Across the Bridge, Goose Hunting the 'Shore'-Fire Way

For half a century, folks have been crossing Chesapeake Bay Bridge from west to east to hunt migratory Canada geese this time of year. Many hire commercial guides, which can be productive or unproductive, depending on the day.

Goose hunting, like any other outdoors pursuit, is about timing. If you set up the trip in advance, as you must with a guide, you're rolling the dice. That's how I've been doing it for years and the truth is, the bad days outnumbered the good.

Last week, by a stroke of luck, I was initiated into the inner sanctum of Eastern Shore goose hunting, twice being invited to hunt with local farmers, who simply don't go if it's not going to be good.

It was quite an experience. I'm not sure I'll be invited back, it being a very different world over there, but at least I've been to the mountaintop and seen the promised land.

The hosts for the two outings were Centreville farmers Buddy Klepper and Sherman Baynard, who live on opposite sides of Route 301, just 15 miles or so from the eastern end of the Bay Bridge. Both can look out the window and see when geese are feeding.

When the time's right and the fields are full, they call friends and neighbors and have at it. There's none of the sacrifice and worry we lesser mortals associate with goose hunting -- no getting up at 4:15 a.m. to meet a guide in some greasy spoon, followed by a high-speed chase of trucks down darkened lanes to a crowded blind, often shared with strangers, which may or may not be on the day's goose flight path. It's much more civilized -- and certain.

"Get here by 7 or so," both Klepper and Baynard said. "There's no hurry."

Klepper married into the clan of longtime farmer Donald Dawkins, whose family farmhouse sits across the road from a field of winter wheat that was under siege by geese last week. Klepper arranged the hunt for Jason Nielson of Arizona, who lost the use of his legs in combat in Iraq. "There's nothing I wouldn't do for a wounded veteran," Klepper said.

Coffee and doughnuts awaited in the equipment shed when we arrived, then it was a short trek across the road to the goose field, Nielson riding an ATV. Klepper had rigged a special field blind with a collapsing front, so when the geese rolled in he could kick the front down to provide an open shot for a seated gunner.

And here they came. It was a mild, sunny day with no wind to speak of but the Canadas were locked in a pattern, flying from a nearby pond where they roosted to the wheat fields each morning to feed. They came in small groups. "Get ready," Klepper said as a half-dozen circled warily, then spread their wings to land. "Take 'em!" On the Eastern Shore, they call that "finishing" -- when geese drop their feet and crane their necks before landing. It's the breathtaking moment waterfowlers live for but infrequently get to see. Upstanding Eastern Shoremen don't believe in chancy, long-range passing shots at high-fliers. If geese don't finish, they don't shoot.

Nor do they hang around all day making sure everyone gets a two-bird limit. We were several birds shy of the limit an hour or so into the affair when Klepper stood and asked, "Everyone had enough?" I, a crass Western Shoreman, responded, "Never enough!" which is why I probably won't get invited back.

A few days later Baynard called to say his fields were being overrun by thousands of snow geese, aggressive migrants that travel in huge flocks and eat everything in their path. He was looking for folks to come over and run the snows out.

"There's no hurry to get out there," Baynard said when we gathered alongside his silos at 7. I commented that across the street, you could hear snow geese gabbling away on the pond. "It's a road, not a street," corrected Baynard's wife, Diane. "You're not in the city now."

Off we went, six of us, to a pit blind on the pond's edge, kicking up an astounding array of snow geese, Canada geese and ducks on the approach. We set decoys -- 50 or 60 floating snow geese and 50 or 60 more Canadas -- then settled in to wait for birds to return.

It didn't take long before the Canadas came rolling back by twos, fours and sixes. Once more, I was surprised to hear Baynard say he wasn't planning on shooting any Canadas that day, and two of his guests, fellow Eastern Shoremen, said they wouldn't, either. "You're welcome to take a couple," he told me. "We're here for the snows."

Which is how I came to stand up all alone a few minutes later when a lone Canada rolled in perfectly, wings pitched, neck outstretched and feet down, 30 yards out. I shot twice and barely dusted a feather.

"Western Shoreman," chuckled Baynard. Or did I imagine that?

In the end, the snow geese never came back the way he hoped, but we did loose one barrage at a huge mass of them circling low overhead. Baynard reckons that should drive them off for a few days, anyway. By 11 a.m., those who wanted them had a Canada goose or two and we'd watched scores more swing in over the decoys, peer down into the blind where we'd tucked ourselves away, then set wings and float down in feathery perfection. It was a joy to watch, and nobody got hurt.

"Catch-and-release hunting," Baynard said, smiling.

So ended my fabulous Eastern Shore experience. I may not get invited back, but I learned some valuable lessons. To wit:

1. No truck is big enough on the Shore. My little Nissan Frontier gets around town fine but looks like a comical toy next to the average Eastern Shoreman's F-350 quad cab diesel with dual rear wheels.

2. Don't bring your dog unless invited. Nellie had such a wonderful time among all those birds, she whimpered with joy -- nonstop. "At least you always know where she is," laughed Chris Wilson, who suffered next to me in Baynard's pit blind. "Maybe you can get a goose-call surgically implanted in her throat and she can help us call."

3. Wear better clothes. I wear funky old canvas pants to hunt and they don't get washed till season's end. Diane Baynard took one look at the mud and blood and grease and said, "If you plan on coming inside for lunch, you'd better put on a pair of Sherman's pants. You're not wearing those in my kitchen."

Live and learn. . . .