I believe there is a natural progression as a waterfowl hunter based on your age and how long you have been hunting. As a young grasshopper the first mission was to harvest our first bird, and the photo of it still hangs up on the wall as a reminder today. Then it was to take your first limit, and then a limit as a group. After that for the next ten to fifteen years the mission it to harvest as many birds as legally possible...usually happens between ages 18-35.  

After the rat race competition for the most and biggest pile pictures becomes dull, we transition to quality. Quality hunts with quality people and we usually start traveling to do so. We then start to create maybe a bucket list of birds that we would like to take for the wall, or a list of locations we would like to hunt based on traditions. My personal bucket list had a Giant Canada Goose with a double rivet leg band on it. This was a banding project that started in Manitoba and was primarily done on big geese. 

The reason this particular bird was on my list was the area they started the banding project in, the Oak Hammock Marsh in Manitoba, Canada. This area is a renowned breeding and staging marsh for the interlake population of Giants that where transplanted from the original Rochester flock back in the late 1960's to help with the rebirth of the Giant Canada Goose. Most of our giant geese that wintered at Silver Lake would come from the Oak Hammock Marsh, so there was a personal connection with this population, and particular one double banded from there. 

In 2018 we where on our annual trip to Manitoba. We where hunting a massive flat cornfield on the edge. The birds had just started to move and we had a couple on the ground. I was sitting on the far left side of the set up and a lone single came low from the left...scrapping across the road with a low giant moan that echoed. Another hunter said "Scott, your side"...without any calling the giant came right in and it was an easy shot. Resting my gun back down, Hunter Rud who was running the photo camera behind us started to get excited looking through photos before the bird was retrieved. He said "Scott, I think you may have just got a special one" and I knew instantly what might have just happened. Never one to look for bands, I started to get excited. As the bird was retrieved we all realized what had just happened. What made this so special was the not only the bird, but the location and the group of guys I shared this memory with. It was a true gentleman's hunt, each taking turns and my turn just happened to be a bucket list checked off. The photos of this bird, this hunt will hang with me forever.