Banded bird stories ? Got one?

hey jesse did you go to methodist point? next time try jig raps i usually have better luck through the ice with jig raps and a minnow head.

This may sound nuts, but if vertical fishing ringworms and super doos works on the river right now, why wouldn’t they work vertically fished ice fishing??? Sometimes up sizing works.
Winter is winter and walleyes are walleyes, give it a try next time the fishing is slow and let us know.

Jeremy

Funny you mentioned that! We talked about bringing ringies with and forgot to bring them. I will definately give it a shot and the jigging raps too! Thanks for the advice guys

Decided to put off my heart attack and not watch the Vikings play football. So went ducking hunting. I specifically wanted to set up for woodies. I found a spot a week ago and hoped to hit it again. It was there for me….

So I moved in and got set up. In no time at all I had a single ‘wood man’ come buzzing through, turned him with a subtle call or two, and dropped him….Things sloooooowed! Then about 5 here came a couple and they were going to land out of range, but again a couple quick calls, this time on my double reed ‘mallard quack er’ they lifted and came in, and I dropped her ‘ol man!” That made my two, and my woody limit.
I waded out to pick him up, and OMG! A band!I was as excited as a kid at Christmas. So back to the boat blind, and a photo op….

I have only one other banded duck to my credit. I shot it when I was a high school senior back in western Nebraska where I hail from. That duck was banded in the eastern Soviet Union across from Alaska, in 1968, I shot it in 1972 in the panhandle of Nebraska. It was big BIG greenhead.

I can hardly wait to hear the info one this woody. I think the gal that answered the phone to gather the info was more excited than I was. I think it kinda made her day too….

Good hunting everyone, and be safe out there.

Nice bird and A BAND Someday, when I get back into duck hunting, I want to get a Male Woodie, such as yours to mount…. now if it had a band too… OMG what a mount that would make

very cool. i have never shot a banded woodie. i have 9 mallard bands and 4 goose bands.
i have kind of a funny story. i work nights, and so does my girlfriend. i can go duck hunting any day i want, i just have to suffer with about 2-3 hours of sleep. so one day last year, me and my gf both stay up after work, and went hunting. we shoot a few mallards, nothing to great. we werent in the best of moods, because you have to tromp through about 400 yards of pure hell. mud up to your knees, bogs you break though and get stuck, ect. on the way home, i have a spot i can jump. you can see about 90 percent of it from the road and the other part is hidden. didnt see any ducks in the part from the road. i told my gf we should still go check it, becuase there is usually always something sitting there. she decided she was too tired and grumpy, and wanted to rest in the truck. so i decide to go jump it alone. i head back there, and see about 6-7 mallards sitting there. i get to within about 25 yards and they get up. i drop two drakes and miss the third shot. one of the drakes is just winged, so i chased after him and kept lobbing shells at him untill finally, after about 5 or 6 shots i killed him. i walk out to grab him, and he is belly up. i can see the band on his leg! i was pretty excited untill i grabbed him and took a look at the band. a jack miner band! the rarest bands of them all. i got all of the info back, and they had only banded like 1400 ducks that year. it was banded in 04 and was 4 years old when i shot it. jack miner was the first person to start banding ducks back in the late 1800s. they still band ducks only in one area up in ontario. they have bible verses on them also. mine said ” cast all your cares upon god” my girlfriend was so mad when i came back and rubbed it in! thats what you get for being lazy!

flat, if you report the band online, they give you some basic info, like how old it was and what state and when it was banded. you can still get the info by partially filling out the report, but without actually reporting it again

BANDS!!! Where do I sign up?? I think I speak for every one when I say that bands are like finding a small piece of gold in the middle of the chisel plowing. I clearly cannot compete with the two previous stories. A bird banded from the Soviet Union and a Jack Miner band are hands down the two most prized bands that you can acquire. I hope that both have found a peaceful resting place on your walls or mantels as these are more than once in a lifetime occurances.
Bands, in my honest opinion, are a nice little icing on the cake. There are people that acquire many bands because of where they hunt locally or where they travel to. However, many people seem to fall in the middle. I for one have seen both aspects in my life. When i was legal to begin hunting some dozen+ years ago they used to band many geese on our local refuge. This meant that shooting banded birds during the early season was really not that big of deal. We would split them up amoung hunters in the group as even as we could since almost all of them always came back same year same town. However, I happened to find one of the exceptions. The first year I could hunt back in the mid 90’s my father brought me out to the blind that I was no stranger to. I had been accompanying my father out to the neighbors pasture for many years at that point and was chomping at the bit to get my turn. Being the youngest person in the blind and having never shot a duck or goose i was given the opportunity to shoot first. My old man gave me the heads up and I rose up to shoot as every one else sat and watched an inspiring addiction begin. I know my gun was empty when I set it down but my eyes never left the goose that I pulled up on. When the barras ran out I ran out and grabbed my goose, admiring its size in comparison to me. When I was bringing it back to the blind someone asked if i checked it for bands? I looked down and sure enough it had a band. I sent the information in (yes, i once lived in the day of mailing in bands) and it came back as banded as an adult 11 years earlier in northern Alberta, recovered in southern MN. I was stoked and my father was even happier. I will never forget those images in my mind, the birds coming in and the look my father had when I was prying that band off.
I have shot many bands in my day since then and as a group we try and keep the band situation as fair as possible. We have gone through the days of every one arguing and fighting over who shot what and what fell where and why one shot there. My brother and I are constants within the group and others gravitate and evade with life agendas and work ethics. We now flip coins for who gets bands as it is the only to evade whiners and criers (even though we hunt over our dekes, our calls, and our spots). Gone are the days of 20+ bands an early season, but my first and formore most will never escape my memory.

Back in the early 90’s I shot a mallard that had 2 bands.A silver Avis on one leg and a gold on the other.The gold band had $100 reward stamped on it which I cashed in on .Anybody ever heard of $100 rewards before? I’ve heard of $10’s.

Awesome stories flatfish make sure you keep us up to date on where your wood duck came from.

thats awesome FF!!!!

On the other end of the spectrum, my first banded duck was a hen mallard, shot in our field near Newburg, ND and had been banded 2 months earlier in Upham, ND about 10 miles away!!

Not much of a story when that band info came back!!

Eric

I have only shot 1 banded bird ever – here is the story I sent to my buddies in December 2006 when it happened!
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Well, after 17+ years of waterfowl hunting, I finally shot my first banded duck! Wahoo!

Lucas and I went to the Flint Hills National Wildlife Refuge on Tuesday, 26 December 2006 in the afternoon. Justin had driven through the marshes on Christmas day and seen a lot of mallards and no hunters. When we got there, there were no birds to be seen. We talked to 1 guy sitting in his truck in the parking lot. He had been watching the Coon Hammond marsh since 11 am (it was now 3 pm) and had only seen eagles and hawks. Leave it to a Johnson County loser to sit there for 4 hours!

We went back to the Horseshoe marsh and set up. Within 15 minutes of sitting down, 3 drake mallards floated into our set-up. Lucas took out the lead bird (unfortunately, it took him 3 shots to do it – sorry Lucas!). Fortunately, for me, it left the other 2 drakes. I dumped them both, and wouldn’t you know that 1 of them was banded! Wahoo!

We picked up another 5 mallards over the next hour. I had set my phone alarm to go off at 5:10, the close of legal shooting time. At about 5:05, we hadn’t seen anything for awhile, so we decided to pick up. We emptied our guns and grabbed the decoy sacks. Just then, Lucas said, “Here they come, load up!” I loaded the gun, he called, and in came a flock of mallards. I dropped 2 to finish our limit and the alarm rang! It was sweet!

Here are the details on the band. Happy New Year! Jeff

INFORMATION YOU ENTERED:
Band number: 1737-11155
Kind of Bird: Mallard
How Obtained: Shot
Status of Band: Removed from Bird
Status of Bird: Dead
Date of Recovery: 12/26/2006 Hunting Season: current
Flint Hills NWR, 3 mile(s) SE of Hartford in Coffey County, KS

INFORMATION FROM OUR FILES:
Band Number: 1737-11155
Where bird was banded: South Dakota
Date banded: 09/02/2005
Species: Mallard

I started duck hunting in 87 and have not shot a banded duck yet. A few yrs back I was in ND in a blind with 2 other guys. It was real slow and we were loungeing around when a drake malard came in from our left. The guy to the left of me told me to shoot that bird. I in turn told the guy to my right the same thing. He pulls up and dropped the duck then runs out to get it. When he picked it up he started jumping up and down and hooting like a madman. The duck had 2 reward bands for a total of $125. I have not passed on a duck from that moment on.

outch! that had to hurt

Those are truly some wonderful stories and memories of banded waterfowl. Thanks goes out to all of you that shared with us!

WOW! I just love all these stories you guys!
My brothers and a hunting buddy called my greenhead the ‘commi’ mallard….The band sits in a shadow box on my sisters wall…When I went to the Army (my number was 25) my Mom cleaned off my desk in my shared room and Dad made her these shadow boxes. My watch, the duck band, and some Indian head dimes and pennies are in those shadow boxes, among other things. They’ll be on my wall soon enough..

I can hardly wait to hear about this woody. Part of me thinks it’ll be a local from the M’sippi river bottoms, but, maybe not I sure I’ll be having one one these drake woodies going to the taxi-man….
Keep the stories coming.
BTW, I was just reading about Jack Miner…. some good reading out there on the i’net….But I had heard of ‘reward’ tags, but thought they were a myth until I read these posts. See how fellow IDOers educate us all
Thanks,
Tim (aka – flatfish)

Banged this one yesterday, I got one about 20 years ago but I lost my whole lanyard after my old lab gunner retreived 5 in a row and couldn’t get in the boat, I thought he was going to go under so I dove in after him, I lost my calls and my only jewelery Is there a web site to turn in the info. or a phone number???

Toll free number should be on the band.
But here ya go:

1-800-327-BAND

Believe me, they’re excited to be answering the phone.
OH< CONGRATS!!

the new bands have the website on it also. http://www.reportband.gov
you get some basic info instantly as opposed to waiting months to get your coa back.( ive waited almost a year to get my info back on one band) tells you the date the species (duh) and what state it was banded in

My hunting partner shot a banded woodie hen on October 17th. Not much of a story behind it, other than it crossed out of nowhere at about 40 yards, and he made a nice one shot kill on it and my dog retrieved it. Was banded in WI one month ago. No more details so far.

I was actually closer to it, but my gun got stuck in my coat trying to raise it and he got the shot and I didn’t. That’s my typical luck with banded ducks.

have never shot one, and have never witnessed anyone shoot one.

I sent the info. vea the website, it didn’t come back with anything, the site says if the info is correct it may have been banded resently and the database hasn’t been updated yet, I will keep you posted.

I shot a double banded drake mallard Oct.9 in La crosse. Hatched in 2009 in Marathon county Wis. I guess a question I never asked was why a yearling was double banded? No colred band…just two silver leg bands.

Well, it came in the mail and here are the few details

species: WOOD DUCK

sex, yes: I mean drake!

age : ?Hatched in 07 or earlier

location: Leeman, Shawano County, Wisconsin, USA

Bander: Richard Kahl (WI DNR)

Harvested: Backwaters M’ssippi River. 10-18-09

Bird is going on the wall along with this certificate…

very cool. ive gotten a mallard that was banded by him. it was my first one.

You guys saw my other post on my first band….While it was exciting to get the band – the bird was hatched in ’09 and banded last month….. oh well – still cool imo

I was just quickly thumbing through the new DU magazine. Saw an article, (page 10)re: bands. The article is actually about “FAKE” bands causing some problems. But here’s something I also wanted to know.

over 80,000 bird bands reported per year!

There are millions of ducky’s out there, and I don’t yet know how many get banded. So I had to go look it up;) > There are also millions of hunters out there. Biologists band more than 200,000 ducks and nearly 150,000 geese and swans in North America each year. To date, most duck banding efforts have focused on mallards. The mallard is the most commonly harvested duck in the United States and Canada, and much of what we know about waterfowl population dynamics and harvest management is due to the continued success of the mallard banding effort. Seems like a small percentage. No wonder we ‘prize’ them so much

Check this out>

http://www.flyways.us/surveys-and-monitoring/banding-and-marking-programs/banding-factoids

Quote:

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I shot a double banded drake mallard Oct.9 in La crosse. Hatched in 2009 in Marathon county Wis. I guess a question I never asked was why a yearling was double banded? No colred band…just two silver leg bands.

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I haven’t found what the two bands mean. Did you hear anything about that when you called in the bands?

I asked him and he just said it was another way of identifying the bird. Maybe just a slow day and too many bands or just not enough birds?!