6/12/2023 0 Comments Canadian goose goose goose duck![]() "When I was learning how to call geese the first thing that I tried to get down was the cluck," McKnight says. Last fall he captured first place in the prestigious Winchester World Open. Though not yet 30, McKnight has distinguished himself in the competitive calling ranks by winning nearly every major contest in the nation. That's what you want to do when you are calling geeseimitate a feeding flock," Eldredge says.Īcross the Mississippi River, Richie McKnight honed his goose-calling prowess in agricultural fields throughout Illinois. That translates into confidence-that the birds are sitting there, eating. ![]() "If the birds get close after doing the hutta-cluck, but maybe start to peel off a little bit, slow your calling down, and do a cluck and a murmur. Instead, he relies on flagging, a well-designed decoy spread, and staying well hidden, to get the birds' attention and draw them near. In general, early in the season, once you get geese on a string, they usually come in because there are a lot of juveniles."Įldredge seldom employs a hail call for geese. "If they don't respond," Eldredge continues, "change up, stop, slow down, speed up, and figure out what they want to hear. If they turn, you go light with the hutta-cluck, and hutta-cluck them all the way down. "Sometimes, they may not want to hear much, so you give them some low-end growls and a couple of clucks. "Reading birds is part of it," Eldredge says. Weather conditions, time of year, locale, and bird behavior all play a role in determining what Eldredge pulls out of his bag of tricks. From there, you can go into the hutta call." I say 'grrrr' or 'grrrrit.' That reference note will get the reed vibrating. That is, like you are humming into the call. "It's important to start with a reference note. Emphasize on the 'T.' That's with either a short-reed or a flute," Eldredge says. Simply say 'hutta-hutta-hutta' into your call. "With early-season geese, the hutta-cluck works very well over water and grasses, like alfalfa or in a pasture. He is typically in the field up to 128 days a year, beginning with the resident goose seasons and wrapping up during the spring snow goose season. I don't use all those different calling sounds, but sometimes I have to pull one of the odd ones out to make things work."Įldredge, who has been tagged with the nickname of "Goose Guru," for the past 12 years has concentrated his efforts in the Midwest, regularly hunting in Iowa, Minnesota, and Missouri. I can do 23 different calls in goose language on a short reed, opposed to 12 calls on a flute. "The key to short-reeds," says professional guide Shawn Eldredge of Des Moines, Iowa, " is their versatility. These days, however, short-reed goose calls are most often the chosen tools. Flutes, first introduced during the mid-1950s, dominated the market for decades. Mechanical calls used to lure geese have changed during the past five years. The dividends of this labor, however, can make the difference between an endless string of frustrating birdless days and success in the goose fields on a regular basis. ![]() Talking goose takes practice, which takes time, which takes discipline. ![]() Perhaps no one can be sure of the exact topic of each conversation, but goose hunters who harbor hopes of outstretched wings over their decoys would do well to master at least a small portion of this colorful dialect. Researchers have determined that Canada goose language includes more than 20 distinct sounds. Geese are the chatterboxes of the waterfowl world. No matter the project at hand, there was always time to stop and listen. They seldom arrived by calendar, but most often appeared when the air first became crisp and the trees began flashing the rich golds and reds of autumn. ![]() While growing up, and continuing to this day, there was always something reassuring about the clarion cries of migrating Canada geese. ![]()
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