Coot isn’t bad, just make sure and get all the fat off of them.

Coots are good...just make sure and get ALL of the fat and skin off of the breast. I soak the breast fillets in buttermilk for 24 hours...wrap em in bacon and season with Montreal Steak seasoning...then grill em till the bacon is done. Pretty dang tasty!

Several time. They have big gizzard which is tasty. They also make a good gumbo.

I have heard of cajuns making pouldeau gumbo which is Coot meat. I didn't seriously think they'd be good to eat. Wish I had known. I probably killed about 20 last night. Sounded like hail hitting the bottom of my boat.

Hell ya we eat coots. Cut the breasts out and clean that big ole gizzard. Cooked down in a black iron pot or a gumbo. Make a puppy pull a freight train. Them mergansers taste way to much like pelican for me. Don't like it.

I got in touch with him. Gonna send him a wood duck or two and the rotten fish duck

You won’t be disappointed. He does jam up work.

You will be pleased, he's done several for me.

Upper Midwest, they make jerky out of the mergansers, it's probably the only way I would eat it. When it comes to Coot, I can't get past their smell.

Years ago when I still duck hunted, we killed 2 hen mergansers and that was all we shot that morning. We were just kids really. Maybe early 20s.
There was an old man at the boat ramp when we got back. He was eyeballing those mergansers hard.
“Is that what they call a wood duck?” he asked.
“I reckon it is,” I said.
It was like Christmas Eve or the day before.
The old man wanted the birds and we let him have them.
“I’m going to have my wife make dressing out of them,” he said. Thanks
Now she may have been a spectacular cook and it might have turned out beautifully. But I’ve always envisioned a horrorible stench coming off that merganser dressing on Christmas morning.

Well that just seems a little lousy to me

Was hunting with a guide in Arkansas years back and we had some coots swimming out around the decoys and jokingly he asked if we wanted a limit of those as well. We laughed it off and he told us he has a group of Cajuns a few days prior that was passing on mallards to shoot the coots that would swim in. He said they was tickeled to death with their limits of coots. It was a fairly expensive guide too. I told him if he ran across anyone else wanting a guided colt hunt to send them to the big G and I’d hook the up for a few $$$.

Don’t knock em till you try them. Did a blind taste test of coot to wood duck and my wife picked the coot. Ugly goofy looking bird but they do eat good. Give em a try, you will be surprised

Mergansers on the other hand.......no bueno

Best thing to do with a hoodie is breast it out and use it for catfish bait. Then eat the catfish.