab, working and playing at the same time, to steal a line from my grandson.

We drove to Littlefield TX, west of Lubbock, checked in to the No-Tell Motel and met our new guide, Mark Meissenburg. He is the sand hill-crane hunting specialist. We drove into a grain field where Mark gave us a “hold here” sign. We watched in awe as he drove into the heart of the 1000-acre field and commenced to set up. Larry voiced what we all thought; “he’s nuts.” We helped erect A-frame blinds covered with straw that Mark designed and manufactured himself. Remarkably efficient there are five plastic lawn chairs to a blind. (That was a bit snug for five full-figured men with gear and guns so next day he added another section.)

Mark pushes open the lid when time to shoot, which is the culmination after his calling and our hearing the crane music overhead for many minutes. He also uses formally-live cranes that he has prepared as decoys so they are very realistic.

We got 10 birds that afternoon, remarkable because Mark said we could’ve easily been skunked. Frankly, you must try and imagine jumping up and shooting from a semi-dark area into sudden daylight, with only seconds to shoot!

Sunday morning we were again up at 0400 hrs and to yet another grain field an hour south of Littlefield. We heard thousands of cranes flying overhead and with Mark’s “calling” were successful in limiting yet again with 15 birds (3 each). Still, we were all amazed that on occasion we fired as many as 15 salvos and missed birds as large as a small helicopter, (okay not really, but standing 3-ft. tall with 6-ft. wing spreads they are formidable targets.)

Must-mention is “Babe”, our female companion in the blinds. She is a Chesapeake Retriever, first that most of us had encountered, and a most competent animal. She responds instantly to voice and hand commands and, like Goliath, is a marvel to observe.

I must confess that besides just being in the wild, and the essence of the chase, I love watching hunting dogs do their thing. On one retrieve of a broken-winged cripple she ran a good 300 yards to successfully capture the bird. Those watching were enthralled.

We had the curses of a hunt, gun-jams. Shawn missed some shots with his “semi.”(I have a low opinion of “semi-shooting” shotguns. We only own one and that’s Beverly’s A391 Berretta.)

However, I must also admit that for a former Marine to borrow and then insert a 3-inch shell into Doug’s 2 ¾-chambered Ithaca pump-actions was foolish and incompetent.

Be reminded that the guides have very short-fused temperament for gun-jams. At one point Mark commanded, “fix those damned guns”!

Camaraderie was good. Shawn asked for talking points to his vegan-friends, justification for his hunting so Doug gave us a 20-minute dissertation on “conservation vs. preservation”. His is a very good story, one worthy of presentation at an AWWC meeting.

All in all it was a very good hunt overall. The guides were most competent, we recommend them to the membership.

Thanks again to David Mahn for his arrangements.