Off Season

[TuMicks]

BTW: Congrats to the Toronto Jays on the last 2 games.

[Scoutpout]

Thanks! been a rollercoaster for sure for the serious fans, and for us "how'd it go" types, a bit more so!
Pretty much all the doggy folks i know around here tonight are watching the do-or-die game, so no fun and dog games with anyone tonight! gorgeous out though, so going to start on a hike after work.

[IRISHWISTLER]

The "off season" seems to be a matter of perspective. TEAM TRAD considers the HT season up here in the northeast the "off season" and we use that ime of year to stay sharp on the skills we need for that whixh HT's only simulate, that being the "actual hunting season" which TRAD and I both live for. During the actual huntimg season, we try to get maximum contacts for TRAD with wild birds and the very specialized experience that only wild birds can bring to the table.

During "actual hunts" TRAD must remain patient, steady, and quiet for long stretches of time, works on marked retrieves and blind retrieves on land and water, recovery of crippled birds, walk up birds, diversion birds, quartering for upland birds, steadyness to wing, shot, and fall, multiple retrieves, hunting out of boats, and blinds, and hunting a wide variety of cover and topography types, as well as variable weather conditions. All real world / practical experience withoutmthe white coats of the FT games and where the birds are the real judges of our success or shortfalls. We live in a state that prohibits hunting on Sunday so we often use that day to train on more "controlled" drills.


Actual hunting keeps us on our game skills for our "off season" of doing HT's in the spring and summer.

Cheers,
TEAM TRAD

[Anna Scott]

We too have a lengthy hunting season for water fowl and pheasant. We also have Sunday hunting in our township and the neighbouring one is considering it. The off season I was really referring too was the one when we can have up to 4 ft of snow covering the ground. This is just the accumulation that stays. Hard to work outside then so look for indoor activities that keep all the skills sharp as we don't go south like a lot of Canadian trainers.

The birds are just starting to move around here. Yesterday there was a flock of about 300 geese in the field across the road. The ducks have been dropping into the pond but moose hunting took priority last week. Hope the waterfowl hunting is more productive before the deer hunt starts.
What will you do with the Mergansers in your picture. Not too many around here want to eat them.

[TuMicks]

I plead guilty of thinking of "off season" as the relative lack of HT's since I don't hunt. But if and when life settles down... who knows, I may begin to run HT's in the South... around AZ and the Las Vegas area. Even if I didn't, we can theoretically run HT's in California in February. We really rarely do that because our dogs have had no water work since September usually. But to Anna's point... this year may mean as much or more snow than we've seen in almost 20 years. They are talking about a "Godzilla El Nino". Indeed, the Cat 5 hurricane in Mexico and the flooding in TX are supposedly due to the warm water in the Pacific. So, I wouldn't mind an "off season" if it were due to a huge winter for us. Maybe then we'd have water when the "real" season begins again.