I had a good/great duck season this year, the last 3 hunts sucked a little because I went into a shooting slump. Missed a few ducks yesterday but ended up with 3 mallards so can't complain too much. And my dog made a memorable "retrieve" that really helped keep my mood up, I would have been pissed if I lost a mallard on the last day. There were very few dumb mallards flying yesterday, almost every flock that circled got further each pass and then left. And a noticeable lack of singles didn't help. I took a high shot and hit a drake pretty good, but he managed to fly off about 150 yards and die. I tried hard to get a good mark but was partially blocked by some trees, it looked like he hit near the edge of a thicket along the edge of the Rio. I was hoping he fell in the open spot in a dried up channel, but after looking around for several minutes in that area with no luck I sent my dog into the thicket, which was mostly a line of Russian olives and salt cedar. Several trips into the thicket and no duck. I was beginning to think my mark was off, so we walked back to the blind and tried replaying it over in my head. I convinced myself my bearing was pretty good, but still not sure of the distance. So we went back and tried everything over again, first looking at the more open (but still grassy) spots. Then sent dog into thicket again. After a few minutes it looked like she was getting birdy, circling around in one spot, but still no duck. Then she started whining, which usually means she can see or smell a duck, but for some reason can't get to it. So I clawed through the edge of the thicket, which opened up a little bit, to find my dog looking up into the trees. About 4 seasons ago this happened in some willows; a mallard I shot helicoptered down and got stuck about 8-10 feet up. That time she smelled, and eventually saw the duck, I was able to knock the duck down with my gun barrel. This time she was intently looking up into the trees but could not see the duck. In fact it took me several minutes of looking around before I finally saw the duck 15-20 feet up in the very top of a Russian olive tree. There was a slight breeze, and the duck was also about 10 yards upwind of where my dog was concentrating on. The duck was wedged into a forked branch pretty good. I tried shooting the branch in half, 4 shots later the branch was free, but it fell about 5 feet and got stuck again. At that point I sawed down a long skinny willow and was able to knock the duck loose. So Good Dog! She just turned 9, and is only showing slight signs of slowing down, just sore after a few hunts early in the season. I guess next year will be a real test though.