Chris Jennings’ Blog

After the decoys have been sorted properly, rigged and prepped for use, my opening day anticipation turns towards innovation. This part-time inventor stage in my life comes every season, and it’s always something I have seen in a catalog. I tell myself, “I can make one of those. That would be easy.” There’s a good chance it could be easy; the problem is that it’s never been easy for me.

My wife, the provider of rational thought in the family, offers me the yearly words of encouragement, complemented by the rolling eyes and ‘Don’t hurt yourself’ speech. Heading to the garage, enthusiasm fueling the mission, there is only one constant this time of year: Something’s going to get broken.

Last year, I “needed” several items for the upcoming season. First was a roof for my boat blind. I felt the lack of overhead cover was causing birds to flare on a regular basis. I decided the roof needed to be in three short pieces and attached to the blind frame so shooters could lean up, throw the roof back and shoot. Simple enough. I scratched out a couple ideas and went to work.

Needing something durable, yet easy to cut and cover, I started out with a 4′ x 8′ piece of cattle fencing. I spray painted it and cut it into 2′ x 3′ pieces. After cutting it down, I realized that my measurements were a little short. One thing to note is that measurements taken at this stage in the game come merely from an eyeball, or I hold it up in the air and say, “That’s about right.” So I got another piece of cattle fencing and started over.

With the correct measurements, my overhead doors were ready to be attached. Using short pieces of camouflage nylon rope, I made two hinges on each door and secured them to the blind. I covered each roof piece with camouflage burlap and grasses. It looked great.

I climbed into the boat, now a waterfowl hunting cavern, and made every effort to get comfortable. The first thing I noticed was that it was well camouflaged on top. So well that a flock of mallards could be sitting on the new roof and I wouldn’t be able to see them. I needed something to prop up the doors about 4″ to offer a glimpse of what’s coming toward the blind. I cut a one-by-two into 4″ pieces, drilled holes and attached them to the other side of the blind. Now my roof sat at an angle offering shooters a view of the sky. Well, about four inches of sky.

Sitting in my normal position in the boat, I crouched under my new roof and excitedly tossed back the door as if ducks were hovering over the decoys. The rope hinges held and it opened, swinging all the way back out of my way as I stood pretending to pick out greenheads and fire. In fact, the hinges worked so well, it swung into the back side of the blind and the sharp edges left on the cattle fencing cut through the camouflage material and grasses on the other side. Other than ripping a gaping hole in the other side of the blind, I immediately found another problem: The sharp edges that shredded the material on the blind’s other side pushed cleanly through the material and managed to cut through the back of my T-shirt and slice down my back as I went to stand up. Obviously, this was a problem.

Bleeding, needing to replace one entire side of my boat’s blind material, and still confident this would work, I went back to the drawing board. When I say “drawing board,” I mean inside to clean the blood off my back and have the Rational-Minded One judge whether or not I needed to go to the hospital. A little hydrogen peroxide, a new T-shirt and still overcome with optimism, I headed back the garage to start from scratch.

Normally, at some point in my waterfowling-gear inventor stage, I call for backup: My father. I called and my mother told me to come over as quickly as possible, my dad has done something crazy, but she didn’t explain. I pull up to his house and his smile was ear to ear, nearly overshadowing the 20′ x 10′ box-frame blind he had constructed in his backyard out of ¼-inch PVC piping, which he spray painted green and covered in camouflage burlap and grasses. Great inventors think alike.

While my wife and mother shared their thoughts on our insane behavior, we contemplated the capabilities of my dad’s blind, which I think he designed for 12 people and 14 dogs to hunt comfortably. He showed me where he nearly cut off his thumb with a hacksaw and I explained why there was blood seeping through my shirt. It’s amazing what the passion of waterfowl hunting will do to a family.

FOR SALE: Three boat blind tops made from cattle fencing and a 20′ x 10′ PVC waterfowl hunting blind. Both items have never been used, but we are optimistic about their functional abilities.

As opening day creeps closer, share your innovative waterfowl hunting creations with us here at Ducks Unlimited.

–Chris