2015-16 Hunting Reports & Pictures

I have been out hunting 1 day on the weekend for the last three weeks down in sw and it has been going very good. Have been seeing a lot of birds every time out and have been shooting well. The dogs have both been working great and the birds have been holding tight.
 
Nice pics miller56001 was out a few weekends ago sw and bagged a woodcock also on a great point was a but surprised thought for sure Hawk had a Rooster pinned.

Pic #2 land looks a tad familiar :thumbsup:

:10sign:
 
Nice work! We will be heading down to SW MN at the beginning of December. Havent been down there yet this year, as I normally go about an hour north of the cities for "day" hunts. Heading out to Dakota next week for 5 days on our annual big trip. Hopefully get the fridge restocked.
 
Headed to SW MN this weekend with 2 other guys. Will have my 11 month old lab and Cousins 1 1/2 year old lab, so couple young dogs but will be fun to watch them live and learn :) We'll see how it plays out on public land with the 2nd weekend of deer, however I went down this same weekend last year and was actually pretty quiet deer hunter wise. Will let you know how it goes.
 
I'll be out this weekend as well four guys one being my old man. I know with deer open it does limit some areas but I have always had no problem finding birds or places to hunt. If you see an orange army doing a drive move on. Plenty of land, in some cases I feel it helps move birds walk slow let the dog/dogs work.

Happy Hunting Rooooster!

:cheers:
 
I went out to a WMA about an hour from Minneapolis yesterday as I only had a couple of hours to hunt as I had to be back for the afternoon. Managed to see one rooster. I thought I had hit it hard with my second shot and watched it go down, but the dog nor I ever found it. :mad:
 
I hate loosing birds! Still amazes me that you can double tap them and they still run away. I'm headed out tomorrow close to home for a quick morning hunt with a buddy and my daughter. Hope to see a few birds with her.
 
Been a while since I reported in this thread. I've been out 2 or 3 mornings the past 3 weeks. I've seen more birds than last year, but they've been out of range or I've missed (my spaniel has not been happy with me lately). I've also passed up on a couple birds because I'm trying to help my pointer learn that pointed birds equal birds in her mouth, but she's getting better.

I'm hoping to get out some over the weekend. I haven't hunted an evening yet this year, which is when I've had success in the past so I'm hoping for that this weekend.
 
Friday the 13th was a fine day to be out Minnesota pheasant hunting. Was in my area before 9AM and noticed just three deer hunters out in the field. Two on stand and one walking. Looked like more deer hunters were heading out around 3 - 3:30.

Hunted four spots. First up was last year's honey hole. It does not look like much, but I shot birds there every time visited. Nothing. Dog birdy twice, but nothing flushed.

Next three spots were all first time visits (for me). Moved birds at all three and had plenty of points where the birds moved and could not be relocated. I could hear them running in a small cattail slough at one spot. I would say most birds simply were not going to fly today.

The last spot we hit at 2:30. A spot that does not look overly promising and your mind says it has been walked countless times already. A couple birds flushed early on the crop edge. Old dog is tired from a few days of hunting (waterfowling out of state) and a little out of sorts. As we make the turn and head back around she works hard using the cross-wind as her guide along another field edge. A couple false points. Then she really locks up and I could tell by her eyes the birds is right there. I walk up to her and nothing ... she breaks and instead of going further up the edge ... she circles back behind me and locks up again. As I approach her (within 5 feet) a nice rooster explodes out of the grass between us. Boom - rooster down and time to go home ... Me :) Dogs :(


There appeared to be plenty of pheasant hunters out and about, but I noticed none of them were getting out of their truck and walk. Saw ONE truck parked at a public area the entire time I was hunting. No other areas ever had a vehicle parked, nor did I see hunters out walking ...:confused:
 
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BRITTMAN said:
Friday the 13th was a fine day to be out Minnesota pheasant hunting. Was in my area before 9AM and noticed just three deer hunters out in the field. Two on stand and one walking. Looked like more deer hunters were heading out around 3 - 3:30.

Hunted four spots. First up was last year's honey hole. It does not look like much, but I shot birds there every time visited. Nothing. Dog birdy twice, but nothing flushed.

Next three spots were all first time visits (for me). Moved birds at all three and had plenty of points where the birds moved and could not be relocated. I could hear them running in a small cattail slough at one spot. I would say most birds simply were not going to fly today.

The last spot we hit at 2:30. A spot that does not look overly promising and your mind says it has been walked countless times already. A couple birds flushed early on the crop edge. Old dog is tired from a few days of hunting (waterfowling out of state) and a little out of sorts. As we make the turn and head back around she works hard using the cross-wind as her guide along another field edge. A couple false points. Then she really locks up and I could tell by her eyes the birds is right there. I walk up to her and nothing ... she breaks and instead of going further up the edge ... she circles back behind me and locks up again. As I approach her (within 5 feet) a nice rooster explodes out of the grass between us. Boom - rooster down and time to go home ... Me :) Dogs :(


There appeared to be plenty of pheasant hunters out and about, but I noticed none of them were getting out of their truck and walk. Saw ONE truck parked at a public area the entire time I was hunting. No other areas ever had a vehicle parked, nor did I see hunters out walking ...:confused:
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So do you think the rooster ran around and back behind you? Sneaky SOBs!
 
Yes.

I have watched pheasants run across a plowed corn field as hunters walked the creek in the middle.

We have watched two guys and a springer hunt into a dried slough along a road. Pheasants were running out of the slough and across the road right in front of our truck.

They run, hold, flush - never know
 
Got out yesterday around Cosmos and put in some good mileage walking! Managed 2 birds between myself and my brother-in-law and had 3 more roosters bust just out of range. Birds seemed to just want to run and my lab wasn't tracking the runners like she had been. For only being 16 months old I couldn't be happier with her progress! All in all a great day to be out and already looking forward to getting out next weekend.

Saw something pretty amusing on the drive home, it looked like a hunter had decided to just sit right on the gravel road outside of his car hoping for a rooster to come out for gravel. That's a new one for me, but maybe it works?!?
 
Put up 11 birds in 2 hours today. Should have had my 2. Got one and took the feathers off the tail of another. Saw a few more roosters but not shootable. Pretty happy with what we saw in two hours. Heeded out Tuesday threw Thursday this week. Hope the rain holds of during the day.
 
tuma said:
Birds seemed to just want to run
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That's all I've been seeing for almost this entire season. The birds are doing whatever they can to not fly. We have had several LONG chases and 2 roosters that my dog has even caught this year. Got out twice this weekend for really quick hour long hunts close to home. We saw 3 roosters, and each did the same thing. Really long chases, then they came to a random tree, bush, or shrub, and circled back around and flushed out of the opposite side never giving me a shot.
 
Hello all,
This is my first time posting! I have been out of pheasant hunting for four years and this weekend was my first hunt in awhile. My experience is the following and my 10 year old black lab has the same experience........... One SD trip in 2009, three game farm trips, and two trips around the cabin (Alexandria).

This past weekend a buddy, myself, and my dog went out in central MN and had little luck. Flushed two hen's all weekend. I would say my dog is a natural born hunter like most dogs. Has great instincts but I would truly say he's a better waterfowl dog than a pheasant dog. He got real birdie about 5 times (two flushed hens). I did notice that the two hen's the dog flushed were holding tight, real tight, so it might be a problem that we passed over some birds.......

Unfortunately we were forced to hunt large pieces of land. We would walk together along the edges of cut corn and just edges in general. We tried to go slow to allow dog to thoroughly hunt the land. We would then go to ponds/cattails and walk along the outside. Was this just bad luck for two hens or are we doing something wrong?

Finally, when I duck hunt I hear pheasants crowing all the time, I noticed when I was hunting both Saturday and Sunday I didn't hear any of that. Is that just a morning/night type of thing or do they make some noise during the day as well.

I appreciate all the help.
 
Weekend trip SW MN went okay, weather was great but VERY WET due to the recent rains, which threw somewhat of a wrench in our plans! A couple of my spots were flooded and not walkable, or if they were it was only the edges. The others were manageable and we were able to find birds in those areas. Didn't seem to be anything in low grass and I believe they were running in the high grass (seems to be the case with others too from what I've read). However we were finding luck at small pockets of random shrubs trees we stumbled upon. Bird(s) seemed to move into these small thick pockets anytime they felt pressure. We started to basically surround any small pocket of tall shrub/trees and let dogs work. Seemed to produce a flush more often than not. Starting to really click with my 11 mo old chocolate so really cool to see. Hoping to get him more live reps and time afield as the season goes on. Probably won?t see the field again until black Friday weekend, the start of my favorite time of the season ;) Pic is of our 7 birds, of course should have had our limit if we could hit anything. 5 public 2 private. Thought I had my shot mastered after the way I shot last season, this season has proved that to be a fluke :cool:

On another note, we stumbled upon a massive 10 pt buck that looked to have been dead about a week. Looked like it had been shot and wounded opening weekend and never found. Such a waste of a nice buck. I would be thrilled with a buck like that any day of the week.
 
ynneb9 said:
Hello all,
This is my first time posting! I have been out of pheasant hunting for four years and this weekend was my first hunt in awhile. My experience is the following and my 10 year old black lab has the same experience........... One SD trip in 2009, three game farm trips, and two trips around the cabin (Alexandria).

This past weekend a buddy, myself, and my dog went out in central MN and had little luck. Flushed two hen's all weekend. I would say my dog is a natural born hunter like most dogs. Has great instincts but I would truly say he's a better waterfowl dog than a pheasant dog. He got real birdie about 5 times (two flushed hens). I did notice that the two hen's the dog flushed were holding tight, real tight, so it might be a problem that we passed over some birds.......

Unfortunately we were forced to hunt large pieces of land. We would walk together along the edges of cut corn and just edges in general. We tried to go slow to allow dog to thoroughly hunt the land. We would then go to ponds/cattails and walk along the outside. Was this just bad luck for two hens or are we doing something wrong?

Finally, when I duck hunt I hear pheasants crowing all the time, I noticed when I was hunting both Saturday and Sunday I didn't hear any of that. Is that just a morning/night type of thing or do they make some noise during the day as well.

I appreciate all the help.
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What city were you by? Generally area? Sounds like to me you were doing everything pretty well. Might be a little bit of a location issue.
 
Look at precip maps from the last couple weeks and you would know where he was (generally speaking). There was some localized flooding in SW MN a week or two ago.

Most areas of SW MN absorbed any rainfall. Roads dusty, ditches dry ... well I suppose until this week ...
 
Tbear said:
What city were you by? Generally area? Sounds like to me you were doing everything pretty well. Might be a little bit of a location issue.
Click to expand...

We were just a little west and south of Sauk Centre and we did one small hunt south of Alexandria.
 
Oops. Commented on the wrong post. Thinking rain - not tough luck.

Anyways the SC to Alex area is OK pheasant country. Need to talk to FCS to see if he will share ...

I have done OK around there, but it does get pounded (public) and my best luck usually is early season (uneducated) or very late season (snow reduces available cover).

I run Brittanys and if we are on a larger tract, they can stretch out ... they either pin 'em or they flush wild out of range.
 
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