That was quite the shindig Friday night in Coteau when nearly 100 people showed up for Gordie White’s 37th Duck Wake.

Names of the attendees read like a who’s who in and around New Iberia and included a former secretary of the state Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, Joe Herring of Baton Rouge.

White said he and Herring met about three decades ago at a Ducks Unlimited national convention in New Orleans.

They have been good friends ever since and the latter has been a regular at the Duck Wakes.

“It’s been a lot of years since New Orleans,” White said.

The latest event was held at the Francis Romero Recreation Center. Outside, near the front door, there were two gumbo pots in use under the watchful eyes of White and many of the local lawyer’s friends who were eager to mourn the passing of another waterfowl hunting season.

There could have been an impromptu court session inside the hall with a number of lawyers, including Jacques Cousin of New Iberia, and Judge

John Conery of Franklin on hand for the Duck Wake. And James “Dusty” Rhodes, an

enforcement agent with the state Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, recently featured as a prep football videographer in The Daily Iberian’s Profiles 2012 /Celebrate Our Community series on People / Neighbors, was there, too.

Marty Delaune of New Iberia, who hunted ducks this past season with Dr. Darryl Elias Sr. of New Iberia on Onion Lake near Intracoastal City, took many photos of people at the event with his trusty digital camera.

Herring also took photos, as he always does, with his own trusty camera.

“Ask him what camera he uses,” White said with a chuckle.

Herring said, with pride in his voice, “A four ninety-five Brownie.”

Duck hunters, naturally, dominated the crowd. They talked about the successes of the past season and the near misses.

The common denominator was White, who in 1975 towed his young son Eric White to the inaugural Duck Wake.

“We’ve got people here tonight who were here for the first Duck Wake — Harry Anderson (of Avery Island), Anthony Duplantis (of Lafayette) and

Earl Roy (of Baton Rouge, who had to leave before the aromatic chicken and sausage gumbo was served),” White said.

Benny Lissard of Loreauville has been to his share of Duck Wakes. The 81-yearold retired teacher and head baseball coach at Loreauville High School made the small wooden coffin that carries the mounted duck inside so many years ago.

Lissard talked about how good the duck hunting was this past season in the Atchafalaya Basin. But waterfowling dropped off when the water level fell, he said, so then he hunted ducks on Lake Dauterive-Fausse Pointe.

“We did all right there,” he said, “but we had choices (species) in the Basin.”

The duck hunting on the lake petered out the last two weeks, he said, and now he was grieving the loss of another duck hunting season. What a way to go.