Arrived Thursday....35 degrees and pretty calm...took a wildlife drive and saw tons and tons of birds...thought we would leave them be until the rest of our gang showed up the following morning. Friday was a bit windy and a tad bit cooler, but not a bad day, considering it was January. Didn't plan on it, but I ran into a neighboring farmer who said that his dad was organizing a hunt at noon, and that we were welcome...I always accept their invite, as the ground they have is usually loaded with birds, which was the case. We were part of large group, but that is one way to effectively hunt this late in the season. When it was all done, I believe we hunted 4 different pieces of CRP, probably saw 1000+ birds, and the group got its limit. Really nice guys we got hooked up with, about 1/3 who I knew, and the rest I didn't, but all were super guys...very safe, too, which is key.
Saturday was tough...very, very windy, creating wind chills that were hard to tolerate. Hunted one farm in the a.m., and the five of us killed 7 birds by eleven thirty. Saw very few birds until one of our gang wandered through the silos and grain bins which are interspersed with some cover....many, many hundreds of birds poured out of this tiny area, creating some fast shooting for those of us close to this area...I killed four, three of which were shot within about 15 seconds of each other. Ended the season with some better shooting than I had exhibited in the prior couple of days, which is nice...I had missed some easy shots in the prior several days of hunting.
When we concluded the big group hunt on Friday, we were standing around bs'ng and I felf some movement in my vest...I handed my gun to another hunter (who now had 2 in his hands) and I reached in and found the live bird...I guess I had him by the tail as I pulled him out of my vest...he was flapping like crazy, and he won! He left me with a a handful of tailfeathers as he flew away, flying directly over a pickup which had 8 of our hunters sitting in the bed, all unable to shoot as they had unloaded by now. The bird flew away, which means he was the first bird that my younger PL brought to me when I entered this field, as I watched my dog chase it down...I assumed it was a cripple, but it must have been a healthy bird that held too long and got grabbed by the dog. It was a good way to end the hunt, everybody got a good chuckle out of it.
2008 was another great season, although the last 3 trips (all Dec) were shortened by blizzards or inclement weather...hasn't been like this for awhile...got spoiled, I guess! It was great getting to hunt with Uncle Buck on this last outing, as well as a "lurker" from PC as well as this website who is from SE SD and whom pheasants fear like you cannot believe! Hope 2009 is a great year for all of you...BB.
bummer!
