The Sun Volt lyrics hit hard, Jeff Tweedy’s words resonate through my head as this duck season draws to an end, “We’re all living proof that nothing lasts.”

It was 8 years ago that I hunted the fields around Eudora, AR for the first time. I went to the “Ain’t No Tellin’” duck camp as a guest of what was at the time my girlfriends Father. A couple of years later and my girlfriend became my wife, and he became my father-in-law. Over the years I became a fixture at the camp, learning everything I know about hunting ducks in the rice and bean fields from the men of the camp. Roy Lee Scroggins (LeeRoy), Larry (L) Clarke, and my father-in-law Tommy Johnson, were my mentors for everything from Decoy placement, to the art of calling ducks in a field. Over the years I would learn how to make a duck call from Tommy, and how to build a skid blind, among many other things. I got to know these guys and enjoyed hunting with them and call them friend.

Oh, and the blind stories that grew out of that camp. From these stories a camp begins to take on a personality of its own, it becomes at times bigger than the members. From the time Billy B. was sleeping in the Scary room at the old camp, when he heard a scratching in the walls, and yelled out during the night, “LAAARRY, LAAARRY, YA’LL GOT ANY BIG RATS IN HERE?!.” “I don’t think so, are you gonna be all right in there?” Larry replied. “I hope so!” Billy answered, his voice quivering the whole time. He made it through unscathed. And the time I decided to try and make my own road between two beanfields while pulling an 18 food pit blind on a trailer. Needless to say, a Honda Rubicon can pull a 4x4 F-250 out of the mud, thankfully.
One of my most memorable hunts happened a few years ago when I took my father on his second duck hunt in the delta, despite a somewhat slow afternoon he managed to kill a banded speckle belly goose. Good luck shined on us that day on a hunt I’ll never forget.

We’ve hosted pilgrims and friends in the camp over the years, limited out in fractions of an hour and more recently stared at blank skies. The years reached an all time low last year, and even though this year has been much better, the proverbial “Fat Lady” is warming up for the “Ain’t-no-tellin’”. This weekend will be my last hunt at the camp, thanks to a cousin who has little respect for the sanctity of duck season and planned a wedding on the last weekend.

The dissolution of the camp doesn’t come without strain, all of us will be forced to find somewhere else to hunt next season. LeeRoy is by no means ready for the camp to be dissolved, but he can’t do it alone, and Larry Clark made up his mind last season, and Tommy has been making up his all of this season. So the end of the Ain’t-No-Tellin’ is almost “saucered and blowed”.

There have been camps that killed more ducks (though in our prime we did pretty well), and many that had a more colorful history, but all else being equal I was proud to be part of the Ain’t No Tellin’ and always had a good time while I was there. Farewell, old camp.


The photo was taken after one of my last hunts at the camp, January 14th 2006.