Calling In Woodducks in North Carolina

Don’t Forget Our Woodland Prince
Calling In Wood Ducks
By Brabham Smith

When I was in high school I was really just learning how to be what most would call a true duck hunter. I was trying to be a young man that could scout promising water holes and streams, build and camouflage my little one or two man blinds to blend in with the surroundings, ride my Jon boat up or down dark rivers and recall the silhouettes of “honey holes” against a pale sky, set out good spreads of decoys, and call in high flying ducks so that they would make another turn and slice down with thin, locked wings to splash in my decoys…if I chose not to shoot them.

My friends and I liked the idea of callings ducks in to our decoys more than any other aspect of duck hunting. I’m not sure what is so appealing about calling in ducks. I think that maybe it is the proof that you are good at your sport, and it is also proof that you achieved your goal of ducks in the bag correctly and honorably. Now don’t get me wrong. There is nothing, in my opinion, dishonorable in pass shooting or jump shooting, but if you call in ducks then there certainly can be no argument against your achievement as a hunter as opposed to just a shooter.

But, we were not great duck callers. How could we be? We did not live near the flooded timber of Arkansas where thousands of mallards pass over those flooded oaks daily. We did not live near Manitoba, Canada where the miles of flat country, separated only by a grid of dirt roads, harbors the tornados of mallards, pintails and snow geese by the thousands. We lived in North Carolina, where we mostly witnessed the squealing “woodies” that made light splashes in local ponds and rivers before light, and almost always before shooting time unless it was a real nasty weather day.

Photo Courtesy of Ben Clewis

The wood ducks would come down fast from the black shadows of trees. Suddenly, there is a sound of wings fluttering and splash-they are there with you swimming near your clump of brush or angled tree. We lived where ring-necks sailed in like fighter plane squadrons paying no mind to any kind of puddle duck call. Except for the occasional surprise mallard, pintail or black duck, we hunted nothing else.

So we had nothing to call in to our decoys right? Wrong.

The fact is, as far as duck hunters faced with wood ducks as the majority, we weren’t and still aren’t alone. Wood ducks or “Summer Ducks” are widespread throughout North America, and more often than not they are nearly the only duck waterfowlers are subjected to in their hometowns.
Most of the time, hunters elect to jump shoot wood ducks or shoot them within their roosting area. However, since I began working at NCWA I learned that there is another method to hunting wood ducks that will allow you to hunt throughout the season in the same areas and when you go to the “hill” you will feel more like a duck hunter and less like a thief.

The first thing that you should do is go scouting at the first of each month of the season. You are scouting for wood duck roosting areas. The way to find them is to visit ponds or swamps that you can hunt, public streams, and public rivers just a half hour before dark. If wood ducks are roosting in the area, you will see them flying in and lighting during that time. Once you have found four or five roosts then it is time to start hunting for that month. I would suggest limiting each site to once or twice per week. After a month of this it is time to scout for new roosts.

You will want to set up near the roost that you have found. Do not set up too close to the roost because if the ducks do not feel safe they will move on and you will only enjoy one or two good hunts and then its over. Once you have decided on an area, scout again in the morning and afternoon to establish their flight pattern. These ducks usually use pretty much the same flight pattern each day, which serves as a line between their resting and feeding areas.

Now it is time to hunt the wood ducks. It is well known that wood ducks do not respond to calls like well let say a mallard or a pintail. Nevertheless, you can call in wood ducks and that little bit of news can make a North Carolina duck hunter very happy considering the wood duck makes up a high percentage of the waterfowl wintering in the state.

Photo Courtesy of Ben Clewis

Rod Haydel of Haydel’s Game Calls said this about calling wood ducks, “Many hunters are familiar with the traditional “wheet-wheet” squeal that a wood duck makes in flight and most call manufacturers know this sound, as well, and have produced this type of call. These calls, because they are fairly loud, are effective in getting the attention of the wood ducks, but “woodies” have a much wider range in their vocabulary.

Just listen closely to a roost one morning and you’ll be surprised at what you’ll hear. Most of these roost-type sounds can be achieved by choking down your call with your hand, and in modifying the way you blow into it. When I’m hunting “woodies,” I’ll usually get their attention with that “wheet” sound and then switch over to a completely different call such as the “wood duck whine.”

The WW-90 is a very soft call that cannot be heard at a great distance and it simulates a locating sound that the ducks make usually after they land. This is definitely the call of choice when the birds are within 150 yards. I’ve seen “woodies” produce this sound and once they get a response, they will then swim over to the rest of the flock.”

Another good tip that I learned when hunting wood ducks is to set out just five or six wood duck decoys and drop in a mallard drake decoy for a more realistic look.

So, while we don’t have Arkansas or Canada numbers of mallards to work in to our spreads, we can still have true and respectable duck hunts throughout the season on our duck… “the woodland prince” as the South’s once poet laureate, Archibald Rutledge called the wood ducks he encountered many years ago.