Pit In Middle Opinions

[WilcoKen]

Last year was my first to pit hunt. Our pit is in the dead center of a 40 acre field. No levee going to it, not on a point--its just buried in the middle. Field was rice and it had been stripped, not cut. We had alot of cover and blended in good enough.

This year it was planted in beans--but they've cut them--all of them and the field is basically just dirt now. I have a hard time believing ducks will work with us sitting in the middle of a "glass water" field--even with grass mats on the pit and 400 decoys. To me, it wont look natural. Opinions, suggestions?

If what i think will happen, happens (alot of flared ducks)--Im not joining this group next year. I've got other options. I think we should've left a couple acres of standing beans around the pit. But its all still new to me.

 

[RUGER]

From what I have been told is that a pit like you describe will out perform one that a levee is right beside.
I was planning on leaving the head high grass / weeds standing around ours and multiple people told me THAT wouldn't look natural and I needed to cut it.

Basically ours is just like yours, even down to the field size.

 

[Displaced_Vol]

Hopefully somebody that knows will chime in but I wouldn't sweat it too much at first, see how it plays out. I think it could work fine or if you all needed to bring in brush you could create a "brush pile" around the perimeter of the pit. Again though I think it'll be ok as is-

Edited to add the bigger factor in my mind will be stale vs fresh birds. If it gets warm and birds aren't moving they could absolutely start avoiding the pit, but a new bunch of birds wouldn't know and so long as everything else is working, pit location and set up like you've got should be OK.

 

[WilcoKen]

From what I have been told is that a pit like you describe will out perform one that a levee is right beside.
I was planning on leaving the head high grass / weeds standing around ours and multiple people told me THAT wouldn't look natural and I needed to cut it.

Basically ours is just like yours, even down to the field size.

It's encouraging to hear this. I definitely have seen a mid field pit outperform a levee pit. Just wasnt sure about what a duck would think of a 3'X12' rectangle of grass in the middle of a 40 acre lake . Always learning.

 

[tickweed]

Bean stalks, stubble. I'd find some beans still standing, maybe ask permission to get a few, be sure and remove beans to keep from a baiting question. I worked for an outfitter in Arkansas. A pit is already very hard to hide in, call from. Me, I'd much rather be in one in a rice levee, with stubble or weeds running out each end. As for which type kills best, I hunted one in Arkansas, guided many times out of it, in a small levee. Without doubt, the best I have ever hunted. a lot has to do with location, mainly most of it. huge spreads are nice, but on still days, they look so unnatural. when ducks are alert, many times they are still. splashing, feeding, chasing looks real. small spreads are much easier to make look real, but not as visible. So, you decide. Main thing in waterfowling. BE STILL. STAY HID. Keep people down. And when ducks are finishing, let em finish.

 

[RUGER]

It's encouraging to hear this. I definitely have seen a mid field pit outperform a levee pit. Just wasnt sure about what a duck would think of a 3'X12' rectangle of grass in the middle of a 40 acre lake . Always learning.

Our rectangle is gonna be 5' X 24' LOL
Plus about 3' around the entire thing.
Never made sense to me either but apparently it works.

 

[RUGER]

Just thought of something.
Our field was in beans also.

Are we hunting together???? LOL

 

[WilcoKen]

Just thought of something.
Our field was in beans also.

Are we hunting together???? LOL

Lol. Pretty much. We are close to the electric co-op on 412. About 4 miles southwest.

 

[RUGER]

Lol. Pretty much. We are close to the electric co-op on 412. About 4 miles southwest.

We're about 12 miles SW of you.

 

[WilcoKen]

Our rectangle is gonna be 5' X 24' LOL
Plus about 3' around the entire thing.
Never made sense to me either but apparently it works.

I saw your pic of the pit in another post. I like it. Youve got a slide roof right? Ours is wide open. Buddy had the idea to cut off the flip door things and have us sit under canvas with grass last year. It worked terrible--got busted alot. I welded the hinges back on and re-insalled them and brushed midway through season and that made a big difference.

 

[RUGER]

Yep, we have three roll tops.
My son, @hunter drew and myself went over a couple weekends ago and attached some shooting hole flaps that @woodyard and I made.
We will leave the roll tops shut when not needed and when we do have to open them to accomadate more shooters we will fold the flaps up and rest them on the top.
Covering the holes is imperitive over there. I think morso than in a regular blind around here.

 

[Levee Jumper]

I've always thought a rolltop with a 3 to 4 inch tall "Pan" for the roof would be cool. put about 1" of mud in it then 1-2" of water. Muddy it up to match the water around you. Maybe add some thin dividers to help keep from sloshing so bad. Add a couple dozen full bodies and should hide pretty good.

Edit..... Probably would suck to hunt from though.

 

[WilcoKen]

Bean stalks, stubble. I'd find some beans still standing, maybe ask permission to get a few, be sure and remove beans to keep from a baiting question. I worked for an outfitter in Arkansas. A pit is already very hard to hide in, call from. Me, I'd much rather be in one in a rice levee, with stubble or weeds running out each end. As for which type kills best, I hunted one in Arkansas, guided many times out of it, in a small levee. Without doubt, the best I have ever hunted. a lot has to do with location, mainly most of it. huge spreads are nice, but on still days, they look so unnatural. when ducks are alert, many times they are still. splashing, feeding, chasing looks real. small spreads are much easier to make look real, but not as visible. So, you decide. Main thing in waterfowling. BE STILL. STAY HID. Keep people down. And when ducks are finishing, let em finish.

Very good advice. Here's how our field looked midway through last season. I much prefer the rice standing. In some spots, we had full body decoys sitting on the very shallow areas with floaters all around in the deeper water. It looked great and the ducks liked it (after I put the flip downs back on). I'm still skeptical about sitting in the middle of a lake with zero surrounding cover this year. There will be a kid with us most days too. I dont think he will stay still. Heck the adults dont!

 

[DeerWhisperer]

I know it sounds crazy, but we have gotten to the point we pull our decoys on every hunt. We no longer leave them out any longer unless we are hunting multiple days straight. The past few years have been really tough with very few if any new ducks arriving and the local ducks get wise realy quicl to the massive decoys spreads they see on a daily basis. We reduced our decoy count to about 12 dozen mixed between mallalards, pintails, gadwall and teal with a few full body specs. It is time consuming to pull the decoys but we seem to have better success in doing so. We just string them up and place them back in the pit. When we reduced the spread, we went with quality over quantity. We no longer use a lot of the older filler decoys, we have a fewer number of good quality decoys. We did away with all but one Mojo which we use sparingly and went back to the old fashion jerk strings. By the way this is in Twist, AR about 45 minutes across the bridge in Memphis. We have moved further North this year to a new place in Wiener, AR.

 

[WilcoKen]

I know it sounds crazy, but we have gotten to the point we pull our decoys on every hunt. We no longer leave them out any longer unless we are hunting multiple days straight. The past few years have been really tough with very few if any new ducks arriving and the local ducks get wise realy quicl to the massive decoys spreads they see on a daily basis. We reduced our decoy count to about 12 dozen mixed between mallalards, pintails, gadwall and teal with a few full body specs. It is time consuming to pull the decoys but we seem to have better success in doing so. We just string them up and place them back in the pit. When we reduced the spread, we went with quality over quantity. We no longer use a lot of the older filler decoys, we have a fewer number of good quality decoys. We did away with all but one Mojo which we use sparingly and went back to the old fashion jerk strings. By the way this is in Twist, AR about 45 minutes across the bridge in Memphis. We have moved further North this year to a new place in Wiener, AR.

Im assuming they are all texas rigged?

 

[RUGER]

I know it sounds crazy, but we have gotten to the point we pull our decoys on every hunt. We no longer leave them out any longer unless we are hunting multiple days straight. The past few years have been really tough with very few if any new ducks arriving and the local ducks get wise realy quicl to the massive decoys spreads they see on a daily basis. We reduced our decoy count to about 12 dozen mixed between mallalards, pintails, gadwall and teal with a few full body specs. It is time consuming to pull the decoys but we seem to have better success in doing so. We just string them up and place them back in the pit. When we reduced the spread, we went with quality over quantity. We no longer use a lot of the older filler decoys, we have a fewer number of good quality decoys. We did away with all but one Mojo which we use sparingly and went back to the old fashion jerk strings. By the way this is in Twist, AR about 45 minutes across the bridge in Memphis. We have moved further North this year to a new place in Wiener, AR.

My old boss hunts about 13 miles north of where we will be this year.
He told me after hunting there for over 20 years they figured out they kill just as many with 300 decoys as they do with 1,200.

We basically did the same as you this year.
I sold all my fillers and replaced with fewer high quality decoys.

 

[Cache]

You just never know what you're going to get with a pit. For some reason ducks like some fields and don't like others. What's the difference in a pit in the middle of a field and a blind in the middle of a lake? Brush it good and keep adding brush throughout the season. Oh, and keep the piefacing to a minimum.

 

[WilcoKen]

You just never know what you're going to get with a pit. For some reason ducks like some fields and don't like others. What's the difference in a pit in the middle of a field and a blind in the middle of a lake? Brush it good and keep adding brush throughout the season. Oh, and keep the piefacing to a minimum.

I agree. We had a blind on OH a few years ago and it was in the middle of a 10 acre "lake". Lake because the corn was pathetic that year so instead of a flooded corn field it was just a lake. Anyways the ducks absolutely would not work our part of the field that year. The blind 200 yards away on the tree line had ducks working 10x better. It sucked to watch. Then Ive seen some blinds on Reelfoot out in the middle and ducks flock to it. Guess we will find out soon enough.

 

[tickweed]

I agree. We had a blind on OH a few years ago and it was in the middle of a 10 acre "lake". Lake because the corn was pathetic that year so instead of a flooded corn field it was just a lake. Anyways the ducks absolutely would not work our part of the field that year. The blind 200 yards away on the tree line had ducks working 10x better. It sucked to watch. Then Ive seen some blinds on Reelfoot out in the middle and ducks flock to it. Guess we will find out soon enough.

Wouldnt it be great if we knew what a duck looked for, what he liked. I wish I had one that could tell me, show me. Id be a millionaire.

 

[T2D2]

I know it sounds crazy, but we have gotten to the point we pull our decoys on every hunt. We no longer leave them out any longer unless we are hunting multiple days straight. The past few years have been really tough with very few if any new ducks arriving and the local ducks get wise realy quicl to the massive decoys spreads they see on a daily basis. We reduced our decoy count to about 12 dozen mixed between mallalards, pintails, gadwall and teal with a few full body specs. It is time consuming to pull the decoys but we seem to have better success in doing so. We just string them up and place them back in the pit. When we reduced the spread, we went with quality over quantity. We no longer use a lot of the older filler decoys, we have a fewer number of good quality decoys. We did away with all but one Mojo which we use sparingly and went back to the old fashion jerk strings. By the way this is in Twist, AR about 45 minutes across the bridge in Memphis. We have moved further North this year to a new place in Wiener, AR.

Agree with this 100%. The change-up based seems to help.
Decoys: quality over quantity
Motion on the water: most of the time a slight breeze isn't an issue in an Arkie rice field, but 'old-school' motion over spinning wings on most days
Stay hidden: not everybody needs to see the birds all the time - just the people running calls & calling the shots
And mind your tracks, especially in a clean cut field. A bird's eye view of a levee running to a flooded field thats been driven to & driven through versus one that hasn't will blow your mind. I hunted a club for a number of years that NEVER allowed ATVs to be used all the way to the pit during season. It was in the rules - if you didn't like it, don't join. Break the rule - you were out. One of the better run clubs I've ever been a part of.

 

[WilcoKen]

And mind your tracks, especially in a clean cut field. A bird's eye view of a levee running to a flooded field thats been driven to & driven through versus one that hasn't will blow your mind. I hunted a club for a number of years that NEVER allowed ATVs to be used all the way to the pit during season. It was in the rules - if you didn't like it, don't join. Break the rule - you were out.

Stuff like this is why I make a post like this thread--to learn this style of hunting. Never would've thought this but it makes sense. I get very particular on small details--especially because its a 4hr drive for me to get to the pit we lease. Guys not minding the details just eats at me. Its too far to drive and too much investment of time to get sloppy and screw up a hunt. Yet it happens all the time with my group. Leaving decoys out, parking ATV/UTV within 80 yards of pit (in the water--yes), standing up in the pit the whole time etc etc etc. Its one thing to mess around when its a 30 minute drive to a sucky blind on Old Hickory. Its a whole different game to me when I go to Missouri. I probably just need to do a pit alone. Lol.

 

[WilcoKen]

Went to our pit yesterday and thought I would share a few pics. Farmer left a circle of beans standing around our pit. I was glad to see that. Still want to add some natural grasses to the Fastgrass. Zero water in the pit which really shows the lack of rain we've had. We drained the pit back in August. Pit was dry as could be. River that borders our field was almost dry. Really wondering if we will have water in our field for opener.

 

[RUGER]

Looks good man.
Hope you get some water.
Is that a rat snake?

 

[Mud Creek]

Good luck!

 

[WilcoKen]

Looks good man.
Hope you get some water.
Is that a rat snake?

I think so. He puffed all up trying to look mean.

 

[cmn]

I used to guide out of pits like yours. This will sound "crazy" but put oak on the pit. This will give you depth, shadows and better cover. Ducks don't know any different than a brush pile. I was given this advise from Don Ansley 40 years ago. ALWAYS works as well or better than any cover. Had to prove it many times through the years....

 

[Smashdn]

Up until I saw the circle of beans I was going to recommend no brush. But you also don't have a roll-top. If it were a roll-top I was going to advocate for no brush and just put a mess load of snow full bodies all on your island and on the roll top to the point where they are the camo.

 

[WilcoKen]

I used to guide out of pits like yours. This will sound "crazy" but put oak on the pit. This will give you depth, shadows and better cover. Ducks don't know any different than a brush pile. I was given this advise from Don Ansley 40 years ago. ALWAYS works as well or better than any cover. Had to prove it many times through the years....

This pit is small enough that I want to try this. I will talk to the 3 others in my group and see about it. Id like to hunt a day with brush as it is now. Then try oak the next day. That pit is only 3'x12' so it wouldn't take too long.

 

[TAFKAP]

Cool snake! Harmless little garter snake

 

[DeerWhisperer]

Agree with this 100%. The change-up based seems to help.
Decoys: quality over quantity
Motion on the water: most of the time a slight breeze isn't an issue in an Arkie rice field, but 'old-school' motion over spinning wings on most days
Stay hidden: not everybody needs to see the birds all the time - just the people running calls & calling the shots
And mind your tracks, especially in a clean cut field. A bird's eye view of a levee running to a flooded field thats been driven to & driven through versus one that hasn't will blow your mind. I hunted a club for a number of years that NEVER allowed ATVs to be used all the way to the pit during season. It was in the rules - if you didn't like it, don't join. Break the rule - you were out. One of the better run clubs I've ever been a part of.

You know I thought I was the only one that felt that way in regards to driving to the pit. I have complained about that for years, one guys has one of the large two row Honda's and he insists on driving right up to the blind every time. By the end of the season it looks like we have been running a Monster Truck Rally out there. Every time it would rain, I would try to re-work the levees. He has since moved on to another lease, we started the same process last year. No driving to the pit except on the initial day, we park well away from pit and use a sled to get our stuff to the pit.