Fighter Jets Of The Marsh With Tony Vandemore
Early teal season for me marks the first time I get to put a pair of waders back on and watch the world wake up in a marsh. I’ve hunted the early teal season ever since I was a kid and look forward to it as much now as I did back then. Fighter jets rocketing through the marsh and fast paced action make for an awesome time!
Blue winged teal prefer invertebrates and small moist soil seeds. This allows them to be found in a lot of different areas from the back of shallow pockets on big lakes to small marshes and swamps. Most of my teal hunting is hunting marshes and keying in on good food sources. They are pretty friendly and most of the time, not many decoys are needed. A dozen or two is just fine.
They are fickle though and oftentimes here today and gone tomorrow. It doesn’t take much in the way of a cold front for teal to be on the move south, they are summer ducks so to speak. Keep an eye on the forecast in Canada and the Dakotas. When you see lows in the upper 40’s to lower 50’s, you can bet some will be traveling. Migrating teal can be hunted anywhere; sandbars on big river systems, big lakes, small lakes, pasture ponds, etc. A lot of times you hear the WHHOOOOOOOSSSHHHH as they rip down from the heavens on their first fly-by of the decoys. It’s an incredible sound!
Teal are acrobatic and fast flyers. While not hard to bring down, they are small and you have to put pellets on target. I’m a firm believer in pattern density and much prefer shooting smaller pellets with more of them than larger pellets and less of them. Leave the BB’s and 2’s at home and grab a couple boxes of HEVI-Teal 6’s which will put a lot more pellets in your pattern. As for chokes, generally speaking, the more open the choke, the better, but shoot whatever you are comfortable with. Personally, I like a tight choke and pattern and shoot it for everything from teal to honkers. Pattern a couple different chokes and see what works best for you.
A fun morning in the marsh teal hunting…Philly teal steak sammiches…college football…now we are talking, adios summer!
