I know I know season just ended but the work and preparation never ends. The other day I found a big floating mat/dock washed up deep in the marsh and I'm planning on pulling in out (gonna need an airboat or three) and when I get it out I'm planning on building a "drive in" type blind on it where I can drive the boat up on top of the mat under a brushed in cover. Its a 20x10 mat I believe. That way I can move it around or reposition it in different areas of the lake where the birds are. I've got the design and anchor method for the blind all figured out Im just not experienced at all with decoys in deep water. Its probably 7ft or so in the area the birds always raft up in. I'm talking hundreds of gadwall and mallards just chilling out where nobody can hunt them so this is my plan to get em. How difficult is it setting up longlines? I would probably just try to do around 6 dozen decoys or so as that's about how many sit in groups around the lake. Is that to many for a long line, or would I be better off just doing a long ass Texas rig with big weights? As far as picking up and putting them out I was planning on either using the boat or my buddy I hunt with has a pretty wide kyak that's sturdy to stand on even with two people. Just trying to figure out this whole deep water thing before I get to far into this project this year and any help anyone can offer is much appreciated. Thanks

7 ft is not deep. It's pushing it for wanting to deal with Texas rigs, but if you got a spot for the drings in the boat that's 8 or 9ft from where you'll set the decoys, it won't bother you much. 6 dozen is a lot to wrap up one at a time with normal lines, so with go the Texas rig route, or go long lines. It's not difficult to run 3 or 4 lines with a couple dozen on them, and just unclip when you pick them up. Have a couple extra weights to place at various points on the lines in case you want to curl them and not have them going straight out one direction.

I've hunted that deep a lot in the lake. Long Texas rigs seem to work best. I just got all my decoys swapped from single lines (wrapped) to Texas rigs the last few weeks of the season and they work much better. I will be swapping line from the PVC decoy line to some black or clear trimmer line (weed eater string) I'll use the same crimps. The crimps cut the PVC line when putting them on.

If you are going to use this method to chase rafting birds on open water make sure it's plenty mobile. They'll move from one day to the next once you start setting up on them. 20X10 is pretty huge, might try something smaller, an irregular shape would also be better over a big rectangle. Just looks like something more natural, the birds won't be quite so wary of it.

Yeah I figured long Texas rigs would be best but I figured I would see if anyone else had better suggestions. I'm not positive its 20x10 but that's just a guesstimate. Its one of those mats that sits at the water level and its that greyish color so its really hard to see in the water. Was planning on building this thing on top of it as low profile as possible, like just high enough for the motor to go under it and that's it. Then leave a few feet on each side to pile tree limbs and brush all the way around it and basically build an island or maybe even a fallen "tree" . anchor it in 4 corners so I can just pull the anchors and drag it somewhere else if need be. Were gonna try to pull the mat tomorrow or Friday, depending on tide. I'll post s pic of it when I can.

Is this a construction mat they use for rigs to drive on in the mud?

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Similar to this?

No. Its a floating pier type thing

I have a blind I hunt that's in about 6 ft of water or higher. I find it easier to skip the texas rigs and just individually wrap them. Just my preference. You may need heavier weights than what you normally would use depending on the bottom content and wind speed.

Just my experience with wrapiing the lines individually is that's an hour process with that many decoys.

Its hard to describe it and I couldn't find a pic on Google. I'll be out there tomorrow and and I'll get a pic of it

Large net with 4 lines and 4 weights is all you need. Lay the net on the ground and attached all your decoys to the net in whatever pattern you will want them in when it's in the water and attached the weighted lines to each corner.

Just individually wrap em with 10ft line

I've hunted deep water and boat blinds for most of my life until recently. Texas rig is the way to go. My coots have 10ft Texas rig gator line on them. When we pick them up I have a buddy sit in the front of the boat and just grab them as I ease by. He clips them and let's the decoys drag behind once 2 dozen are clipped he makes a big knot as close to the decoys as possible then another close to the clip. Throw them in the boat and keep on moving. As far as the blind, why not just make a good boat blind and bring some cane with you to break it up. That's what we would always do. Just a warning though. Birds will learn to stay away from big blobs in open water.

I'm talking about keel wrap lol fuck that shit. Not to sure of this river wrap your talking about.

I have a boat blind but its to much of a hassle to put it up and take it down to pick up birds or whatever and its a pain in the ass to get in and out of in shallow water much less trying to do it in deep water getting in a kayak. My plan was build a blind frame on this thing that I can drive the boat up into and park the boat and hunt all in one spot. I was going to attach 2x4 ribs to the mat where I would park the boat and I got a quart of gator glide left over and just paint it onto the boards so it slides on and off easily.

I hear you about the blob thing. There a few island around the edges of the lake that are roughly the same size their just not in the middle where the birds are..that's where I'm hopeinh being able to move it helps. If they get smart of one,side of the lake just move it and hope for better outcome. Theres also quite a few divers that hang out there to. They dumb so I don't see it effecting them to much. Its a large open freshwater lake, I've seen GoldenEye on it before too just no way to hunt them. If I could kill one of those little bastards I would be just fine with nothing else there

If you're going to be the only "island" in open water brush, brush, brush and when you think it's got enough cover.....keep brushing. Being a blob in the open water is ok as long as it looks as much like an island or muskrat hut as possible. A lot of guys get lazy when it comes to brushing a blind and it hurts big time when educated birds are all that's around.

Doubt there's a whole bunch of muskrats running around in the Trinity river

I had a muskrat run off with my damn fish basket before. I was fishing on a dock and the bastard snuck up and chewed the stringer I had it tied to. Got away with 6 trout. Asshole

It's simple. get a mud motor. shoot ducks in the face.

Them coons are always stealin somethin...

Mamma usually chases them off with a broom.

Mojo spreader with a clip and 10 feet of 1/4" loneline rope with one large weight is the simplest way to put out and pick up decoys. We store 20 standard size decoys on the spreaders in stand up lawn bags. It is like putting out and picking up 15 decoys (60 decoys). You always drop the weight first and then attach the clip to the spreader.

Coming from someone that hunts Catahoula, the bigger the blind the harder to hide.. This year I spent 3/4 of the year hunting in water well over 15 feet deep and trying to use texas rigs that long is a pain in the ass. Just keel wrap them is the easiest way to do it. And remember on open, deeper water the more decoys the merrier, because you're trying to simulate rafts of ducks not just a couple dozen. Also that blind will not be anywhere near as mobile as you'd think.. You'll burn up a huge chunk of your day moving it just a few miles. And as said before make sure you use big weights, and space your decoys out more than usual. A few big waves will have them things in such mess you'll never get it untangled. And as brickgw said, brush until you think you have enough then add just as much brush as you put the first time.. It takes an ungodly amount to completely conceal a big floating blind to make birds less wary of it.

Have you thought about using layout blinds on the mat? You could make it a lot lower profile instead of trying to hide a boat on it. Just sink your buddies kayak next to it or use a dog to pick up birds.

When the birds are going down in water too deep to wade we hang climbing stands on the trees and use a pirogue to go back to the boat, i hate using a boat blind, ducks see that shit too much


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I vote layout boats. It's expensive though. I feed like you could raft 4 or 5 of em together, grass em in and one anchor ought to hold em all. Or spuds, which ever you like

It's simple. get a mud motor. shoot ducks in the face.

I want a layout boat bad but the I would be hunting by myself because they are so damn expensive lol.

I thought about the layout blinds on the mat but its so close to water level that if there's any rough water it would wash the layouts right off. And I would be soaking wet. The area I'm thinking of of putting it has a protected cove about 7-800 yards away that I was thinking would be s good area to drag it to when rougher weather is coming so it don't get torn to pieces. I'm headed out there right now and I'll get s good pic of it

So maybe its not as big as I thought I remember it being....lol 12x6 is what I stepped it out to. So the boat thing most likt not going to work... And yes that's a trampoline behind it. Legs are rusted out but the actually trampoline part is still perfect if anyone needs one lol

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We used a couple of these this season and it worked perfectly. May convert to this for all of our decoys:

spreadwithdecoys-copy.jpg

The wheels from a caster set work even better than hockey pucks.

All spreaders in 8' of water. 40 decoys.

What you need is a net raft or two, made out of old shrimp boat nets. You can store them rolled up decoys still attached on the floating blind. Unroll them by boat and anchor off. You can add a couple of singles to break it up abit .. Done.

I use 120 foot long lines,12 deks on each line, loops on each end, an round drake standup bags. Each bag holds 2 dozen oversized deks. My anchors are the fold out 3 lb with 10 foot of line and a d ring on the end. To deploy just open the bag find the decoy with the line loop around its neck and take loop off, clip on anchor and start feeding. After 12 decoys are in the water you will have a loop end where you will clip anchor. Then repeat until you get all the lines out. I also carry a bag of loose decoys that I fill in with. We put out 7-9 dozen in about 20 min with 2 of us. Taking up is just as easy BUT some lakes have a lot of underwater weeds that make taking up not so fun.


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We've been talking about buying an old pontoon and cutting a parking spot out of the middle of it for the boat and having boards to fill the hole over the boat. Build yourself a little shack/blind, brush it in, and leave it anchored and just drive up to it. When i comes time to move it, tie off in your parking spot and start driving.

I've got my eye on an old POS pontoon in town sitting in a guys backyard to do just that. I think it would work great.

i use fairly long texas rigs. I get those bungee loops with the ball on them, i think they are called tarp bungees or something like that.

after i put 1dz on a ring ill wrap the bungee around the lines tight and slide it as close to the decoys as i can, keeps from kinking the line too much, then ill take the rest and coil it up and use another bungee to hold it. they dont take up any more room than a shore texas rig that way.