Teal fly low, bunched in flocks, zigzagging mere inches, it seems, above the water's surface. Drawn to the decoys by some frantic curiosity, they flash over quickly, in and out of range before you know it. Their darting flight makes the tiny birds look more like butterflies than ducks as they recede into the distance.
Teal may be our smallest ducks, but they play a big role in American waterfowling. Total teal breeding populations stand around 5.4 million, nearly equal to the number of mallards, and hunters shoot over a million teal each year. While many are taken during early September bluewing seasons, most teal are bagged incidentally to other ducks as they come skittering in over the decoys. Think of them, then, as the duck hunter's equivalent of panfish: small but sporty, not especially wary, always there to fall back on when the finicky blacks and mallards won't cooperate.
Like all ducks, teal are known by some confusing common names. The tiny greenwing, for instance, is the "Congo" to Cajun gunners. Bluewings are called both "summer ducks" and "autumn ducks", depending, I guess, at which latitude you live. For some reason, the reddish cinnamon teal is known to some as the "silver teal." Anyone, however, who's ever eaten roast teal of any variety will have no problem at all understanding why they're called "breakfast ducks". Teal may well be the finest tablefare of all waterfowl--reason enough right there to seek them out in the fall.
Here in the U.S. we have three varieties of teal--the bluewing, the greenwing, and the cinnamon. All three are dabbling ducks, feeding primarily on bulrushes, pond weeds, smartweeds, and other aquatic plants found along water's edge in the sloughs, rivers, and ponds where teal feel most at home.
Bluewings nest mainly in the prairie pothole region, but are found as far east as the Great Lakes, as far west as British Columbia, and south into Colorado. Like doves, bluewings head for the wintering grounds at the first hint of cold weather. Their migration begins in September, earliest of any duck, and their journey is the longest. Some travel up to 7,000 miles to wintering grounds in Chile and Argentina. Fortunately for us, many stop to winter in Louisiana and Mississippi, attracted by flooded rice fields where they feed on waste grains as well as marsh plants. Bluewings also winter along the Atlantic Coast, from Chesapeake Bay on down.
Greenwing teal are the smallest American duck species, weighing barely 3/4 of a pound. They're also the fastest of the three teal, attaining speeds of 60 mph. Greenwings nest throughout the northern states and southern provinces of Canada, and their range extends west to the Pacific Flyway.
Unlike bluewings, greenwings are a hardy duck, among the very last dabblers to fly south in the fall.
While greenwings favor the same ponds and sloughs that attract all teal, they will also use bays and estuaries during their migration along the Atlantic Flyway. The Gulf states and northern Mexico host large numbers of wintering green wings.
Cinnamon teal confine their range to the Pacific Flyway and are by far our least numerous teal. Virtually the entire population breeds within the borders of United States and winters in southern California or Mexico, where much of the hunting for cinnamon teal takes place. You rarely see large flocks of cinnamon teal as you do with greenwings and bluewings, but in all other respects they are most teal-like, preferring the same shallow waters as the other two, feeding on a similar diet of bulrushes, flying erratically, and decoying readily.
Teal, especially bluewings, are early risers, and they'll be among the first ducks moving in the morning. If there is a special trait you need to hunt teal, it's extra vigilance. Teal will come into your blocks low and without fanfare, rarely indulging in the agonizingly suspenseful fussing or circling of bigger ducks. One second the sky is empty, the next it's full of teal buzzing in front of your eyes like gnats. Be aware, too, that teal will often bunch up over the decoys, contracting into a tight mass of tiny bodies and pumping wings. Shoot then and you run the risk of downing half the flock with a single shot. A few hunters prefer to let the birds land in the decoys, then jump them out. Often, you have no choice; they'll light before you know they're there.
Teal aren't picky; they'll check out almost any decoy spread. Often teal will land at the edge of the decoys before you know they're there, so even your farthest block should be in easy gun range of the blind. Leave a gap in front of the blind to encourage the birds to land right in front of you.
A teal gun, by the way, might well be shorter and quicker than the traditional waterfowling piece. Even an open choked 20-gauge loaded with steel 4s or 6s is adequate over decoys. Whatever shot size you choose, you'll need a load that puts upwards of 140 holes into a 30-inch circle at the distance you'll be shooting to be sure of multiple vital hits on these tiny ducks.
At midday, teal can be found loafing and feeding along the water's edge, and jump shooting becomes an effective tactic. There is, of course, that explosive first flush to be dealt with, often straight up (they don't call those whiplash-inducing sporting clays stations "springing teal" for nothing). If you miss, take heart: startled teal don't always fly as far as other ducks, leaving open the possibility of a follow-up if you miss. Also they'll sometimes circle back low overhead when jumped.
One of the first ducks I ever shot was a greenwing teal that obliged me with an easy second chance. I'd flushed the drake off a farm pond and shot beneath him, seeing the pellets kick up harmless spray as he jumped. Then I crouched and waited for him to come back, as my father had told me teal would, and this time the duck dropped stone dead into the middle of the pond.
The water was deep and cold, there was no wind to blow my tiny prize to shore. I kicked off my boots and swam for the bird. If teal require a testimonial, here's mine: today, several years and many teal later, I'd gladly make that freezing swim again.
While greenwing teal populations have actually increased slightly in recent years, bluewing numbers have shown a steady decline from peaks of over 6 million in the mid-1970s. Currently bluewing populations are hovering right at the 3.2 million breeding birds minimum set by the Fish and Wildlife Service as criteria for holding a September teal season. Cinnamon teal are so few in number they are counted along with bluewings in Pacific Flyway harvest statistics.
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