After a great opening day the week before, the doves and now-legal teal went AWOL. Does the success of the hunt depend only on the birds taken—six doves and one teal? These pictures argue otherwise.

Here is the whole story. Tom and I were impressed by the number of teal we had seen while hunting during the dove opener. I wanted to try the early season teal, and Tom didn’t want to be left behind. He came up with a way to blend time with his recently increased family and a hunt. We had a very pleasant late afternoon tailgate before trying doves on Saturday evening. We had just discovered a new bed & breakfast in the old Famers State Bank building in Sedgwick, a small farm town just down the road. It turned out to suit our overnight plan ideally. When it was obvious the Sunday morning teal hunting wasn’t going to be productive, Tom and I went back to pack up our family and find a picnic spot along the South Platte River on the way home. There are no illusions that this plan can be repeated in December or January with snow on the ground and temps below freezing!