Setting a goal and finally making it happen is a satisfying experience. Especially when the goal is something unconventional. But for hunting friends Anthony Mackey, 46, of Noble, and Aaron Milligan, 58, of Norman, they’ve got “unconventional” in the bag.

The game bag, that is.

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Don P. Brown

These two set out on a quest in 2014. Their hunting goal was to harvest a bird from every category listed on the federal Harvest Information Program permit, an annual federal survey required to be filled out by most migratory bird hunters across the nation.

That means they would need to take duck, goose, dove, woodcock, rail/gallinule, and snipe/coot. And they wanted all of it to occur in Oklahoma.

“Not everyone will understand, think this is a big deal or even care,” Mackey wrote on Facebook. “But to us, this is.

“Well it started in 2014, with two snipe. I’d only seen snipe in a book. I’d been ‘snipe hunting’ as a kid in Boy Scouts. Then I’d always thought to myself, ‘I’m going to get one of those snipes I’ve seen in a book’ – I actually know it exists." 

So, on a duck hunt that fall, on a small public lake, the two men happened to get within range of a pair of snipes. Each of them fired and bagged a bird.

Since they first met at their workplace in 2009, the two have been on some interesting hunts, Milligan said. “One thing I’ve found about hunting: It’s not always easy to find somebody who likes to hunt the way you do and hunt the things that you do. And this little adventure we went on is kind of a case in point. A lot of people would not want to participate in something like that. 

“We are always up for something different, some kind of adventure. I’ve always been interested in variety. I like to catch fish I haven’t caught. I like to hunt things and go places I haven’t been.” 

So, Milligan decided after getting the snipe, he would pursue a rail.

“You’re not going to find much if you Google ‘rail hunting in Oklahoma.’ But you can talk to the folks at the Wildlife Department, and you can get some real information.” 

State biologists suggested a successful rail hunt could be had at Hackberry Flat Wildlife Management Area. So the two men headed to southwestern Oklahoma in September 2015. They took seven sora rails that day. 

 

Watch It on TV

Watch Anthony Mackey and Aaron Milligan on a waterfowl hunt as they try to complete their quest to bag one bird in each of the categories listed on the federal Harvest Information Program permit. 

During the drive home from Hackberry, the men began talking about the birds listed on the HIP. Each had already taken ducks, geese, coots, snipes, rails and doves. It was then they decided to make it their goal to be able to check every category on the survey, and what they needed was gallinule and woodcock. “We started calling it the HIP quest or the goony bird slam.” 

Next on the list was gallinule, but the timing wasn’t right and they had to wait until 2016. With tips from the biologist at Red Slough WMA, the hunters drove nearly four hours to the public hunting area that seems out of place in Oklahoma. They encountered fire ants, angry wasps, cottonmouths and alligators. But within 15 minutes, each of them had bagged a common gallinule, Mackey said. 

“So we got the rails, got the snipe, got the gallinules. We were still kind of in disbelief that we’d done it and fairly easily to that point. And then came the woodcock. And that’s when things kind of really slowed down.” They hunted five times for woodcock over the next two years, with no luck.

Milligan said, “Honestly I was starting to think maybe the woodcock just wasn’t going to be. You’d think with all the miles we’d walked that we’d kick one up eventually. I guess we are just easily entertained.” 

But Mackey said each encouraged the other. “You are never going to get it done if you don’t go try. We figured it was going to be a lot of work.” 

Finally they heard some talk of woodcocks being seen at Heyburn WMA. In late November 2018, they made the trip. Walking through a forested thicket, a woodcock flushed into the air. And neither man fired a shot. 

“It was probably because we were both flabbergasted” by actually seeing a woodcock, Mackey said. 

They followed the bird, flushed it again, but both of them missed. 

After several more rounds of walking in the woods, Milligan was heading back to the truck and he caught sight of a woodcock ahead of him. The bird jumped up and BOOM! The HIP quest cam to a successful end for Milligan. The next week, Mackey took his first woodcock, finishing the quest for himself.

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Don P. Brown

One of each of the various HIP birds taken for this first quest will end up in a mounted display, Mackey said. As for the rest of the birds, Milligan said, “all these birds make fine table fare.” 

He said they had to educate themselves a lot during their quest. “It took us a lot of places, places we probably would have never hunted. We talked to a lot of people we probably would have never talked to. 

You always come home with memories. You never know what you’re going to see. It’s all the other things in between the shooting that make the story, that make the memory. 

“It was an adventure. A lot of people think it is maybe kind of goofy. But we thought it was great. We were a little bit persistent, a lot lucky, and we had a lot of help.” Mackey agreed. 

“We lamented our misery,” he quipped, “But it was really a lot of fun. 

“And to make it even more special, we did it all on public land, and all in Oklahoma. And we did it together.”