opening day of squirrel season.
What's your other option then, Einstein? The birds are
landing smack dab in the middle of the most wide open bean
field that has ever existed.
"A-frame," Mills told me years ago.
If you take his advice, sticking one of these blinds in the
middle of a cut bean field, you'll be convinced it would be
better camouflaged if set in the middle of a Walmart parking
lot. You'll laugh at him and others like him, condemning their
minor league-ness as you climb into your coffin.
Until you hear guns going off from those blinds and find out
that geese will, in fact, land right on top of an A-frame, as long
as one thing is for sure — the blind is sitting on the X.
Magic
The "X," as it's known, is the exact, magical spot where
you're convinced birds will land when hunting.
Years before my shed and my hunting partners' garages
and sheds were filled with equipment, an old friend from
Tennessee, Jeff Wages, would go with a group of hunting
buddies to Canada, pulling a trailer of decoys 1,500 miles
for the opportunity to hunt ducks. The group would break in
half, with one group hunting during the morning while the
other group scouted.
Once the hunt was over, the groups would share information
and switch. Hunters became scouters; scouters became
hunters. The scouting was the most important part. They
had to find where birds were specifically working. They were
looking for the X. Once they found birds, their job was to gain
permission as quickly as possible and solidify their hide.
But there remains an issue with the X, whether hunting in
Canada, Nebraska or all parts in between. Do not think you
can hunt the field within sight of the
X, waving your newly purchased goose
flag trying to convince yourself that the
third goose on the left side, the big one,
almost came your way? He wasn't going
to. It's as much mirage as it is false hope.
Being on the field next to the X
also won't work. Why visit you when
there was still corn, and no hunters,
in the next field over the day before?
You might get an occasional curiosity
flock, that's for sure — the group of
birds that veer your way because
they've seen movement outside of the
blind: a wayward retriever, or maybe
two teenage boys throwing dirt clod
footballs. The birds will momentarily
cup their wings — something you and
your buddies will talk about on your
drive home — but they'll turn and land
in the next field over.
An impatient Lab retrieves and finally has a little fun during a Sarpy
County goose hunt.
Regardless of hunting success, a blind breakfast is
always worth the trouble to chase Canada geese.
December 2023 • Nebraskaland 31
