2022 Road side counts

I always take the roadside count with a grain of salt but I always read it and wait for it come September. I think it will be spotty based on location. Where I hunt, last year we saw A LOT of hens. Almost an annoying amount of hens. So if they had good rearing success as the report mentions, I anticipate my local area will be good this year.
 
Munster927 said:
I think it will be spotty based on location.
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I hunt the east-central zone and the count there has literally never been this rosy. Its almost always forecasted to be "poor" in that zone because its "non-traditional" pheasant habitat.

I've had fantastic pheasant hunting there for over 20 years now and rarely see another hunter. I also turkey hunt that area in the spring and heard a fair amount of rooster cackling every morning I was in the turkey blind.
 
gimruis said:
I hunt the east-central zone and the count there has literally never been this rosy. Its almost always forecasted to be "poor" in that zone because its "non-traditional" pheasant habitat.

I've had fantastic pheasant hunting there for over 20 years now and rarely see another hunter. I also turkey hunt that area in the spring and heard a fair amount of rooster cackling every morning I was in the turkey blind.
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Gim, I know you've said you hunt private in your area, but is there much public around where you hunt? I don't need to know where you're at exactly but I've looked in that east central zone before and don't see much public in that area really. At least not pheasant type pieces of public, more swamp and forest type WMAs. The few pieces I do see that look like pheasant habitat, I worry about making the 1.5 to 2 hour drive to find someone else is there and wasted my time.
 
-47% Change from long-term average won't stop me from getting out, but kinda sucks as the report sounds so promising, until you read into it.
 
mnbirdchaser said:
-47% Change from long-term average won't stop me from getting out, but kinda sucks as the report sounds so promising, until you read into it.
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I think the change from the long term average has probably been negative for over 10 years maybe much longer? It's just like the Mille Lacs walleye numbers, they will likely never be what they used to, because the lake has changed. This will be my 4th year seriously hunting pheasants. To me the counts look really good. I will be out every day I can.
 
Long-term average goes back to the 50's when birds were like locusts and they were killing 1M+ each season. There was also the more recent boom in the 2000s.

The 20% over the 10-year average is more meaningful relative to the 'new normal' - takes out those prior 'boom' periods that inflated expectations.
 
Did a scouting trip saturday morning to the area we hunt for opener and we were shocked at the numbers we saw. Every spot we scouted we saw numerous birds and broods on the roads, needless to say we are pretty pumped for opening day. I even took a walk with the dogs this morning about 20 mins from home and put up 10 birds in a little over a hour of walking on a small wpa.
 
waterdog09 said:
Did a scouting trip saturday morning to the area we hunt for opener and we were shocked at the numbers we saw. Every spot we scouted we saw numerous birds and broods on the roads, needless to say we are pretty pumped for opening day. I even took a walk with the dogs this morning about 20 mins from home and put up 10 birds in a little over a hour of walking on a small wpa.
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You might want to read up on the regs before walking your dog on a WPA pre-season...
 
Woollybob, unless I’m mistaking in MN you can walk your dogs on DNR controlled areas after July 14. I think they closed mid April and open again mid July.
 
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