What started out as a slow day for Bill Brandt and his hunting companions soon turned into a fantastic day in the field, with everyone taking home a band—some even taking home two! (Photo courtesy of Bill Brandt.)
June 26, 2025
By WILDFOWL Staff
Bill Brandt and five of his friends, Chris Rudd, Jordan Miller, Nick Deau, Andrew Tomasiewicz and Scott Campbell set out for a morning of honker hunting in Northern Illinois. The weather was overcast, and a strong wind blew out of the west. “The hunting had been slow when we saw a group of geese fly over the hunters to our northwest,” says Brandt. “We began to call and flag continuously and that drew the flock towards us.” They eased off the calls and put the flag down as the honkers got closer. Once in range, Bill gave the command to shoot, and five birds came crashing down. However, the fun wasn’t over. They hit the calls again, and the rest of the flock came back around for a second pass. “Some of the guys hadn’t had the chance to reload their guns, but we still managed to knock down three more.” As the hunters made the rounds to pick up birds, the hoots and hollers started. One cry of “Band!” came, then another, and another. Brandt recalls the moment, “To our amazement, all eight birds were banded. If we would have gotten the ones that had escaped, we’re certain they would have been banded as well.”
Though the group didn’t see any other bands that day, there wasn’t any complaining about a bad hunt—quite the opposite. They distributed the bands one to each hunter, then had a draw with spent hulls in a hat to see who got the extra two.
An amazing day in the field, where not one, not two, but six hunters all walked out sporting one—or two—new bands on their lanyard. The banding information proved that all eight birds were from the same banding project in Ontario from earlier in the year. But instead of being shot just a few miles from the banding site, they made a full migration down the flyway to Illinois. An amazing shoot, and a memory not ever to be forgotten. The craziest part, Brandt says this is the second time this has happened. Not too long before, he had a hunt where the group knocked down nine of 11 birds and all were banded! Don’t some guys have all the luck?
