By Ron Pharr

The lonesome quack of an old mallard hen bouncing off the water and the whistling wings of fluttering water fowl circling the decoys filled the blind with anxious excitement for those who were brave enough to venture into wet predawn cold. Suddenly the blind became alive with a chorus of raspy quacks and fed chuckles. the soft splashes of ducks rippling the water, and the words, "Get em Boys," rendered a thunderous roar of exploding shotguns and marked the beginning of a new water fowling season. Preparation for such a moment as this began for many duck hunters the day after the previous season ended. However, it becomes inflamed again during the fall when the new line of waterfowling products reach the shelves of our local sporting goods stores such as our own Mark's Outdoor Sports.

Of the many key waterfowling products available, choosing the right duck call and learning its operation is a critical part of becoming a successful duck hunter. Many consider a duck call is next to a shotgun in each successful waterfowler's list of heirlooms. Since its early inception in the 1900's for reproducing the sounds of a mallard hen, one thing has remained constant, that is its simplistic design of using air flowing over a thin reed and curvature tone board producing a sharp quack. Having a proven design of the duck call established; call makers began looking for various materials in which to build a better duck call.

In the early stages of callmaking, many duck calls were made from the callmaker's regional native wood. As time passed and the availability of procuring many different types of native and exotic woods became available, callmakers began looking for woods with vast densities, durability, and dependability. The woods would need to create an ease of crafting as well as possess the ability to perform under adverse conditions. The three most common woods that possess these characteristics and tonal features are bois d'arc, cocabola, and African Blackwood. These three woods are still used today by the modern callmakers.

It wasn't until the mid 1970's that a synthetic product named acrylic was thought of as being a high quality material for making calls. The manufacturing procedure of cast acrylic enables it to be very stable and consistent during the call making process. Unlike woods, acrylic is a non-porous material making it impenetrable to moisture, while enabling it to produce unprecedented sound qualities. Acrylic calls are also available in a variety of many different traditional and non traditional colors. Today, acrylic calls have become the standard by which duck calls are measured.

when selecting a duck call for your personal hunting situation, I would suggest that you invest in a call made from one of the afore mentioned woods or an acrylic model. With so many colors, styles, and set-ups to choose from, a duck call is much more than just a personal preference. Here are a few criteria that you may want to consider prior to purchasing your next call.

Usually duck calls are designed for three different types of hunting situations; timber, field, and open water. A timber call is usually a soft, low-end volume call that easily produces the nasty, and nasally quacks. This call is also great for use in confined areas such as green timber where the coaxing of the birds into shooting range is of utmost importance. The beauty of these calls really lies in their ability to produce the realistic sounds of ducks with little air and minimum volume.

Field calls are designed for hunting large flat flooded agricultural fields. These calls are capable of producing ringing hails for getting the birds' attention without sacrificing the raspy low end duck needed for finishing the birds into the decoys. Field calls typically have the same basic ranges as those of the timber models with the biggest difference being in that of the hail call.

Last you have the open water calls. These calls get their name from the style of hunting situation in which they are utilized; hunting the vast bodies of water. The main emphasis of these style calls is that of creating high-pitched, ringing hail calls for maximum volume and range. It is imperative that these calls be able to produce loud, ringing calling in order to get the attention of the high migrators that utilize the open water. These calls must also possess the ability of being soft and seductive to finish off the birds once they approach the decoy spread.

Once you have selected the style call, defining a call's set-up is the next step. By the word set-up, I mean a couple of things. First, do you want the call set-up as a double reed or single reed? There have been many debates about his particular subject regarding which makes the sound better. As stated earlier, most all calls have the same tone board design so it is only a matter of producing the call with two reeds instead of one. In my study of the subject, versatility is the main difference between the two set-ups. Many classify versatility as the ability of the call to produce on the high end of the scale as well as the low end while sounding like multiple ducks. These tonal features are somewhat less present in double reeds as well as the range of capabilities. In defense of double reed calls, they are much easier to control/master and sound just as ducky but as aforementioned they limit a caller to only one sound and all ducks sound different. Once you have established the set-up of the call, next look for consistency in the call. A call with consistency will allow you the ability to vary the sounds that come out of the call easily and naturally. Your call should allow you the ability to produce the sounds of a duck, not a person blowing a call. With all the criteria being chosen in creating your personal duck call, one must be committed and focused on using good calling techniques.

Being a custom call maker, my personal recommendation of a duck call would be a single-reed, acrylic call in the field model. This versatile call has everything a novice or avid duck hunter would desire in a call without any sacrifices. This particular style of call is used widely for multiple hunting situations and capable of mimicking the many duck cadences while allowing room for growth as one becomes a more polished caller.

Please visit Marks Outdoors to test drive many of today's latest duck calls as well as other great water fowling products. Be Careful, Good Luck and Shoot 'em with their feet down so you can see the jewelry!