Two officers and four members (six total participants) had a great time at the 1/18/08 - 1/20/08 Non-Chartered Blast and Cast (Duck Hunt and Fishing Trip) in Corpus Christi. When we arrived on Friday we were greeted with a steady 25+ MPH north wind and a heavily overcast sky. We set up camp and did a little scouting. We then ate at Castaway's in Port Aransas.
The wind kept up through early Saturday afternoon. This made getting across Wilson's cut on Saturday morning very challenging. I, Randy Rowley, couldn't paddle Mark Dillow's kayak into that wind and Tim Price's trolling motor wasn't strong enough to push his duck boat across either. Jeff Reece had to tow us across in his bass boat. We set up at our usual point and then encountered our next problem - the wind pushed about half of the decoys to the shore.
Nevertheless we had a great hunt and harvested our limit or Redheads (12), a Pintail, and a Widgeon and shot another Pintail but couldn't find it. The 14 ducks killed was a record for an FCS Blast and Cast. We returned and cleaned birds and guns and cooked brunch. Then it was nap time. After a couple of hours we went and fished along Wilson's Cut. Harry Biggs caught an undersized Redfish. We then cooked fajita's.
Sunday morning was much better than Saturday as far as the wind was concerned but we had a blue bird day. Tim was able to easily make it across the cut. I, however, couldn't sit upright on Mark's kayak and paddle at the same time because I was wearing my son's rubber waders (which would hardly bend), so I hitched a ride with Tim. We had no problems with the decoys but there were a lot fewer ducks in the air than the day before. We still managed to bag 11 Redheads and should have gotten our limit but lost a Redhead that dove after hitting the water. We also missed a loan Redhead that responded to my calling (a few minutes earlier another loan Redhead responded to my call and came straight in that we nailed). I also had a little scare. A flock of about a dozen Redheads came in from behind us. I picked out one that was straight out from me and nailed it, but it almost took me out when it fell. As I watched it fall I realized that it was heading straight for me. I could hear the whistling of the air as the duck crashed. At the last instant I realized that if I didn't move the duck would miss me. It crashed one foot to my left. If it had hit me it would have either hit my chest or head!
We camped at Mustang Island State Park. I led us in the devotional Stuck on Friday and the devotional Decoyed on Saturday.
Thanks to Harry Biggs for bringing his pop-up, Jeff Reece for bringing his bass boat, Tim Price for bringing his duck boat (converted sailboat), and Mark Dillow for letting us borrow his kayak.