Muddy Days for Greenheads, Greenwings and Grave Digger

"Grave Digger" is what we've called my brother Sean's Ford F-150 pickup since he drove it home. With its wide tires, all black exterior and standard cup holders, it has a certain badass-ness to it. And on our recent South Dakota duck hunting trip, it lived up to its namesake.

Long before it was pancaking beater cars, the original Grave Digger monster truck was constructed 30 years ago by some dude who wanted the ultimate mud bogger. We'd have made the creator proud, as we bottomed out our own Grave Digger in the low spot of a muddy field in northeast South Dakota early Sunday morning. Having to wait for light and a decent hour to ask a neighboring farmer for a pull, we could do nothing but set up our decoy spread across the field and hope for the best. We saw birds – thousands and thousands of mallards and geese – but that truck stuck just beyond the hill was the headstone for the act that snuffed the morning hunt.

My brother felt terrible, but it wasn't his fault - merely the final nail in the coffin of a hunt that hadn't gone according to plan. In the gales of November last Wednesday afternoon, I'd snuck out to a Minnesota slough, put up a wind-generated motion decoy and quickly bagged two greenheads. I thought that would be a small prelude to what we'd find in South Dakota.

But it was our first time waterfowl hunting the Glacial Lakes region of South Dakota. We didn't scout aggressively enough at the start of the trip. The snow had piled up there more than we anticipated, and some smaller wetlands were already freezing over. With Grave Digger literally laying our hunt's final resting place, this adventure looked to go down without a eulogy.

Thankfully, the farmer my dad, Gary, and our hunting buddy Terry happened upon was more than happy to help pull us out of our rut. A fellow hunter, he wouldn't take any money for the inconvenience: "I've been stuck plenty of times myself," he said, "You help people out, that's just what you do."

Our energy and ambition were pulled out of the muck along with the pickup. Back from the dead, we descended upon a private wetland where we'd gained permission earlier in the week and had our best hunting.

For the better part of two mid afternoon hours, the pothole heated up with gadwall and teal working and decoying to perfection. Sean was the hot handed gunman, tripling on a small flock of gads that came in. When three green-winged teal dive bombed the blocks, Sean, Dad and I each singled out a bird with success, including a pair of drakes decked out in their winter party attire. Dad hadn't hunted ducks in about 15 years, and I'm certain this was the first time we'd all dropped a duck sharing the same blind.

Hopefully, we'll be drawn for South Dakota nonresident waterfowl tags again next year, remembering these rules: Scout, scout and scout some more. When you find yourself in a hole, stop digging and find a farmer with a John Deere 740 Classic. Or just hunt water.

Fun 'Fowl Links:

· South Dakota Waterfowl Thunderstorm Map - Even if you're not going to South Dakota this year, this map – updated weekly by South Dakota Game Fish and Parks staff – can give you an idea of where to plan a future hunt.

· Ducks Unlimited Migration Map – Check out field reports from hunters across the U.S., and if you've been out hunting recently, enter one yourself.

· Waterfowler.com - Guest registration is free, which will allow you to view a limited number of hunting reports.

· Stormchasers Network – Built around the popularity of Black Cloud ammo, this social network for waterfowlers includes a migration map.

· Duck Hunting Chat – 'Nuff said.