Nov. 23, 1912 
FOREST AND STREAM 
651 
Our Thanksgiving Ducks 
By FRANK W. BICKNELL 
1 WASN’T going to be cheated out of the last 
southward flight of my favorite game, the 
wild duck, though it was only a few days 
before Thanksgiving that 1 was just getting up 
from an attack of lumbago and had plenty to do 
besides hunt ducks. All my usual hunting com¬ 
panions had had their share, were busy chasing 
dollars, and I could not find one to go with me. 
My life partner began to hope that I would have 
to give it up, for though she likes a duck on the 
table as well as anyone, she thought sitting in 
a blind in a cold marsh was about the last place 
for me at that time, and I suppose she was right 
as usual. But I had made up my mind to try 
it and could not be turned aside. If none of 
the boys had sense enough to take advantage of 
such a good thing, I would just go alone. 
In Calhoun county, Northern Iowa, two little 
lakes once existed, with a high ridge between 
them. They were called Twin Lakes, and off to 
the south of them stretched marshes, runs, some¬ 
times almost creeks, but always rich mud under¬ 
neath in which grew the many plants that ducks 
like. There was the “Gunbarrel” slough, a great 
long irredeemable marsh that stretched for fif¬ 
teen miles between slight elevations. Not far 
away was “Hell slough” or “Purgatory,” as it 
was sometimes called. It was not to be trifled 
with, for its deadly quicksands swallowed 1 up 
anything that had weight enough to sink. A 
farmer undertook to drive across once and was 
never heard of again, either he or his team or 
wagon. At the time of which I write all this 
was changing, and has now yielded still more 
to the demand for land. The forbidding morass 
has surrendered to the persistent skill of the 
drainage engineer, and thousands of acres of the 
richest land on earth have been literally lifted 
out of its depths. During the days of the lakes, 
before the draining began, a little summer hotel 
had been built on the ridge between. The first 
few ditches put the hotel out of business. Its 
principal guests in the summer were the gigantic 
mosquitoes bred in the swamp nearby. The lakes 
receded until nothing but sloughs were left. The 
hotel property became worthless and unsaleable. 
But in the fall, and I am ashamed to say to some 
extent in the spring, it was a glorious resort for 
duck hunters. Some of us in Des Moines planted 
wild rice and celery in the old lakes and had 
the place patrolled by wardens during the closed 
season, so we had splendid shooting there for a 
few years before too many bummers got to 
going there, more intent upon killing “booze” 
than ducks. About fifteen years ago, the time 
of this adventure^ the place was at its best. All 
kinds of ducks came there, spring and fall, from 
the dainty little teal to the big, tempting mallard 
and canvasback. 
Without notice to our man in charge at the 
lakes I arrived at the station, eight miles away, 
got a rig and went out. The weather was cer¬ 
tainly getting cold, and I did not hurry out the 
next morning till a fire had been built in my 
room. After a little preliminary walk along 
shore, killing a few small birds and mostly los¬ 
ing them, I persuaded the lazy fellow in charge 
to take me out in our boat, for I thought with 
a lame back I could not row myself. He was 
so awkward that I finally took hold and rowed 
him ashore in disgust. Nothing doing. 
In the afternoon I got this man to hitch 
up and haul me and my boat and decoys to my 
sure place in the swamp about two miles away, 
where after a half mile of rowing I established 
myself in a good blind with my decoys beauti¬ 
fully deployed in front in open water. It looked 
very promising, but nothing happened till late in 
the afternoon, when the mallards began to spy 
my bogus birds, and even to come to my imper¬ 
fect calling. By the time it was too dark to 
shoot I had eight mallards, two redheads and 
several bluebills and widgeons. I had regularly 
missed the spike-tails that came shooting by, and 
it was not till next day that I was able to hit 
one. Somehow it always happens that way— 
more trouble to gauge the flight of a pintail than 
any other duck, even the green-winged teal. By 
now my hands were nearly frozen, ice forming 
all around me, and I fully expected to find my¬ 
self dead with a broken back next morning. But 
the pull out to the landing place and the walk 
back to the hotel warmed me up beautifully, and 
I was overjoyed to hear that the boy I had sent 
nine miles for a friend returned with the news 
that he would come “some time in the night.” 
I must tell you about that friend. 
Sherman Smith was a real sport. He had 
been an architect in Chicago on the World’s Fair 
job under Burnham. He broke down, had ner¬ 
vous prostration, and had to get back to nature. 
Having the most convenient father imaginable, 
he was provided with a 700-acre farm in Cal¬ 
houn county, where he was fighting swamps and 
nostalgia with some success, money not being 
much of an object. He had happened around 
before when we were shooting at Twin Lakes 
and told me he would always be ready to join 
me if I came up and wanted company. He was 
hungry for some congenial spirit from town. 
My messenger found him in the midst of several 
big jobs with a lot of men waiting for orders. 
He put in the afternoon and early evening get¬ 
ting rid of those men or trying to find some¬ 
thing for them to do while he was gone, and at 
1 A. M. he turned up'at Twin Lakes, ready for 
the serious business of helping me hunt ducks. 
We turned out next morning long before 
daylight, temperature far below freezing, cloudy 
and apparently getting colder and looking like 
snow. “I don't like this,” observed Sherman, as 
we stumbled along in the dark making our way 
to the boat. “It means snow soon and regular 
winter.” 
“But you can’t pick nice weather for duck 
shooting, Sherm,” I replied, “and this will bring 
one thing sure, and that is a big flight of the 
last of the big ducks. We ought to make a 
record killing to-day.” 
“You can’t tell me anything about that,” re¬ 
turned Smith. 
We did fairly well, what would have satis¬ 
fied me under ordinary circumstances with the 
greenheads tumbling around us till we had a 
dozen or so scattered about and a few other 
ducks. But it was mighty cold. We had been 
obliged to break ice to reach the blind, and the 
decoys we found frozen in and had to remove 
the ice. About 9 o’clock Sherman had an ex¬ 
perience that warmed him up some. We were 
in opposite ends of the boat, and he, being an 
expert, was doing the calling. I peeped up and 
saw two mallards coming into my field and into 
easy range. I waited as long as I dared, then 
sat up and made a double and got them both. 
Sherman, after letting go both barrels over my 
