Ok how do ya'll get pintails down?

Several days this season I've had lots of pintail high overhead but won't come down. Everywhere from singles to large groups. I don't have a ton of pintail decoys, but run around 70 decoys with a solid mix of mallard, teal, scattered puddle ducks, and divers. Tried with and without mojos and wonderducks. Tried not calling at all, giving them some quacks, and with and without a pin whistle. They just won't come commit! Over 150 ducks down this year, majority being GWT, Bluebill, Mallard, Gads. So whatever I'm doing isn't completely wrong. Are these just 'dumb ducks and I'm screwing something up?'

I've shot quite a few pintails but in my limited experience they've got to come in early and if they are circling might as well forget it. Circle, circle, circle, circle...leave

Supposedly on the coast they decoy great.

More bluebill, redhead/canvasback, pintail decoys, less mallards and teal.

Rifle

I have shot 95% of my pintails over a dozen pintail decoys and 2-4 bluebill decoys. I rarely get pintails to come in with mallard decoys but do get a few to come in with widgeon and teal decoys. This year has been weird though as I have yet to shoot a pintail and have only seen a handful. I have also only shot 1 mallard this year where as I usually shoot quite a few.

If pintails don't come in the moment they see your deeks, then they know something is up. They will circle your deeks many times while laughing and pointing, and then leave. I have never seen pintails circle a spread and then commit. It has always been circle, circle, circle, circle, gone.
However, I have had a group of pintails circling and then a separate pair of pintails shows up and comes right in.

Kinghunter - do you still get other other ducks coming in with a pintail/Bluebill only setup?

Exbellicus- I do but they usually land near the bluebill decoys not the pintails. I put the pintails off to one side then a hole then the bluebills off to the other side. I have also put 4-5 widgeon decoys with the bluebills and the pintails still come in pretty good usually.

I've definitely had pintails come in, but like others said usually smaller groups or pairs. One of the best years for pintail for me was an area that was loaded with them- we would throw out a few pairs ~30 yards off from the main group of decoys and these lone pairs were pintail magnets.

Awesome, thanks guys. I'll add some pintail decoys to my off-season list.

I wonder how many opportunities I miss without pintail decoys. I'm N Tex too, not the coast or anything, seem to shoot plenty of pintails every year coming into mallard or gadwall decoys. I will agree with Bluesea, if they see something they will circle forever and then leave. 90% of the hunters I see don't hide well, can't hold still and call like a fool, and I think that has way more to do with it than having pintail decoys. Especially if it's a bigger group of them they do seem to be wary birds, but not impossible by any means. We've shot 2 on each of our last 3 hunts out, 1 pair, and the others out of groups 10-12.

The ones that are a mile in the sky have their minds made up about where they want to go and there's not much you can do to change their minds. If they're flying low they're usually pretty easy to decoy but, like multiple people above have said, if they start circling and look pretty skeptical they will usually hit the road or land way outside your dekes. If that is the case you just have to wait and hope they'll circle directly in front of you / overhead and give you a clean shot.

spooney, teal and ringneck decoys, with 2 pintailbutts and 2 pulsators have been my drug of choice this season and it was highly effective. I like them small decoys as they show a bunch of white and they bounce around when less windy.

Barely used mallard, wigeon, red, or cans this season

https://youtu.be/RJhuieEgsSg

Try you one of these..

^^^This^^^
Grandson and I went this weekend, very limited on time. Pulled a few dead trees to the shoreline to hide. LST ducks everywhere! Because no dog we were choosing our shots carefully. Ducks were pouring into the decoys, Pintails everywhere. When it became light enough to see well, they stopped. Then we saw the X on the X with a temp blind. Went there without decoys. Birds wouldn't land on X while standing in blind, they landed in our decoys. After kneeling in the blind at the X, they started landing on the X again. So concealment is very important, more so than we realized.

We shoot our pintails every hunt but there are tons in the area(Gulf Coast). I would say that the biggest thing is being where they want to be. Second is concealment. Make sure you are very well concealed. When its a big flight remember that each duck has a pair of eye balls and they can see almost 340 degrees so just because they are "flying away" don't move.

Don't look up

Are you hunting with black painted plastic bottles for decoys?

Hunted this weekend in Oklahoma. Had 50 ducks in the decoys over the course of the morning on Saturday. All but 4 were pintails.

Drove my dog nuts. I've always put a group of about 8-12 pintail drakes with a handful hens off to the side separate from the rest of my spread.

This weekend we only had 3 pintail decoys but had them about 40-50 yards upwind from our biggest group of decoys. Most of the pintails flew just outside the bigger group and lit in the vicinity of the pintail trio.

I think they may have just been leary of the bigger spread this late in the season and felt more comfortable with the small group though.

Shoot em on the first pass bc if they aren't landing they aren't gonna!

We had the best luck on pintails setting up with spreads that were heavy on pintails plus widgeon and gadwalls. No mallards or any other ducks.

The best season we had hunting them in the late season we set out two pairs of pintails and then two bufflehead drakes upwind to give them something to look towards. 6 dekes in Dec and Jan and you couldn't keep them out.

We see tons of pins at my big lakes. Both spots have put blinds in the open water. I run 12 pin decs 20 yards upwind if my pit and 4-5 20-30 yards 90 degrees to one side or the other. I put 4-6 can and ringneck decs downwind. This puts em swinging/approaching right on top. Sometimes they circle 20x but they usually leave minus a few buddies. Every other species we have in Centex comes to this setup.

For the most part, pintails are going to do what they want to do, and it's usually not how you plan on it happening. Larger groups are much harder to trick. Seen far more pintail this season than I have in years past, and they almost always come in large flocks of 50+. I was guiding a group this past Saturday and we saw a couple hundred pintail that didn't even want to give us a look. Very next day we had them dang near breaking their wings as they fell from the heavens into the spread. I've had them flare instantly the first sound of a whistle, and the very next day wouldn't commit unless I stayed on the whistle non-stop until they put their feet down.

The good news however is that there are a few things that you CAN control. Being on the X is the first. Running traffic on pintails usually won't work. Also, make sure you're hidden perfectly. Last, make sure your spread is setup correctly. That's a recipe for success on any hunt, but holds more true for the pinnies. If all that still doesn't work, then you can probably chalk it up to pintail acting like pintail

They don't circle in west tx

Thoughts on hens - are the crucial for a pintail spread or would a dozen drakes do it? Can they really tell the difference between a mallard or gadwall hen?11

Shot more pintails this year than ever in N Tx. Concealment number one. Motion important. They responded better to pintail call as well. Just have to see how respond. Don’t think shot any with feet down. Typically on second pass. They usually haul arse by 3rd+

Smaller spreads-pared up and matched ducks- 2-4 types of motion nearly every hunt 12-25 dekes on water dependent on scouting results. Less birds less dekes etc

Cloudy days and no blinds no good. Sun vs wind always better- both typically home run- even with low duck numbers- later season get creative. Try larger number dekes were not hunting- set up handful and motion on were you believe X is- hunt south side open water with North setup with north wind etc. cross wind better than from back.

All I use are drakes. My experience is you won’t shoot any pintails if you don’t have pintail deeks. Concealment is very important, but not like mallards, just to put in perspective. But they come strong second. I have seen them flying high and slow like the OP posted, and they do seem to bust you that way. I used to see that on my lease a lot, not sure they had plans to land any way, never shot many on my lease. North Texas, they do work, and circle a lot before they commit, and I have seen them just come straight in. They will work a whole area. I had few hunts this season I could have shot a pile of pintails.