“If you build it, they will come” was the famous saying from the movie “Field of Dreams.”
Of course, this referred to a warm summer Iowa cornfield being transformed into a baseball field, not a freezing cold field of cattails near Orchard being transformed into small open-water wetlands for waterfowl to come.
It was one of those small wetlands that a few waterfowlers recently gathered to endure single-digit temperatures with the hope of taking a few ducks.
Our “build it, they will come” were the decoys we threw out on the small areas of open water made possible by electric pumps running 24 hours a day to keep water bubbling and flowing into the wetlands.
The decoys were not the common plastic ones produced by numerous manufacturers but beautiful, individually hand-carved and painted replicas made by Thornton resident Bill Walters, who I first met in 2009 when he provided a carved decoy collection to the former Wildlife Experience in Parker for a public display.
His work is unique, and his realistic decoys have won numerous carving contests and awards.
Starting as a simple hobby in the 1970s, Walters’ passion for decoy carving continued over the years — and he has hundreds of realistic decoys mostly used for show and decoration. But he has personally amassed a collection of 100 rigged and ready decoys for hunting.
Fooling numerous ducks
On this hunt the decoys proved effective for fooling numerous ducks into joining them. Some ducks fell prey to the hunter’s game bags in spite of challenged shooting skills due to extra layers of clothing slowing one’s reflexive instincts.
Just as Walters built the decoys for ducks to come, our host Bill Sparks of Empire built the wetlands we were hunting. In 2000, Bill purchased the land located along the South Platte with plans of enhancing the area for hunting as well as providing excellent habitat for wildlife.
He partnered with Ducks Unlimited (DU) and improved levees within the area for holding water while at the same time working to eradicate areas of invasive cattails which covered most of the land.
In summer months, Sparks, along with his sons and friends, raged war on the cattails, clearing small parcels one at a time and then building levees to hold and flood those areas with water.
Rigorous and timely work in clearing areas of cattails, combined with some dry summers — which allowed access to plow up the cattails — proved effective. And each year more and more open water showed through the cattail matting.
Sparks is ensuring more wetlands habitat along the South Platte. And while his land is private, you cannot fence in ducks — and it provides more birds to the South Platte drainage, which hosts several good state public hunting areas managed by Colorado Parks and Wildlife.
Conservation work that Sparks did with DU is fairly common with other South Platte landowners, and the result is increased wetland areas for wildlife, as well as offering excellent hunting opportunities.
The South Platte River and adjoining wetland areas are critical in fulfilling the life-cycle needs of our North American waterfowl, specifically during the spring migration as thousands of ducks and geese pass through the state heading north to the breeding grounds of the Prairie Potholes in the Dakotas, Montana and Canada.
As DU state biologist Matt Reddy once taught me, it’s an obvious formula for success — ducks arriving to the breeding grounds in healthy physical shape mate and produce healthier and more numerous broods than malnourished ducks.
Duck season ends Jan. 28
Colorado is a critical refueling stop Reddy continued for migrating birds. And the more habitat we provide, the more ducks we will have in subsequent years.
There were four shooters on our hunt with two younger, talented callers. But the star of the show was a thin, young, yellow Lab from Minnesota named Spirit. Spirit came with Chad Cahill of Brighton, who’s an expert waterfowl caller. Enthusiasm, demeanor and pure skill in smelling out and bringing back a wounded or downed bird were his prime attributes.
Not a single downed bird of our 14 ducks taken were lost, including several that landed in thick cattail patches, as well as a scaup that played hide and seek with Pride, diving with every move of the dog, yet finally succumbing as Pride would dive just as fast and finally faster to bring the bird to the surface and bag.
When we elected to cease our hunting and retreat to a warmer indoor climate, we had a smorgasbord of ducks. Mallards comprised most of the bag, but there also were scaup, golden-eye, widgeon and gadwall.
The duck season continues to count down to its conclusion, as the season ends Jan. 28. For geese, the season in most areas will run until Feb. 18. But whether going after ducks or geese, be sure to refer to the CPW waterfowl regulations. Good, detailed information on public waterfowl hunting including walk-in areas for waterfowl can be found on the CPW website at cpw.state.co.us.
If you build it, they will come, and if you protect and maintain it, they will keep coming. Bill Sparks and Bill Walters will continue in their areas of conservation, and Colorado’s hunters and sportsmen, along with conservation agencies such as Ducks Unlimited, will continue working with CPW to ensure that waterfowl keep coming for generations to enjoy.
