Sabine Refuge Hunter Name Types
 

If you ever hunted Sabine refuge or any public area you have probably ran across these guys.

I will start with a few and y'all can chime in.

1. The "hail caller" this savvy hunter blows a very loud 18 note hail call anytime he sees a group of birds within 2 miles. The "hail callers" are know to hunt in packs and sometimes collaborate for added effect.
The "hail caller" does not need the satisfaction of working birds, he just enjoys tooting his horn.

2. The "sky buster" this overly optimistic hunter will sling bb's at any bird within 80 yards. A whole book can be written describing this hunter but we will move on.

3. One of my personal favorites is the "duck blocker" this greedy hunter will intentionally flare your birds by shooting at a dragonfly. "Duck blockers"are usually "hail callers".

4. The "I didn't see your light guy"
Its 5:30 am, your decoys are set, boat is hidden and you see someone coming your way. You politely shine your light @ the approaching hunter so he knows your position. The "I didn't see your light guy" completely ignores your light and begins to throw decoys. He is so close you can hear the decoys shuffle in the bottom of the boat. At this point I recommend a very long and loud "hail call" or hit em with your Q-Beam. If the stubborn hunter does not take a hint I believe it's ok to become hunter #1, and 3 when the opportunity presents itself.

All reasons I seldom hunt anymore. Had a #4 set up so close his dog was breaking, trying to retrieve our ducks. Weekend warriors at their finest.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Tapatalk

Had a #5 (the late arriver), show up and become a #4, then at shooting time turned into a #1. Problem was, he was wailing on his mallard call in a flooded swamp with nothing but wood ducks in it.

Makes me glad i don't hunt public.

God I hate that place. lol Here's a cool story. Used to hunt one hole in particular at Lac pretty hard back in college. Always a few groups racing to get to it. Me and 5 buds (had a plan to put out a big spread, about 12 dozen dekes) got there first, set up (decoys out, mojos on the poles but not running, pirogues brushed up for us to stand in while hunting, dog stand with the dog already on it, etc.) Well we had left our guns back in the big boat, so after guarding our spot until almost daylight we walked back to grab the guns (100 yds or so). Saw other groups coming in to hunt (pretty much 1 trail in & 1 out) and politely showed them where we had already set up (3 groups can safely hunt these ponds, have seen 5 before though) so they went a little further from us, no biggie. We're gone 5, maybe 10 minutes and make a short walk back to our spot, and sure enough, 2 cats were standing in our pirogues ,head lights on, had went and turned on our mojos, and were calling at ducks standing right beside our retriever... keep in mind it's just getting legal shooting time, and we just worked our balls off hauling decoys and what not. So we nicely ask *** is going on here, and they immediately start crawfishin. I'm a very non confrontational kinda guy but my buds are 180 opposites (6 of us, 2 of them). One of the guys was a good bit too big to be walking in the marsh and apparently fell in a few times just getting to our spot. So they play that card and say they can't walk any further/back because big guy will probably die. So I offer them to take my pirogue and go paddle themselves somewhere else. So by this time 10 minutes had passed and ducks are everywhere. We finally say screw it and just hide them right next to us for the daylight flight, and will just move them when it slows. By this time they feel pretty bad/stupid, and we give them the whole spill about we will call the shot, put your calls up, don't shoot our dekes, don't shoot over the dog etc. They are very polite and agree to everything. So we got 8 dudes spread out across the bank. We finally apologize for being dckheads to them and load our guns (got heated enough at first to where I made everyone unload, just in case lol). As soon as the first few groups came in it was alllll good. We ended up letting them hunt the entire morning with us, and come to find out they were pretty cool dudes that were just new to ducks. Didn't really know what was cool to do and what was not. Gave em the ol' public land do's & don'ts and they asked all kinds of questions about just ducks in general. It was actually kinda fun sharing knowledge and theories with people that had minimum experience. They were amazed by the dog, how well the ducks responded to our calling (isn't even that great but made me feel cool) and how we could manipulate the large spread to get them in better. 8 limits later everybody was buddy buddy lol. and they got to take home 2 limits of ringers, teal, and spoons lol. After that we ended up almost having 6 limits of mallards and pins, with a few greys. Annnnd that was the last time I hunted public. Or at least Lac & Sabine.

But was their face painted?

They hadn't reached that stage in their duck commander career yet.. pre dynasty days too.

I can't really talk, I usually make everyone wear a mask or paint. No mirror allowed of course. Nothing screams "turd" like seeing a guy with a pattern meticulously drawn on for extra cool points in his picture of 2 teal and a scaup...

From my experience, I'm thinking this is the average pattern in the progress of our beloved sky busters/duck commanders career.

• Year 1: Makes 1-4 hunts on public land with buddies (who are more than likely already sky busters etc.) Kills a few ducks
• Year 2: Obtains barrel sticker for his 870 pump, a triple reed Duck Commander call, Sam's Club size box of face paint, and a pair of waders.
• Year 3: By now he's pretty much got it figured out. Has a sticker on backglass saying "Team _______" : Insert cool name.
• Year 4: Buys tiller handle rig, with his clan name sticker on it, of course. By this time his scouting, calling, and skyblasting techniques are almost perfected. He now owns 16 decoys, has a dog "that'll hunt good", a ziplock full of rocks, has a boat to follow other boats, and is working on getting his "pro staff" together.
• Year 5: Get TF out this dudes way. Everyone else in the marsh can't hunt for beans, and he now knows every thought that goes through a northern shoveler's mind. Opening morning comes, and he doesn't limit!? So he thinks to himself.. "this is the same hole I've killed ducks on for 4 years now, what do I do?? Well, I've sure heard a lot of shooting further back, and 136 boats went back there this morning. I wonder if it's too crowded??...Naaaah. I'll just set up wherever I can fit. I bet we can at least get some fly by shots from the birds working the other 60 spreads of decoys. Hell, I don't even need to put decoys out now!" Finishes off a limit, thinks of scouting till 12 to maybe find a new, less crowded place, but he just CAN NOT wait to get back to that ramp. Now it's show time.. Tail gate drops, perfectly line up the limit him and his bros just so you can see the "TEAM____" 16"x32" backglass sticker , hop in the truck to use the mirror to freshen up the checkered pattern face paint, and now he's ready to throw some hashtags around and make it Facebook official.
• Year 6: He starts taking the "year 1" guys, and the circle of skybusting continues..

I'll make a lot of friends with this statement.
Make the refuges lottery hunts. The refuges have become over crowded and unsafe.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Tapatalk

yall think sabine is bad??? spend a weekend in the Wax. I promise it gets worse!

Lol yep never hunted the Wax but I hear it's all the above plus much more remote and tidal.

Nothing but a bunch of crazies running around in surface drives with LED light bars blaring music all day and night. Its unreal duck habitat overrun with idiots. I wish they'd outlaw surface drives and make the entire thing pirogue only.

Would change things a bit! Surface drives are like bass boats 30 years ago. Bay boats/surface drives are the new toys today.

I used to say there was a box in Sulphur, LA where you deposit your common sense before heading south to Sabine. It used to be really dangerous before they built the parking lots. There were tons of trucks lining the highway each morning.

The ducks don't get here til February.

I love reading these stories and hearing about all the public land antics, at the same time I'm very grateful to hunt private land. I'm starting to see this first hand in the deer hunting public land situation though, I've only made a few hunts on public land and it made me question how people ever kill.

No

We had a group at Lac decided around 8:00 decided they had hunted late enough. Well here they come dragging canoe right through our pond. This was bad enough. Then they decided to take a smoke break right in the middle of decoys. Not sure how it did not end up in a fight that morning.

More! More! never hunted public myself, this makes me appreciate my little slough.