The Cajun life of Victor Vautrot: Hunting Season at Serenity Farm: Awesome!

Here I am out in my woods on the northern end of my property, holding my Collins double edge axe, chopping down trees to make another trail for us to travel on to get to the duck hunting ponds hidden in the Cypress & Oak tree forest!

Since September and hunting season begam, my friends, family and I have harvested quite a lot of Wood ducks, Green Wing Teal, Blue Wing Teal and squirrels. I have seen some rabbits, but their numbers are down on my property (220 acres) due to a pack of coyotes that apparantly has devestated their population over the years while I was away in Massachusetts completing my residency training through Harvard School of Medicine. Now that I am back, however, my brother and I will hunt the hunters--use a predator call at night (an electronic device that makes sounds like a wounded rabbit) which attracts the coyotes for an apparant "easy meal." Well, they'll be ambushed and have a lead sandwich instead!

Back to the duck hunting on my property in Eunice: it's unbelievable. I placed several hunting blinds around one of the many small pounds that are located near Bayou Mallett, which courses through the northern boundry of the Vautrot estate. I cut with an axe some Palmetto trees and other small trees and planted this foliage along the edge of the pond in several clusters, from which I hide behind. I then got into my canoe (pirogue) and placed several decoys in patterns on the pond water's surface. At 6:05am each morning, the ducks are swarming from all directions directly above us trying to find spots to land in the pond. They dive directly down from the sky above like missiles--it is such a beautiful site to watch them as they flare their wings back to slow down immediately prior to landing on the water surface. We have seen flocks of about 2 dozen Woodies circling and then landing in my pond, as well as larger flocks of the migratory Teal ducks (the rare Blue Wing and the very common Green Wing teal). I instructed my family and friends not to shoot the female Woodies (Wood Ducks), as they are local/indiginous ducks, and I want to keep their population very high on my estate. However, we are free to strictly follow Dept of Wildlife and Fisheries mandates to harvest the maximum limit of teal--since they migrate to Louisiana from up North...escaping the brutal, bitter winter cold weather.

We have harvested our limits of teal in less than one hour at my pond that I have the duck blinds prepared on. It is really amazing--while standing behind the implanted folliage (small trees and Palmettos), you'll see other wild life come by: squirrels in the trees around you leaping from limb-to-limb; Great Horned Owls come to land in the tree limbs, too...monitoring the squirrels as their prey; and large, swamp rabbits run by the water's edge--oblivious to your hidden presence. There are risks out there, however: I have come across two venomous Copperhead snakes near my hunting lodge...they are not as poisonous as the notorious Water Moccasin (a.k.a. "Cotton Mouth"), but can cause quite a lot of pain and still requires ER attention if one is bitten. They are, oddly enough, a most beautifully colored snake--even their eyes are the color of bronze/copper!

adult Copperhead snake

adult Copperhead snake

My sister came out to Serenity Farm; her and her husband went to one of my other ponds (my property has several ponds stocked with fish on the southern side of my estate; several ponds for duck hunting located on the northern border of my estate; and several very large ponds for harvesting crawfish located in the middle). She caught several Brim (Perch) in just a couple of minutes. My brother caught a 2-3 pound Bass with just a few casts of his pole using an artificial worm. So, no matter what your interests are--hunting ducks, squirrels, rabbits, fishing, crawfishing, etc), there is something fun for everyone to do! That is why I named all of this property "Serenity Farm."