Cattail Mayhem: A Muddied Shotgun and the Limit That Almost Wasn’t

Cattail Mayhem: A Muddied Shotgun and the Limit That Almost Wasn’t

There’s no blind, no dog platform, no layout. Just me, knee-deep in cattails, crouched with the waterline licking my waders and my shotgun jammed full of marsh mud. This wasn’t how the morning was supposed to go. But when you hunt pressured ducks in public sloughs during the last week of the season, chaos is part of the game—and sometimes, it makes the best story.

🌫️ The Setup: Frozen Parking Lots and Warm Water

It was January 4th. Most of the lakes were locked up. I found a spring-fed slough about 40 minutes from town that still held open water, thanks to a narrow channel cutting through cattails and silt-bottom muck.

Scouting the day before had revealed birds—lots of them. Mallards, gadwalls, a pair of black ducks, and enough feathers on the water to promise action. Access was walk-in only. That meant knee boots and a sled full of decoys.

🌪️ The Mayhem Begins

The plan: sneak in early, toss a small six-pack spread in the cut, and tuck into the cattails with a homemade marsh seat. What actually happened:

• 5:12 AM: Dropped my thermos in the water. Gone forever.

• 6:45 AM: Stepped into a hidden beaver run. One boot completely submerged.

• 7:10 AM: Three mallards landed before shooting light. Watched them feed 15 feet from me, hearts pounding.

🔥 The First Flurry

Legal light broke. The first group—a pair of gadwalls—buzzed in low. One shot, one bird. Dogless, I made the retrieve with a rigged decoy pole and a pair of ski gloves wrapped in plastic bags.

Then, the flock came.

🦆 What the Mallards Did

I’d just reloaded when 15 mallards circled over the open water. Two locked up. I swung—and my trigger jammed. Wet hands, silt in the chamber, and a worn-out pump that hadn’t been cleaned since teal season.

The birds landed.
I froze.
One started to swim away.
I manually chambered a round like an old lever-action rifle.

Boom. One down. The rest flushed straight into the fog.

🧭 What I Learned the Hard Way

🧠 Why This Hunt Stuck

It wasn’t a limit. It wasn’t clean. But it was real. In the cattail mess and fog, with frozen hands and half-working gear, the birds still came. I still pulled it off. Barely. And in that barely—there was everything I love about waterfowling.

“The best hunts aren’t always clean. They’re the ones you claw through and earn.”