Putting Duck In The Air

[simonyglog 0]

Hi, we have a very small shoot, just for fun family days and have put our first 50 duck down on a dug pond. Come our first day I would like to get them off the pond and into the air. Any suggestions?

 

Now that they associate me with food I am starting to progressively feed them further from the pond. My intention is to walk them off the pond to a distance and then to put them up but am unsure of how to instigate the flight.

 

I reason I do need to have the odd proving flight with them prior to the day. They are now nine weeks old and the odd guy is starting to fly about four foot up back to the pond when the see me (breakfast) coming.

 

Any ideas are gratefully received.

[simononeill93 69]

When feeding I use a referee whistle,then you can get them to fly out to you to feed.I can call them out 2-3 fields away. If they only see you for food get a friend to walk in,they usually get spooked enough to fly,or just flap a stick with a plastic bag on the end.

[simonyglog 0]

That's a great idea. I'll try it.....

[butcherboy 68]

Really not a big fan of ducks on a pond. Totally get why shoots do it, but it tends to end up with tame ducks flying around the pond in circles waiting to land.

 

Have seen some mass slaughter on the ducks & it needs a bit of common sense from the guns to leave alone when they have had enough.

[jok 3,317]

I think the idea is not to feed them away from the main (or only) pond. Counter productive. On a litle 110 acre shoot I ran, we had 5 very small ponds but only fed to One. We drove the birds off as often as possible which meant they landed on the other safe places. However the need to get back to mother pond, ie, food was paramount. That therefore was the evening flight. Guns, as someone has already pointed out, needed to be trained, only shoot the the birds on the way in. After that get away and leave them in peace. The big bag is of no consequence. One or two birds and the rest for a fortnight later. And a fortnight later etc. If you only have one flight pond then this is clearly a problem. Ducks love to feed in shallow water. Any shallow brooks near you? Other water of any description? We did have a monumental problem. Our tenant farmer asked me why I was feeding ducks with bananas because he had to help one which had been a bit greedy. As well as, how many ducks do you have as they are taking my cattle corn for breakfast. The best duck shoot I've ever been on was at Wirksworth in Derbyshire where the keeper assured the highest birds known to man. Correct.Brilliant. Exciting. Proper. Enjoy.

[sussex 5,777]

We had a couple of ponds that we put ducks on , we fed them of it , we walked them up through the wood then flushed them , it was quite good to be able to let them flush in small bunches , before the season started we flew them quite a few times to get them flying properly , nothing worse than when they take to the air only to flop back on the pond asap ..

[bird 9,969]

Really not a big fan of ducks on a pond. Totally get why shoots do it, but it tends to end up with tame ducks flying around the pond in circles waiting to land.

 

Have seen some mass slaughter on the ducks & it needs a bit of common sense from the guns to leave alone when they have had enough.