seeth07
Well-known member
Day 3 - Mas de lo mismo (More of the same)
This second morning of waterfowl hunting we are heading back out with Raul from the fiest afternoon and a new guide named Diago. He had come into the lodge this morning to help out and he would be taking over the lodge so Damian could get a few days off.
All three groups were headed to the same body of water. It was a massive flat that appeared to be very shallow based on where and how many flamingos we saw. This morning was the first time we experienced it being calm and with the air temperature right at freezing, it was quite foggy directly over the warmer water. We didn't spook a lot of birds as we walked to the blind - yes we actually had to walk to this one as it was about 1000 yards out on the end if a island - but it didn't take long after we were setup and flock after flock kept showing up. Given the early morning lighting and fog, it was still pretty dark and we chose to not shoot quite yet but instead just take some videos. Meanwhile, we can hear the other two groups just banging away. 15 mintues or so go by and we are still enjoying the morning flight and we agree it's time to begin. Here's the problem though. With hundreds, wait no it was definitely in the thousands, of ducks rafted around us from in the decoys to a few hundred feet away, it was difficult to pick the first group to shoot at since they were landing all over but not necessarily in a way landing nicely into our decoys. I tell my wife that the next duck she gets in range to just shoot once to spook the entire flock so we can start. A duck shortly after banked far out to her left and she shot and missed it. Complete chaos once again followed and I was able to keep count of the ducks we shot at up until 15. Probably not even 5 mintues had gone by. It was so fast and furious I lost count as there were times Ibwas reloading and my wife was shooting solo or visa versa. In total we used 5 boxes of shells between us and when we were at the end of that 5th box, Raul just said go ahead and shoot our guns empty and we finished. We ended up retrieving 43 and I know at least 3 were swimming away with their heads up that we didnt get. There were also at least 3 misses each. Once again the wound loss bothered me.
On the way back, Diago talked with us a bunch since he speaks really good English and he is a really great guy. Hands down the best guy, of many great people, we got the pleasure to hunt with. We had some great in depth conversations about wildlife management and their crappy government. It was really fantastic to see how important hunting management is to them and how they take it upon themselves to do it. The government actually has a daily limit of 50 ducks/day but he explained that it really isn't anything they can enforce and there are a lot of outfitters that while not advertising it will actually sell "500 duck days from one blind" and get clients that will pay huge amounts of money to do that. Our outfitter, who Diago is part owner of, actually limits their blinds to 50 ducks in the morning and 30 in the afternoon or a total of 80 ducks per hunting couple per day. They feel that with that amount it's enough to satisfy the clients "high volume" desire and keep their duck spots fresh and producing the same results. Another thing they do to ensure consistent high volume hunts like we experienced is to only hunt a blind once a week. In their gear/guide room, they have a big white board with all the blinds noted on it. There are over 50 of them and they mark them off after each trip to keep track.
I also asked Diago where most of his clients are from. He told me that they only advertise in the States and they try to only book people from the States. He explained that people he has dealt with from Europe, especially from France (I had to laugh out load to that), are too needy and too demanding. They dont have any appreciation for the wildlife let alone to overall experience. I brought up about how wound loss was bothering me and how that shows how much I do care about the wildlife and he was like, yes exactly. He said there was a group from France last year and they would knock a duck down and refuse to use a shell of their allotment (you get 4 boxes max in the morning per person, 2 in the afternoon) to finish a duck on the water. I laughed because 4 boxes seems impossible to go through. He said those guys will use all 4 boxes and not even have their 25 because they miss so much and our guides just let them keep shooting because they know they are never hitting the ducks. He said that a normal blind for that group will pick up 30 ducks max!
We get back to the lodge and out the back door there is a fire rolling and good smells. I head out to investigate and discover a Bbq of flank meat and pork ribs and vegatables. I'm really enjoying all this fire cooked food. After we eat and chat some more, my wife and I decide today we are going to take a nap. Dang it, we are getting old arent we. We set the alarm to wake up in an hour and we both fall asleep and get almost that full hour.
We gear up and head out in the early afternoon for a very cool setting for our afternoon hunt. I told Diago that I would appreciate it if we could hunt this afternoon a little bit slower where we ensure that we get all ducks we shoot. He said we could go for it which meant that if there was a swimmer or one winged I'd be chasing after it. The group from Georgia was going to be set up on the other side of this big pond. Idea being that the ducks would be constantly trading back and forth. We also decided we were going to try and identify all ducks we shot in flight and actually just take drakes. As a result, man did we shoot good. Not even three boxes total between us which included probably a dozen at head up on the water downed birds. We didn't miss a single duck except for one which we for sure hit with feathers flying but he just kept on flying. 29 ducks in the photo at the end. Much better.
On the way back, Raul said we needed to finally try "real" Mate. Google it if you want. Basically it's a tea. There are claims and notes about it having substances in it, some say its just the caffeine. Regardless it was actually on my list of things to try and was super happy when asked. The four of us while driving back passed the cup each taking our turn. It's a unique taste for sure, not bad though. I never really felt anything funny after a few turns so maybe it is just caffeine.
Diago also decided to stop at a local bakery. You wouldn't even know it was a bakery based on how it looked on the outside but he went in and came out with some of the best looking Argentinian donuts. He said they are a must try. Damn delicious. Honestly, I think it was at this point that I knew we had selected the right outfitter. What kind of outfitter just stops on the fly and buys a couple donuts for his clients? A good one, no a great one I suppose.
Back to lodge and Santi arrived. Santi is who I dealt with almost exclusely during the booking and planning of our trip. Santi showed up so he could take us to the big game lodge the next day. We got to chat with him for awhile before dinner as well is with the other two groups. The older group from California decided to do doves that afternoon. They went through an entire case of shells and got over 50 although I guess the old guy doesn't have the speed anymore to hit ducks as his son thinks he only got maybe 5 of those 50 doves.
Dinner tonight was duck in a sweet gravy, sweat pototoes and a spinage souffle. Fantastic meal once again. Ive never had duck this good before, not exactly sure how they cooked it so good. The desset with peaches and walnuts and bunch of stuff I didnt know what it was but it was by far the best we've had yet.
I don't have very good nternet right now as we are traveling for a camping trip. If internet improves, I'll update with all the photos from this day.
This second morning of waterfowl hunting we are heading back out with Raul from the fiest afternoon and a new guide named Diago. He had come into the lodge this morning to help out and he would be taking over the lodge so Damian could get a few days off.
All three groups were headed to the same body of water. It was a massive flat that appeared to be very shallow based on where and how many flamingos we saw. This morning was the first time we experienced it being calm and with the air temperature right at freezing, it was quite foggy directly over the warmer water. We didn't spook a lot of birds as we walked to the blind - yes we actually had to walk to this one as it was about 1000 yards out on the end if a island - but it didn't take long after we were setup and flock after flock kept showing up. Given the early morning lighting and fog, it was still pretty dark and we chose to not shoot quite yet but instead just take some videos. Meanwhile, we can hear the other two groups just banging away. 15 mintues or so go by and we are still enjoying the morning flight and we agree it's time to begin. Here's the problem though. With hundreds, wait no it was definitely in the thousands, of ducks rafted around us from in the decoys to a few hundred feet away, it was difficult to pick the first group to shoot at since they were landing all over but not necessarily in a way landing nicely into our decoys. I tell my wife that the next duck she gets in range to just shoot once to spook the entire flock so we can start. A duck shortly after banked far out to her left and she shot and missed it. Complete chaos once again followed and I was able to keep count of the ducks we shot at up until 15. Probably not even 5 mintues had gone by. It was so fast and furious I lost count as there were times Ibwas reloading and my wife was shooting solo or visa versa. In total we used 5 boxes of shells between us and when we were at the end of that 5th box, Raul just said go ahead and shoot our guns empty and we finished. We ended up retrieving 43 and I know at least 3 were swimming away with their heads up that we didnt get. There were also at least 3 misses each. Once again the wound loss bothered me.
On the way back, Diago talked with us a bunch since he speaks really good English and he is a really great guy. Hands down the best guy, of many great people, we got the pleasure to hunt with. We had some great in depth conversations about wildlife management and their crappy government. It was really fantastic to see how important hunting management is to them and how they take it upon themselves to do it. The government actually has a daily limit of 50 ducks/day but he explained that it really isn't anything they can enforce and there are a lot of outfitters that while not advertising it will actually sell "500 duck days from one blind" and get clients that will pay huge amounts of money to do that. Our outfitter, who Diago is part owner of, actually limits their blinds to 50 ducks in the morning and 30 in the afternoon or a total of 80 ducks per hunting couple per day. They feel that with that amount it's enough to satisfy the clients "high volume" desire and keep their duck spots fresh and producing the same results. Another thing they do to ensure consistent high volume hunts like we experienced is to only hunt a blind once a week. In their gear/guide room, they have a big white board with all the blinds noted on it. There are over 50 of them and they mark them off after each trip to keep track.
I also asked Diago where most of his clients are from. He told me that they only advertise in the States and they try to only book people from the States. He explained that people he has dealt with from Europe, especially from France (I had to laugh out load to that), are too needy and too demanding. They dont have any appreciation for the wildlife let alone to overall experience. I brought up about how wound loss was bothering me and how that shows how much I do care about the wildlife and he was like, yes exactly. He said there was a group from France last year and they would knock a duck down and refuse to use a shell of their allotment (you get 4 boxes max in the morning per person, 2 in the afternoon) to finish a duck on the water. I laughed because 4 boxes seems impossible to go through. He said those guys will use all 4 boxes and not even have their 25 because they miss so much and our guides just let them keep shooting because they know they are never hitting the ducks. He said that a normal blind for that group will pick up 30 ducks max!
We get back to the lodge and out the back door there is a fire rolling and good smells. I head out to investigate and discover a Bbq of flank meat and pork ribs and vegatables. I'm really enjoying all this fire cooked food. After we eat and chat some more, my wife and I decide today we are going to take a nap. Dang it, we are getting old arent we. We set the alarm to wake up in an hour and we both fall asleep and get almost that full hour.
We gear up and head out in the early afternoon for a very cool setting for our afternoon hunt. I told Diago that I would appreciate it if we could hunt this afternoon a little bit slower where we ensure that we get all ducks we shoot. He said we could go for it which meant that if there was a swimmer or one winged I'd be chasing after it. The group from Georgia was going to be set up on the other side of this big pond. Idea being that the ducks would be constantly trading back and forth. We also decided we were going to try and identify all ducks we shot in flight and actually just take drakes. As a result, man did we shoot good. Not even three boxes total between us which included probably a dozen at head up on the water downed birds. We didn't miss a single duck except for one which we for sure hit with feathers flying but he just kept on flying. 29 ducks in the photo at the end. Much better.
On the way back, Raul said we needed to finally try "real" Mate. Google it if you want. Basically it's a tea. There are claims and notes about it having substances in it, some say its just the caffeine. Regardless it was actually on my list of things to try and was super happy when asked. The four of us while driving back passed the cup each taking our turn. It's a unique taste for sure, not bad though. I never really felt anything funny after a few turns so maybe it is just caffeine.
Diago also decided to stop at a local bakery. You wouldn't even know it was a bakery based on how it looked on the outside but he went in and came out with some of the best looking Argentinian donuts. He said they are a must try. Damn delicious. Honestly, I think it was at this point that I knew we had selected the right outfitter. What kind of outfitter just stops on the fly and buys a couple donuts for his clients? A good one, no a great one I suppose.
Back to lodge and Santi arrived. Santi is who I dealt with almost exclusely during the booking and planning of our trip. Santi showed up so he could take us to the big game lodge the next day. We got to chat with him for awhile before dinner as well is with the other two groups. The older group from California decided to do doves that afternoon. They went through an entire case of shells and got over 50 although I guess the old guy doesn't have the speed anymore to hit ducks as his son thinks he only got maybe 5 of those 50 doves.
Dinner tonight was duck in a sweet gravy, sweat pototoes and a spinage souffle. Fantastic meal once again. Ive never had duck this good before, not exactly sure how they cooked it so good. The desset with peaches and walnuts and bunch of stuff I didnt know what it was but it was by far the best we've had yet.
I don't have very good nternet right now as we are traveling for a camping trip. If internet improves, I'll update with all the photos from this day.
