I used to do some hunting, but it's been 11 years, and it was never for geese. Frank's invited me to go along on duck or goose hunts few times in the past, but it's never quite worked out. I've been ice-fishing with him a couple of times since we moved Michigan.
In case you didn't know, Frank is the guy that hired me as I bailed out of my post-doc position back in Washington. We worked together in Seattle until that whole thing sort of fell apart. It's perhaps the strangest coincidence imaginable, but I took my current job with a different company and Frank transferred within without changing companies, and we independently ended up living and working in the same town in Michigan. His office is just down the street from mine.
Frank's an interesting and very likable guy. A hunter and fisherman, a runner and a scientist. He's honest, open, and very pragmatic. He has two teenage boys, and they have huge garden and can lots of veggies every year. I could really see him as a farmer, just as easily as an environmental consultant. He sometimes calls himself a liberal redneck.
Anyway, regarding the hunting trip, at first I was going to say, "No. Too much to do, too little time, don't have the money, not sure I need another hobby, etc.," but instead, in a momentary lapse of reason, I said something like, "Sure. What time are we leaving?"
Getting ready for a hunting trip in two days time with two kids to take care of wasn't easy. I definitely didn't have time, given all the homework I have to do for work, and the kids didn't have time, given all the homework and piano practicing they should have been doing, to spend two evenings tracking down all the licenses and gear I'd need for a goose hunt. Cindy worked Tuesday evening, and had a PTO meeting Wednesday evening, so I dragged those poor kids from one sporting goods store to another.
The answer to "what time are we leaving?" was 3:30 a.m.!! The plan was to drive up to Shiawassee National Wildlife Refuge, arriving before 5:00 a.m., to sign up for a drawing with all the other hunters who wanted to hunt geese in the refuge that morning. Sign-up started at 5:00a.m. and the drawing was at 5:30 a.m.
There was something surreal about being at the USFWS office at 5:00 a.m. with a bunch of hunters to enter a drawing for a goose hunt. The majority were middle-aged men, but some were old and some were young, and there were a few ladies. Almost everyone was wearing well-worn camo coats or coveralls, and big boots. Everyone was very quiet, lots of folks were sipping coffee. Frank asked me if I thought I was the only one in the group with a PhD. I wondered if we were the only ones in the group who had jobs. This is Michigan, after all.
The drawing took place in one half of a big metal barn-like structure with four roll-up garage doors all along one side. The single door open at one end that morning closed with governmental precision at 5:30. Between 5 and 5:30, each person had to show their hunting permits (two state licenses and a federal waterfowl stamp) and identification. Forms were filled and out and numbers assigned to each party, with a maximum of three hunters per party. At 5:30, all the little metal numbers were put into a classic wooden tumbler, the handle was turned and the numbers tumbled in the drum with a rattling sound out of an old western, then one of the officers pulled them out of the hatch one a time and lined them in a trough. I'd expected it to be done on a computer, but this was much better.
Frank's number was the sixth out of the tumbler. There were about 30 numbers hunting spots, or blinds, and being sixth gave us a pretty chance to select one of the more productive spots. The USFWS monitors exactly how many geese have been taken at each spot, and the results are posted, so it's easy to see that some blinds are more productive than others.
As soon as we signed up for our blind, we hopped in the truck and headed for the parking lot in the refuge. It was still dark, and we were in a convoy. Another petro-chemical-intensive human activity. All the hunters parked in one muddy lot and walked perhaps a mile or so to their blind. Many used wagons or carts to haul their decoys and gear. Frank had a whole pile of decoys, but didn't have a cart, so we stuffed them all into a couple of big bags and carried them on our backs. We also carried bags with food, hot coffee, water bottles, shotgun shells, and of course a couple of shotguns. One of the refuge rules was that you could not make even a single return trip to the vehicle. Once you were out, you had to stay out until you were done. Hunters were allowed only 10 shotgun shells in their possession, too, so the amount of shooting was quite limited.
The walk to the blind wasn't much fun. The bag of decoys hung down to my feet, so I had to sort of hold it off to one side. The bag of food and stuff was heavy and didn't carry comfortably, either. The ground was muddy, and my old LL bean boots quickly became 10-pound balls of mud. It was dark and hard to tell the difference between a lump of mud and and hole in the ground. I was hot and sweaty by the time we reached out blind.
The blind was not really a blind at all, but a bench set into the edge of a field of standing corn. We set the decoys up in the adjacent field, which was freshly sprouted winter wheat. Then we sat and got cold. I think the geese were supposed to come over from the Shiawassee River, which was probably only a half-mile to the north, to feed in the corn and wheat. We could hear them over there all morning, but they must not have been in the mood for corn and wheat. We watched a lot geese fly over, way above us, paying no attention to our decoys.
There were a couple of close calls. Once a pair flew low overhead and looked at the spread of decoys. Frank called to them, they called back, even turned around in a couple of circles overhead, possibly considering landing by the decoys, possibly just wondering what those silly men with guns were doing in the corn field. Another single goose came even closer, made a circle over the guys in the blind to our south about 100 yards. It, too, flew away. Everthing we had with us and on us, expecting my brown pants, was corn-stalk camo. I borrowed a coat from Frank, and he made me leave my blue backpack in the truck. I wore Quinn's camo baseball cap. But still the geese didn't land.
We watched some deer feeding on the wheat for a while. We saw lots of ducks fly overhead, and many smaller birds, too. We saw a hawk land in the wheat, capture a small mammal, and fly away with it. But no geese came close enough for a shot. We heard a couple of shots from hunters in other blinds, but just a couple. We don't know if they took any geese. Eventually the sun got high enough overhead that we began to thaw. And eventually even the high-flying geese stopped coming around. By about 10:30, most of the other hunters had headed home. We did, too. We might give it another try later this year.
