Here They Come

- T. Edward Nickens

THE GEESE HONK, cackle, and moan, their calls ringing off the sheet water that forms amoebic patterns across the field. Echoes double each sound, and the din over the decoys brings to mind the ancients who hunted the ancestors of these same birds, in this same open country, long ago. Just a few miles away from this patch of barley, the two lobes of massive Lake Manitoba neck down to a rock-rimmed hourglass waist barely a half mile wide. To the aboriginal Cree, the crash of lake surf on the narrows’ limestone bluffs was the beating of a giant drum by their great spirit, Manitou. Now I lie in a row of raked grain, elbows soaked from the muck, surrounded by the haunting sounds of past and present.

I check the gun safety, make sure the muzzle clears the blind doors, and snug the shotgun butt into my shoulder. Sixty yards away, the geese call to one another and to the decoys and I grin, because they are calling, too, if unaware, to us: It’s October in Canada, they say, with snow in their wings, and here we come.

Just yesterday I rolled into Manitoba with the remnants of a decent summer tan, since we were still shooting ducks in short sleeves back home in North Carolina. We’d had a few cool mornings but only hints of the winter to come. Yet, it’s that time of year when we know the world outside is about to transform, when migrations, breeding seasons, and heavy feeds before cold weather fill skies and streams with game and fish. Each pressure ridge and weather system holds promise from the north. From now to the end of January, I’ll monitor the weather with an obsession, watching for each push of ducks and geese. Waiting.