R.K. (Rob) Sawyer grew up on Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay, a student of both its waterfowl and rich history. The latter inspired him to chronicle the mostly undocumented waterfowl history of his adopted state, Texas. The result was his first book, A Hundred Years of Texas Waterfowl Hunting, and a second, titled Texas Market Hunting: Stories of Waterfowl, Game Laws and Outlaws. Both are available from Texas A&M University Press and Amazon.com.
The legends and lore of pintails in coastal Texas are not unlike the canvasback and the Susquehanna Flats. While most of the native prairie grasses and ephemeral prairie ponds in Texas are gone, hunting clubs such as Thunderbird Hunting Club and Spread Oaks Ranch have worked to create habitat that still attracts great swarms of pintails as they trade between Gulf of Mexico barrier islands and interior shallow flats and rice fields. With their high approach and habit of circling a decoy spread four or five times before committing, a limit of pintails falls to only the most experienced of hunters.
