A5 Sweet 16
Well-known member
So fantastic habitat got a bunch of pheasants through winter last year, such that this has been an awfully good season, at least for me. Ace & I caught up with this yellow dog & her boy for a private land hunt on Sunday. It was about 15 degrees with a 30 mph wind, & we were only in about 5" of snow. It was my only legit private land hunt of the season.
The first spot had tons of pheasants (& if leg-breaking holes are any indication, a very healthy badger population in a thin shelterbelt). The spot had been hunted a few times this season & is adjacent to a large WPA. No doubt all of the pheasants have spent considerable time on the WPA & are essentially public land birds. Pretty experienced in the ways of hunters & their goofy dogs. We found the pheasants in the cattails, but even hunting into that wind, the vast majority ran &/or busted out of range. Only 3 gave us decent shots in nearly 2 hrs of hunting.
The 2nd spot was night & day different. It's surrounded by quite a bit of pheasanty private ground & had only been hunted once this season....in October. It too had lots of pheasants, many of which flushed wild, but not NEAR as wild as the first spot. We cleaned up our remaining 3 in 20 minutes & probably should've been done even more quickly.
Anyhow, it was a great day, marked by many pheasants, WIND!!, great dogs, & plenty of sophomoric conversation & laughter. It was a testament to habitat & a textbook example of the differences between super smart wild pheasants & ones that really hadn't played the hunting game much before, if at all.
The first spot had tons of pheasants (& if leg-breaking holes are any indication, a very healthy badger population in a thin shelterbelt). The spot had been hunted a few times this season & is adjacent to a large WPA. No doubt all of the pheasants have spent considerable time on the WPA & are essentially public land birds. Pretty experienced in the ways of hunters & their goofy dogs. We found the pheasants in the cattails, but even hunting into that wind, the vast majority ran &/or busted out of range. Only 3 gave us decent shots in nearly 2 hrs of hunting.
The 2nd spot was night & day different. It's surrounded by quite a bit of pheasanty private ground & had only been hunted once this season....in October. It too had lots of pheasants, many of which flushed wild, but not NEAR as wild as the first spot. We cleaned up our remaining 3 in 20 minutes & probably should've been done even more quickly.
Anyhow, it was a great day, marked by many pheasants, WIND!!, great dogs, & plenty of sophomoric conversation & laughter. It was a testament to habitat & a textbook example of the differences between super smart wild pheasants & ones that really hadn't played the hunting game much before, if at all.
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