Both Barrels May 2020

Great season expected!

From our Spring brood counts and ongoing wet Summer we have seen plenty of mallards, paradise shelduck and black swans getting around this season.

In fact, this year will be one of our highest populations of mallards in many years.

So, despite the delay in the season, it is likely to be one of our best seasons yet!

We hope with plenty of time on your hands over the last few weeks you have been busy practicing your calling, scrubbing up your decoys, building a jerk string, training the retriever, eating bacon and egg pies… to name a few.

All your practice will pay dividends for the up and coming season!

Maintaining social distancing

Under Alert Level 2 we still need to maintain one metre of social distancing with those outside our bubble, so for many of us we will need to consider how we hunt.

Keep this in mind when planning your Opening Weekend and mai mai situation.

Some options to consider are temporary mai mais elsewhere on your wetland.

These can be as simple as hiding behind or amongst some appropriate vegetation or if you have yet to get vegetation established on your wetland, the use of a camo net or layout blinds can do the trick as well.

While mai mai’s offer some nice comfort, staff would prefer to hunt in one of these temporary type set ups.

Other advantages include being able to move around easily to where the ducks maybe decoying, you have a great view of the sky and should have a nice clear opening for swinging cleanly on any ducks.

Have a think about what may work best for your setup. Good luck!

Hot Barrels

Erin Garrick, Southland Fish and Game