rice field hunting

[talk2me suzy]

me and some buddies of mine were rice field hunting a couple of days ago with four dozen decoys and four mojos and the ducks wouldnt come to the decoys at all. we saw thousands of ducks but none would work us. any ideas why they wouldnt?

[rebelduckaholic]

more robos on a blue bird day ought to do the trick

[MSDawg870]

2 possible explanations...

1. You say 4 dozen decoys and 4 mojos were used, some ducks don't take to an even numbered spread. Next time try 13, 27, 35, or 41 ect.

2. The mojos might've been spinning the wrong direction, if the birds are coming from the West your EDMs(electronic duck magnets) need to have their wings spinning in a clockwise fashion, if flock is flying from the East a counterclockwise motion is recommended.

my $.02

[blindbuilder]

Not quite enough mojos, if you are training them for next season. You should try a 3 to 5 ; mojo to decoy ratio.

[alabamabronco]

dont forget to call nonstop....

[mudsucker]

You got to hold your mouth right!

[Blackduck]

Simple. You have to be where the ducks either want to go or don't mind going. Obviously they wanted nothing to do with your rice field.
Other common problems are
1)crappy blind
2)no face mask
3)crappy calling
4)crappy spread. 4 dozen blocks just scattered about may look like crap from 200 ft up.

If that doesn't work then try holding your mouth just right.

[Deagle]

Try replacing the body of the mojos with large sweet potatos.

[Locked Up]

This can't be a real post. Somebody's play'n around.

[mudsucker]

[Wildfowler]

There is a naturally occurring ratio that exists and occurs in the world. It was first discovered back in the 11th century by the Italian mathematician Leonardo Fibonacci.

When deploying that many robo ducks it important to give consideration to this golden ratio from nature. A couple of others here have suggested it, but I don't think they are giving you the strait talk on the golden ratio taken from nature. I'm not calling them out specifically, because they may not fully understand the ratio, and how it occurs in nature. I suppose it's possible too, that they may be giving you bad information which would only result in failure. Surely no one here would do that?

Take a look at this spiral pattern: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fibon ... ral_34.svg

If you've ever spent hours watching snow geese accumulate in a field, you'll notice that they always create this pattern. Sure, it does tend to vary based on the contour of the land they are congregating in, but this pattern is always present and can be calculated. This pattern of birds feeding does tend to get distorted as the morning grows on, as more groups of birds come in to the flock, but that initial landing does tend to stick to this pattern. I can assure you that waterfowl do recognize it. Sadly, I don't think that many duck hunters have ever known, or understood this, because we're basically programed to throw out decoys and shoot whatever stragglers happen to come in.

You need to understand how that natural spiral pattern is formed, and overlay the end of the pattern upwind, and downwind of where your blind is located. That means you may have battery powered twirlies in front of you, behind you, to your left, and to your right. Depending on the wind, of course! To keep things simple, it's best to start out you hunting in a precision leveled field, so that you won't have to distort the spiral based on the contour of the land. From this point forward, I'm going to give instructions based on the assumption that you're hunting in a leveled field or over water, which is always flat.

The most important part. How do you go about determine the when to form the end of the pattern? That's dependent on the number of robo's and regular decoys you have on hand. You can virtually do this with any number of decoys. If it's a high wind, for best results, you need to keep your decoys tied off tightly to keep them from drifting in and out of formation. But that could be best saved for another topic. Back to the formation.

The formula is as follows: The first number of the sequence is 0, the second number is 1, and each subsequent number is equal to the sum of the previous two numbers of the sequence itself. So in your case, since your decoys total in number of 48. Placing them is as easy as pi. I have found that I have best results when I place the origin point of the spiral at approximately 45 degrees to the wind, and in front of me. (This means in front of you, and to your left) By doing so, you will also be able to maintain the clockwise rotation that ducks like to follow when making their final approach. But that too, is best saved for another subject.

Since the first number in the formula is zero, and you can't put out zero decoys, you'll have no choice but start with putting out at least one deke. If you have 50 or more decoys to put out, start with two dekes. For 100 or more decoys, start with three dekes. You may confidently put out your decoys using this sequence using any number of decoys you happen to have on hand. Then begin forming the spiral. Always place the next group of decoys from the number sequence in a counter-clockwise formation while beginning at the end which is 90 degrees opposite end of the previous placement. Imagine that each group of dekes represents a square. Remember that from this example, we're assuming that initial decoy placement being 45 degrees off of the wind. For the next group from this example, drop downwind approximately 1/4 the size of the initial square. For the next group, same thing. 90 degrees opposite end, and continue this ever growing sequence until all your decoys have been place. If everything has been calculated correctly, you should end up with the last grouping of decoys placed (not exceeding the approximate mid-point of the total area of the decoy spread) in front of your position, which should create the natural landing zone, that all flocking birds are programmed to seek out.

When using robo ducks, I have found that best results are had when keep them as close to the origin point as possible. Substitute one robo-duck for one regular decoy in each successive natural sequence of decoys being place out. I like to keep them near the origin of the spiral pattern because we all should know by now, that live ducks generally do not land right over the top of these gadgets. If you've placed them around the point of origin using this wind example, The approaching ducks should come right past them, directly into the wind, which should be directly at your position.

You can also use this technique with different variations of wind degree for that initial decoy placement, which could be especially useful when specific hunting terrains dictate that the blind will have to be placed in such a manner that wind is not at your back. This means you can engineer this decoy placement to have the ducks approach from your left or right. You can also do this with the wind in your face, and have the ducks approach from behind, but I would caution that this can be very unpredictable, and should only be performed by experience hunters.

Good luck with this. I'm not going to be available by private message for additional help for the remainder of this season, but I am sure there are some other guys here who are much smarter than I am that would be glad to help with this.

[tcash]

my .02.....mojo's are good real early in the morning, thick timber, and maybe sloppy days. Everybody up and down the central flyway use them. Experts have said that juveniles are a whole lot more prone to come to it than an older duck. Guess what, by the time they get to us the juveniles have been hammered and the rest have been educated. They used to be awesome. We haven't used them much in about 3 yrs.

[RockBottom]

[maverick21]

Get another 4 dozen decoys. Then with 12 decoys for each letter, spell out L -A - N- D H-E-R-E.


Should do the trick.

[chattahoochee]

The reason they didn't want to come in is because you didn't put out that duck attractant that they can smell from the air. Every HARDCORE WATERFOWLER puts that out before every successful hunt.