500 Straight Limits
Milestone: Friends do the impossible, shoot 500 straight limits
“Fifty, maybe 100 years from now, there will be people saying, `Those were the days. I wish I had been around back then. I heard about two guys that shot their limit of ducks 500 straight times.’”
That’s what outfitter Bill Sherrill with WS Sherrill Waterfowl in Wharton said to Tim Mercer and James Perry (J.P.) after they did just that on Saturday, Dec. 11.
The Houston men, Mercer in the offshore drilling business, and Perry, a retired professor of architecture at the University of Houston, didn’t initially set out to accomplish a feat — they just wanted to hunt together.
“We started hunting together 20 years ago,” Mercer said. “We hunted here before Bill had the place.
“We wanted to have our hunts with just us, so we made Bill a proposal about 12 years ago.”
The proposal was not that complicated, and for Sherrill, was not that hard to accept.
“We hunt four in a group but they wanted to just hunt with the two of them and a guide,” Sherrill said. “But they agreed to pay the price for four hunters — and they paid up front. I’m not stupid.”
The proposal was all on a pre-set schedule. The two friends would hunt each day of early teal season. Then they would hunt the opening weekends, including the weekend after the split, and the closing weekend.
There’s more. They would hunt each Tuesday and Thursday throughout the season.
“We set that up because JP was still working and he could get away those mornings,” Mercer said.
They could change a date only if Thanksgiving or Christmas interfered.
They shot their limit the first day. And the second. Then it became a habit.
“We didn’t set it up for a streak,” Mercer said. “But then it was 36 times in a row. Then 84. Then we started to talk about it."
Once talk of the streak began, Sherrill got worried.
“I told them it’s impossible,” Sherrill said. “Mother nature. No rain. No ducks. Something would go wrong.”
Then the streak hit 100 limits. Then 200.
“We had every kind of weather you could imagine,” Perry said. “And lots of other things went wrong.”
“J.P. hit a hog,” Mercer said.
“You hit a deer,” Perry responded.
“You lost your gun.”
“You overslept.”
“You locked your keys in the car.”
“They closed the freeway.”
“You couldn’t shoot straight.”
“You showed up with a .410.”
“You showed up with three friends.”
At the end of each season, the hunters would order caps with the number of limits embroidered on the canvas.
Their guide on most of the trips was Robert Korenek, and he described what might have been the toughest hunt.
“A cold front hit with 45 mph winds,” Korenek said. “The ducks were stopping short in the pond — they couldn’t get to our spread. I said “”Grab your guns, we’re going to the corner of the lake. They pass shot their limits.”
Korenek praised the abilities of the hunters.
“They are good hunters — and good shooters,” he said. “That makes a big difference.”
But even the best shooters have an off day.
“We’ve had to share shells a few times,” Perry said.
The streak almost ended around limit 130.
“We left the lake one bird short, but there was one cripple we couldn’t find,” Mercer said. “We thought it was over. Then we found the duck on the way out.”
And the choice of duck species suffered some. Most hunts lasted less than 30 minutes, but some were more difficult.
“We’ve shot plenty of spoonies,” Perry said. “And ruddy ducks.”
But they shot some interesting species as well.
We shot a ringed teal that must have gotten lost in Argentina,” Perry said. “And a surf scoter last year,” Mercer added.
The most banded ducks came in one year.
“One year, we got 10 bands,” Mercer said. “I got all three types of teal with bands.”
It’s been a few years since the pair has brought down a banded duck, but they don’t seem to mind. Nor do they seem to mind the cost of the adventure. Mostly they just praised the area they hunt — and the 75-plus separate ponds over the thousands of acres of prime duck and goose habitat.
“There’s no other place in the U.S. where you could do this,” Perry said.
Mercer agreed, and he should know. He’s hunted birds all over the world.
“This is the most consistent area for wild birds,” he said.
The hunters bagged their limits early on the morning of Dec. 11. Korenek, again the guide, showed obvious relief.
Were the hunters relieved enough, having reached the milestone, to take a day off or let the streak end?
“No, we’ll keep going,” Perry said. “I’m going until I drop — you’ll know I’m done when I’m under the ground.
“And I’m making a special cap this year. With the number 500.”
Sherrill, never at a loss for words, shook his head.
“I told them it was impossible,” he said. “I was wrong.”
And the friends were back the next day. It was on the schedule.
And, of course, they shot their limits.
The 12-year journey
Limit Date
100 Thurs., Sept. 27, 2001
200 Tues., Dec. 9, 2003
300 Wed., Sept. 13, 2006
400 Sun. Nov. 2, 2008
500 Sat. Dec. 11, 2010
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Originally Posted by Rubberhead*
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