As many of you may know ducks and geese are not getting any less wary. Hunters today employ any number of sneaky devices such as mojo mallards, quiver magnets, duck kites and many others in order to bag more ducks. Ducks in my home state of Virginia can become very decoy shy as the season winds on so a different approach is needed to insure success.
Take one part summer fun boat plus one part camo and viola. You have yourself a sneaky low profile duck hunting machine. I started with a 12 foot dark green kayak. The color of the kayak is very important. You cannot and I mean cannot paint a polyurethane kayak. I tried and within minutes of being in the water the paint was sloughing off in sheets. So the base color of your kayak needs to be a dark color such as green or brown.
Next you will need some specialty items from your local boat shop or camping store. I used 20 small “U” attachments that served as my guides for the ¼ in bungee cord and bolted these around the boat in 14 inch increments. The bungee cord is weaved through the ‘U” attachments and then pulled tight to tie off at the rear. The reason to use bungee is because when you are rolling down the road to your sweet spot for some gunning you want the camo netting to give a little so that it does not become a sail and rip off.
Now that you have attached the connectors and the bungee you will next need to pick out some camo. I choose a pattern that had some light tan mixed with some dark colors to blend in better with a marsh or river. For duck hunting Mossy Oak Shadow Grass is my camo of choice but the local shop was out so I used Realtree AP. If you can find it use die cut camo. One reason is because it looks more natural and the second is because it will let air through as you are driving along so it will not wave as bad in the wind. Once you have picked out the camo you will need to attach it to the bungee. For this I used common electrical zip ties. I would recommend using 75lb zip ties as again the kayak will probably be attached to the top of your vehicle and you don’t want your camo blowing off. Space them about 7 inches apart and attached them all the way around the kayak.
Once you have the kayak completed to this point you will want to drive down to your local Ben Franklin and pick up some Raffia. Raffia is the perfect material for making your kayak blend in with the marsh and by purchasing it from Ben Franklin it will save you some dough. I used 5 small bundles for this project and you will want to attach the raffia at random but be sure to have an even layer so that it covers the entire kayak. The Raffia is very durable and the whole rig has been tested at highway speeds without any coming off.
Congratulations! Now you have a stealthy, sneaky, low profile, cool as it can be duck harvesting machine that will be the envy of all your buddies. All you need to do know is just add water and go. Good gunning.
List of items and costs.
- Kayak $299 $299
- Raffia $3.99 per bundle 5 $19.95
- “U” Attachments $4.95 per pack of 10 2 $9.90
- ¼ in Bungee $.49 per foot 25ft $12.25
- 12 ft X 56 in Camo $19.95 1 $19.95
- 75lb Zip Ties $5.95 pack of 100 1 $5.95
Total $367
