When you have three dogs and only one hunter, the dogs have to take turns.

Thunder hunted the opener.  He always hunts the opener.  I think it is a rule, although as far as I know it isn’t written down anywhere.  Freighter went second.  Hubby was really hoping to get him a bird because Freighter usually ends on the outings where there are no birds to retrieve.

Then there is Storm.  If you are a regular reader of this blog, you know that Storms loves to upland hunt: grouse, woodcock and pheasant.  She is very good at it.

Waterfowl hunting comes in second because she has to sit quietly and wait for the ducks to come to her unlike upland hunting, where she goes out and finds the birds.  Waterfowl hunting also requires Storm to retrieve birds in cold water.  Storm is not a fan of cold water.

Last Saturday she found herself at the river waiting for the wood ducks to arrive.  It was a frosty cold morning and there was a lot of fog on the river.

Hubby and Storm waited for the fog to lift a bit and for some birds to show up and finally they did.  The first duck landed right out in front of Storm in the river.  Storm was nice and steady.  OK so she could have been considering going into the cold river.  Hubby sent her on her name and she made a nice retrieve.

They waited a bit longer and hubby got another bird that also landed right in front of Storm in the river.  This time she was happy to go and made another nice retrieve.

Just to make sure hubby did not forget Storm’s most favorite thing, she flushed a couple upland birds as they were walking out.  Unfortunately the cover was so thick, hubby did not see whether they were grouse or woodcock.

We are not sure how long the wood duck hunting will last this season.  The ducks usually migrate south when the leaves fall off the trees and we are getting close to that.  So far it has been a much better waterfowl season than last season.  All three dogs have had retrieves this season which was not the case last year.  Hubby hit every bird he shot at and the dogs found every bird with no lost cripples even though a couple were in the heavy cover on the other side of the river.  Each dog did its job and did it well.

With the wood duck hunting winding down, we are hoping that the dogs will get some upland hunting in.  Unlike waterfowl hunting, upland has been very slow.  We have had warm to hot weather and rain.  Neither are not good for upland hunting.