all I could come up with as far as pictures go but we kill kinda an unusual amount in NW KY. I’d say we average a pair of black ducks for every 75 we kill.
I think that generally speaking, pintail are universally considered a prized bird. While I do not get on the phone and call all the relatives when I shoot one, and they are rather common, I still consider a bull pintail a prized bird, and enjoy shooting them... Very often they fly later in the morning, and we will hold places on the strap for pintail... And often wait long periods before an opportunity presents. Pintail are wary, and more difficult to work into the call than mallards... Very rarely do pintail bank in hard to a call... Generally speaking (in my experience) we use a well-timed call to break birds over the blind; there is often a lot of circling involved, and often finishing a bird (or flock) can involve 20-30 minutes of circling. And while pintail are wary, part of that has to do with the fact that we are generally shooting them over open water (which is more difficult to create a good hide), and that they tend to be in groups more often... The few times I have killed pintail in thicker cover, they are no more wary than other birds. I honestly feel that mallards are a smarter bird than pintail, but we hunt mallards in areas that are more conducive to getting birds in gun range. As for canvasbacks, they are also a prized bird in the grasslands, and eat very well... In some coastal areas, they are not so great eating... Generally speaking though, most duck hunters place a pretty high value on canvasbacks... In my opinion, canvasbacks are virtually uncallable, but very susceptible to decoys, and are not an overly intelligent bird. A number of times I have had canvasbacks land in the decoys, and have never, ever heard one vocalize. Many of us make a growling call, but it is more to do something other than sit on our thumbs... Hunting with a friend, I did that growling call, and a high flock banked and came right in... A second flock came over high, I growled, they banked and came right in... We were both commenting on how well that call worked (having each finished our two-bird limits)... Then, the next 9 flocks came over high, banked, and came right in, without me calling... As to black ducks, I would love to shoot one... They have a reputation (warranted or not) of being wary, and generally decent on the table (although I understand that they can be tough to eat in some areas)... Not as common as a mallard, and there is always some degree of appeal to shooting birds that are not as common...
Cans are dumb as hell. You'll shoot em and they will come back around and finish. Nothing like hearing a jet of cans come over the top of the blind though.
If they have white on their speculum, count them towards whatever works with your limit/bag because they are mallard x black hybrids.
Which means that they are counted as a wild duck and NOT part of your mallard limit OR your black duck limit. BUT, mr green jeans may still have his own take on it......
Not so sure about that Quarne, but I know for a fact the CPO's in VA I have spoken to saw it my way....of course they hardly know a ringneck from a blackhead so YMMV.
We killed a black mallard one morning when black ducks were closed. If I remember right that one had a fairly green head, chestnut tint to the breast, and white wing bars but otherwise black duck body. Ended up getting checked by a fed that morning. He asked us what we had and we gave him the rundown of the 6-8 ducks we had. He kinda looked at us funny when we said black mallard and asked to see it. He agreed that it was neither and I think he said he wouldn't count it as either. He also said that he would have counted it as whatever we called it if we had said mallard or black. I wish I had pictures of some of the hybrids we've killed over the years, some neat varieties. That fed was actually a pretty cool guy.
