AMERICA'S BEST PUBLIC DUCK HUNTING

Another Great Duck-Hunting Spot

EDITOR'S NOTE: My duck hunting partners, Tate Wood of Memphis, Tennessee, and Buddy Harris of Greenwood, and I hunted in Mississippi from a flat-bottomed, War Eagle boat with an Avery Quick Set Duck Blind that we could pop up in less than a minute and drop to the side of the boat in about the same time. I wasn't confident that we'd see many ducks in these public-land hunting areas. And if I hadn't witnessed our hunts with my own two eyes, I never would've believed that we would have the opportunity to take hundreds -- even thousands -- of ducks each day.

The following morning I met Johnny Freeman of Greenwood, my guide on another public-hunting site just north of Greenwood called Malmaison WMA. Avery Wood, the Mississippi Game and Fish Commissioner for several years, had developed this 1,450-acre greentree area. I expected a less-than-great shoot, because I just knew that another public-hunting area so close to Greenwood, Mississippi, couldn't have as many ducks as Mathews Brake. As Freeman motored the boat up a narrow alley between the dense trees, we came to a 50-yard wide pothole. The spot didn't look like it would hold many ducks. When I asked Freeman if he thought we'd get any ducks to come in here, he answered with a smile, "Thousands. Don't shoot every duck you see. Let's just take the greenheads and possibly a wood duck if you like."

Once again we jammed a War Eagle Boat equipped with a Quick Set Duck Blind between two trees. I learned most of the locals used this technique for setting up boat blinds on these two public-hunting areas. "When we scout, we don't only look for ducks and potholes to set up in," Freeman told me. "We also search for trees positioned close together so we can jam our boats between them. We try to find jams on all four ends of a pothole. Then, regardless of the direction the wind blows, we can jam our boat between two trees, set out our decoys and have ducks come into the wind and into our blind. When we jam a boat between the trees, we try not to knock any of the bark off the trees because we don't want any other duck hunters to easily identify our blind site.

"I like this particular pothole because it has such a small opening in the trees that ducks will come within our range, no matter where they light. Also, the shallow water behind us allows us to step out of the back side of the boat and wade into the timber to get our ducks if they fall into the timber and out of the pothole. Or, we quickly can run into the pothole if the ducks fall there, pick up our ducks and put our boat back in the jam between the two trees before the next flight arrives. To take a limit of ducks in the north delta region, you must pick up your ducks and get back to your jam before the next flight arrives."

TOMORROW: SECRET DUCK-HUNTING SPOTS