(gentle music) - [Bret] On this episode of "Prairie Sportsman," join us as we explore a unique duck hunting opportunity on Lake of the Woods with layout boats.

And we'll also take a look at the installation of accessible fishing piers at lakes across the state, making it easier for everyone to enjoy the great outdoors.

And we'll join Nicole Zempel for a "Fast Forage."

Hey, it's Bret Amundson for "Prairie Sportsman," and another great show starts right now.

(upbeat music) (gentle music) - [Announcer] Funding for "Prairie Sportsman" is provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund, as recommended by the Legislative Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources and by Mark and Margaret Yackel-Juleen on behalf of Shalom Hill Farm, a retreat and conference center in a prairie setting near Wyndham, Minnesota, on the web at shalomhillfarm.org, and by Live Wide Open, Western Minnesota Prairie Waters, and the members of Pioneer PBS.

- And this is one of the coolest things we've gotten to do on this show.

It's one of the most unique duck hunts you can do anywhere, let alone in Minnesota.

There's only a handful of places you can do this across the state.

It's open water, layout boat, duck hunting.

Stick around, we'll tell you where it is and how you can do it too.

For nearly a hundred years, open water duck hunting was restricted in Minnesota.

Despite strong traditions of this type of hunting in other parts of the country, our state chose to protect diving ducks, and kept hunters partially concealed in natural vegetation along the shoreline.

In 2013, waterfowl hunters and the DNR agreed to open up a few select locations to this tactic.

It was mostly border waters where this type of hunting was already allowed in the neighboring states or province.

One interior lake, Mille Lacs, was picked due to its size.

The other lakes and rivers that allowed include Superior, Pepin, portions of the Mississippi River, and Lake of the Woods.

(bright music) (gentle music) Dan Amundson and I would be hunting at the Northwest Angle, and to get there by vehicle, you have to go through Canada.

Just like that, we're through the border again and on our way to the Northwest Angle.

I've never gone this way by road.

I've never been up there when the water's been open.

I've only gone by snowmobile or by the ice road that they built a couple of years ago to go to the Northwest Angle, so I've always wanted to experience driving through Manitoba to see what it's like.

And you never know what you're gonna get when you go through the border, but I'll tell you what, that guy that we had there today was great.

In fact, we've gone to Canada a few times this year and every time we've gone through, the guys at the border have been great and we've gotten through without any issues.

So it was a quick stop through the Customs and now we're on our way.

We're gonna roll through Sprague and go up to the Angle and take a boat out to Flag Island.

Get ready for some duck hunting in the morning.

We crossed at Warroad and took the hour drive through Manitoba to Jim's Corner.

There are a number of ways you can check in with Customs when you do this, including through an app, but we wanted to do it the way it's been done for a number of years, and that's by stopping at this station.

(gentle music) Then it was on to Angle Inlet, where we'd be picked up by the crew from Flag Island.

(gentle music) After unpacking in our cabin, we decided to get a closer look at the layout boats we'd be using.

There's actually quite a bit of room in here, but it doesn't look like much and you're obviously so, so flat.

But you get under here and there's actually quite a bit of room on both sides here to throw your shells or whatever, probably have some camera gear under there but... (zipper zipping) And then you lay it, this is a headrest, right?

So you're gonna lay down as flat as you can.

This is gonna be wild being right at the surface of the water like this.

Eight inches off the surface of the water right here, and if it's anything like a layout blind, if it's nice and sunny and calm, I might take a little nap in here.

It's kind of comfortable already, but ducks come in, (Bret imitates gun firing) lay back down, take a nap, go in and have some lunch, maybe go fishing.

I like it.

I can't wait to do this.

I've wanted to do this for so long, and there are ducks everywhere.

We went out driving around and scouted some ducks out and these guys got us.

There's ducks right there, flying behind 'em right now, flying over.

They got a plan for us for the morning and we're gonna have great weather, lot of ducks around and a completely new duck hunting experience for us, so, (hands clapping) let's go!

(gentle music) - All right, so we mainly are shooting buffleheads.

We do get big, big runs of bluebills in later fall.

Every now and then we'll shoot some sea ducks or we shot a goldeneye here a couple days ago.

- Divers is kind of one of those things.

It's they're there and then they're gone and you have to make that split second decision on it if you have enough time to sit up and get there.

Now, when they do want to sit on on the ends of those lines, turn in and come right to you, then it's a show to behold, 'cause then you don't know what that duck's doing.

He doesn't know what he's doing.

He might sit down, he might turn left, he might turn right and get it outta there on you.

So as soon as they get into the decoys, it's one of those things, you gotta take your opportunities when they come and you'll get plenty of them but to get the ones where it's almost like feels like, a gimme a shot aren't gimmes.

- [Bret] We were looking forward to the challenge.

And after a good night's sleep, it was time to get set up.

♪ We could be in this cover, this cover ♪ All right, so there's, the first boat has been deployed.

Now these guys are gonna get the boats in the water first and then get the decoys set up around them.

Normally with the wind they'll just let the boats kind of drift down wind normally, but they're gonna set 'em just a little bit differently since we're filming.

So we'll have the sun a little bit more at our back.

So just a little bit different set up than normal but we'll get this second boat in the water then get some decoys in and then climb in.

(bright music) With just the two of us hunting, I grabbed the camera and let Dan shoot first.

(bright music) As birds are shot, Forrest and Andy bring the tender boat in with an anxious retriever named Grouse ready to jump in and grab the birds.

♪ This cover, this cover, this cover ♪ ♪ Please this cover, this cover, this cover ♪ ♪ This cover, this, this cover ♪ After a few opportunities for Dan, it was my turn.

I hear ducks everywhere right now.

Got ducks swimming in the decoys, ducks flying over.

(water plopping) (heavily exhales) (imitates duck squawking) Right here.

(water plopping) (clothes rustling) (duck wings flapping) Oh no!

(Bret laughing) (bright gentle music) (water sloshing) Oho.

(chuckles) Whoo!

(bright gentle music) ♪ This cover, this cover ♪ ♪ We could be in this cover ♪ ♪ This cover, this cover ♪ ♪ We could be in this cover ♪ - Right in front, three pack.

(water sloshing) (clothes rustling) (gun firing) ♪ This cover, we could be ♪ (water sloshing) (gun firing) - [Bret] (laughs) Oh!

(upbeat music) We sat here now all morning, we've had divers in your face and normally my diver hunting experience is sit on shore and hopefully get 'em to not wanna sit in the middle of the lake.

So to have 'em trying to land on your face is it's pretty fun, it's pretty cool.

(singers vocalizing) (clothes rustling) (Bret exhales) (water sloshing) Oh, right side, right side.

(water sloshing) (duck squawking) (singers vocalizing) Doggone it.

That first group came in and I'm not gonna lie, they were balled up.

Right side, right side, I don't have any shells in my gun.

(singers vocalizing) Doggone it.

(water sloshing) That was nutty right there.

It's 9:00, things were kind of slowing up just a hair.

All of a sudden a whole group of buffs came through and they balled up over the decoys.

They were going a hundred miles an hour.

Missed them, missed them all completely.

And then more ducks came through.

I ran outta shells, I didn't hit a thing.

That was crazy.

(singers vocalizing) (gentle music) - No, that's why we love the divers up here especially open water, you know.

Your playing field is 360 degrees that you just can't expect them to show up right in front of you like a mallard and come in nice and slow, and so you have time to prepare for 'em, pick out your drakes and whatnot and we see that all the time.

Guys come in with a lot of confidence, and they're shooting these puddle ducks, and shooting half a box and getting their limits.

They come up here and now they're shooting something that's flying a lot faster and they're used to it, different angles, directions, and you know put the element of the big water in.

You're moving with your wave and it's a whole different ballgame and- - I think the gimme birds are the ones that land.

- [Andy] Yes.

- But I'll tell you what, regardless of people's opinions on shooting birds on the wing or shooting 'em in the decoys, whatever on the water, I think that's the fun of this is shooting them on the wing.

- Yup.

- And shooting 'em when they're zipping through it a hundred miles an hour.

And there's a couple of times where they'd be coming straight on and I'd anticipate a turn to the right, my gun would start to swing that way and then they'd go left (chuckles), you know?

- Yep.

- You just never really know where they're gonna go.

Forrest and Andy have been guiding out of layout boats for a few years now.

- 2017 would've been our first year that Andy brought out the first one up.

- What was your first experience like?

- Three boxes of shells for six birds.

(both laughing) - It's not easy.

- It's not, it's a total adjustment and like you know, you get guys that come up here, "Yeah, I'm a pretty good shot," blah, blah, blah.

And then they get into the boat and they're through two boxes of shells and they only got two birds or three birds and next thing they're, "Oh, do you have more shells?"

And so we started in boxes of shells.

- [Bret] Before the fall, waterfowl season, the pair teams up to guide Anglers throughout the summer.

Limited buffleheads, 50-inch musky?

(laughs) - I'm probably on the musky side.

I know, I know Andy's answer will be different.

But this is a very, like it is a nice change in the fall to go shoot shoot ducks you know.

After grinding, you know, muskies for three, four months, it is a lot of fun to go do something else.

- And do guys, when they come up and do that do they do make it a cast and blast?

Is there a package for that?

- [Forrest] Yep, so we offer the whole cast and blast package.

We'll go out and we'll hunt till, you know we normally will be done by 11.

That way we have an hour, hour and a half to get back and pack up and you go out for four hours of fishing in the afternoon whether they want to go jigging for walleyes or we can go trolling or jigging for muskies.

So we kind of have have all the options.

We get guys that just come up for the hunts and we get guys that do the whole package.

- [Bret] Since they offer a cast and blast package, we had to spend a couple of hours at the Walleye Capital trying to catch dinner.

And while we did catch a nice assortment of fish, we were hoping to hook into a musky - Well, we were talking about all the different species you can catch up here, 'cause it's the Lake of the Woods, you just never know what's gonna bite your hook.

(fishing line whirring) - [Speaker 1] It is a musky.

(air whooshing) (water sloshing) (fishing line whirring) (air whooshing) (water sloshing) - [Speaker 2] Well, 40?

- [Speaker 1] Yeah, it's like 40 incher.

(fishing line whirring) - [Speaker 2] Getting closer, yep.

Look at that.

- Energy is out.

(chuckles) - Look at that.

(chuckles) Welcome to Lake of the Woods.

- [Bret] How often does that happen?

- Well, how often?

- Ah... - Sometimes more often than not.

- Yeah.

- Spring and fall when the walleye and the musky down deep together.

You know, you had a really good chance at this.

- [Bret] There's always been a uniqueness to the Northwest Angle.

(water sloshing) and adding layout boat, duck hunting just increase its appeal to those who love the other things.

- [Speaker 3] Ah dang.

- [Bret] And to experience waterfront into a challenge.

(person squeals) (person laughs) - [Speaker 3] This is it.

(upbeat music) (water sloshing) - Right in front.

(water sloshing) I hit one.

(upbeat music) (water sloshing) (gun firing) (chuckles) Had a shooting twice.

You ready?

You ready?

(body squeaking) Whoa, he just skirted the outside the spread with that duck right before it came in perfect, came in low centered up right in the middle of the spread right in front of me.

I shot once, knocked it down and hit the water.

I must have just bumped a wing or something 'cause it got up and started flying again.

I had to shoot it a second time and slowed it down just enough with the first shot that the second shot did the trick but, man, they come in so fast and sometimes they'll come from all directions.

You don't know where to look and all of a sudden you'll look up and they'll be ducks right coming at you in the decoys and you gotta be quick on the trigger.

But thankfully I've gone through a lot of shells today but thankfully there's been a lot of chances so I just need one more.

What an experience up here in lay boats at the Northwest Angle.

- It truly is a unique experience again that I think everybody needs to try.

Whether you're an avid duck hunter, which I'm not.

- [Bret] When people come up here and try for the first time, and then they come back in here to warm up or grab beer or whatever, what do they tell you?

- You know, Forrest and his team truly put on a good experience and, you know, some of them are laughing because they burn through a case of shells and get two ducks and others are limited out by 8:00 in the morning.

So it's fun hearing the camaraderie about that and those groups being able to connect and have that experience.

- On our second day we are joined by two of the workers at Flag Island.

- Thank, I went through a box without hitting a bird.

(Bret laughing) - On the second box it went a little bit better, but it was tough right away.

- It was pretty crazy.

I didn't think I'd be able to get the hang of it.

But I either got really lucky or I figured it out really quick.

- Why slow it all those ducks down for you?

- Yeah.

- First of all.

- Yeah.

- [Bret] 'Cause I missed them all and then you smashed them.

They probably didn't slow down at all.

But that was your first time in a lay boat?

- First time something I'd always wanted to try.

I've never done layout blinds or field- - Duck hunting.

- Field hunting.

Nope, just shore waterfowl hunting and... - [Bret] Left side.

- [Mitchel] It would be kind of unique to try.

(gun firing) - And there we go, I'm done, whoo.

- Nice drake buffy to finish off the day.

That was cool, he came in right in.

I picked him up right as he was going through the sun so I kind of lost him and then he was tracking, so I had to get way out in front of him.

Nine times out of 10 today I would've missed that shot.

(gun firing) (water sloshing) (duck squawking) Takes a little bit of time just to get used to these layout boats.

But, man, once you get it figured out and you get your timing down, especially these little buffies are so small it is so much fun.

And to be honest I thought I was gonna miss that shot, but, man, what a great way to end this trip to Leg of the Woods.

So much fun.

♪ This cover, this cover ♪ ♪ This cover, this cover ♪ ♪ This, this cover ♪ - [Len] I have some employees that came from other their cultures and so forth and they just have been in Paynesville to maybe six to months to a year and they wanted to start fishing to see if they like it, so they brought their family down.

So there's like six or seven of 'em down fishing and now they're into it.

- When you harvest, a little bit soft to the touch, a little bit spongy.

(bright music) - [Bret] As the popularity of fishing continues to grow in Minnesota, the Department of Natural Resources and local communities are working to create more opportunities for Anglers to wet a line.

One of the ways this is being done is by installing fishing piers around the region.

Lake Koronis in Paynesville is one of the latest locations to get a new pier.

(bright music) - Yeah, so this project came about, the pier was installed in 2020 is when we got all the funding in place and when it actually came out here.

So, you know, it's now been operational, the 2021, 2022.

But before that it was really the brain trial of a few in town.

Our park and tree committee was very involved in getting it going, applied for all the grant funding from the DNR to get it going and then we partnered with Paynesville Township as well as the city to get it installed to really service not just the city residents but the community as a whole.

- We were most recently approached by the city of Paynesville in about 2019.

They had submitted an application and let us know that they were interested in a fishing pier.

They had submitted an application earlier in 2015, I believe, and some new opportunities had come up.

So we began working with them on some opportunities for placing the pier here.

- [Bret] In 2019 and 2021, the Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund chose accessible fishing piers as one of the projects they wanted to fund which ultimately helped Lake Koronis get this new pier at Veterans Park.

- I definitely do think the Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund is a very important fund.

There's a big demand for fishing piers and that fund has helped fund, you know, a lot of piers in the past.

As we get applications and we're not sure if there's gonna be funding, it's hard to answer applicants when their project might be funded.

And with this fund, we've been able to set a more normal expectation that piers can be funded and placed in different areas of the state.

- This is something that the city of Paynesville, the township and the community itself have been wanting for years.

We just didn't know how we were gonna pay for it for one.

And also with our swimming area if we were gonna have enough room for a nice big fishing pier.

When the DNR and the grant came available, we said now's the time we have to make room.

So we used to have about one more dock out here and a bigger swimming area for the kids.

We shortened that up just to make room for the fishing pier.

And we haven't had any... You know, the kids still have plenty of room to swim and we have plenty of room for fishing too, so it's worked out great.

- It provides some exceptional fishing but I think even more important, it provides, you know, opportunities for kids and adults and older citizens to enjoy fishing and get out.

- It's fun to see the beginning families out too who can't afford the boats and so forth still enjoy it.

The people in the wheelchairs can get out there.

Walkers, canes and so forth can all enjoy go fishing like we we're so used to.

I have some employees that came from other cultures and so forth and they just have been in Paynesville to maybe six to months to a year and they wanted to start fishing to see if they like it.

So they brought their family down, so it was like six or seven of 'em down fishing and now they're into it.

Now, they love fishing, they enjoy it.

So you can get different cultures interested without having to buy a boat or going on places where they shouldn't be.

Here, it's nice place to go, it's a nice park.

They can go swimming and enjoy fishing.

So it kind of brought that into their cycle of life in Paynesville and get 'em acclimated to the town.

- My son is able to get out here and go fishing with grandpa.

He's able to do things like that.

They love playing out here in the water and doing all the things and this is just really wonderful for all the residents in town, especially those who might use like a wheelchair or something like that can come out here and still enjoy nature.

We have a drop-off, so there's some nice fish.

So come out here and catch some bass.

- I have seen people walking off here with several buckets full of fish periodically.

So yes, the fishing here is good.

(bright music) - [Bret] Once these piers are in the water they're pretty easy to take care of.

- Some locations pull their piers each year and place them in a more protected area so they don't get damaged from ice and so forth.

Other sites can sit for 10 years and not have any damage and one year with the right wind they can suffer damage, so it does vary a little bit.

Typically, the basic maintenance involves the deck boards, the railings, things like that.

Sometimes the floats will have to be replaced.

Critters will get in there and chew through the floats occasionally and they have to be replaced.

Where you have wind damage or ice damage, some of the corner brackets may have to be replaced.

So it varies a little bit site to site, lake to lake.

- [Bret] The Paynesville pier isn't the only one in the region and hopefully won't be the last either.

- In our work area we cover eight counties in the state of Minnesota.

We have approximately 34 fishing piers that we maintain or work with partners to maintain.

There's a lot of demand for fishing piers and we definitely have other projects out there that are looking for more fishing piers.

This year we have another one that we're working with on Lake Osakis that we hope to fund.

- [Bret] If people continue to love these piers as much as the Paynesville residents have, more communities will be applying for one of their own in the years to come.

- What's really funny is the young kids here in the summertime, with our swimming dock over here which is also a portable dock, they will go from that one if the fish are biting over there and then they'll run across and jump on the fishing pier.

So both these docks actually get used quite a bit and it's it's fun to see the kids out here fishing.

- It is so loved by the community.

You know, it's infrequently the government can spend money and really get positive feedback across the board.

But this is one of those areas, you know, because we're Minnesotans, because we love the water, we love fishing, really having this pier here to work for everyone is just so everyone loves it in the community.

(gentle music) (bright music) - We are standing by a wild rose plant and we are gonna harvest rose hips.

They're super rich in Vitamin C. Interestingly, this rose hip contains 20% more Vitamin C than a whole orange.

Rose hips are also great for people that are dealing with diabetes also arthritis.

There's anti-inflammatory properties in these as well.

Rose hips are best harvested this time of year early to mid-fall and preferably after a first frost but it's not necessary, but they do become sweeter if you wait until they go through the first frost.

And so to harvest rose hips, it is super easy, you just pluck them off.

And so what I'm gonna do is collect a bunch of these beautiful rose hips into a basket and they can range in color from like a yellowish to an orange to a beautiful red like this, almost to like a burgundy.

And they're gonna be, when you harvest a little bit soft to the touch, a little bit spongy.

And then you can bring those home and you can do a couple different things with them.

You can dry them and you can then utilize that for tea.

You can also steep them right away for tea.

But if you're not into tea, I make a rose hip syrup.

And that is the most versatile way, I think, personally to enjoy the rose hip.

One thing to remember if when you're gonna dry your rose hips, you're gonna cut them in half and you are going to remove the seeds and the little fine hairs, and those little fine hairs can be irritating to the skin or if ingested would irritate your throat.

So just make sure you kind of dig those out, and then yeah, you, there's a variety of ways that you can then dry the rose hips or like I said you can create a concoction and boil those rose hips.

You can make the syrup, you can make jelly.

So there's a variety of uses and they do smell quite wonderful when you're cooking with them.

(bright gentle music) - [Announcer] Funding for "Prairie Sportsman" is provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund as recommended by the Legislative Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources and by Mark and Margaret Yackel-Juleen on behalf of Shalom Hill Farm, a retreat and conference center in a prairie setting near Wyndham, Minnesota, on the web at shalomhillfarm.org and by Live Wide Open, Western Minnesota Prairie Waters and the members of Pioneer PBS.