My son and I hunted in east central Illinois yesterday. A lot of snow had fallen over there but this farm, on private land belonging to my son's acquaintance has produced for us the last few years. The land is top notch cropland so what there is to hunt, is filter strips and buffer strips adjacent to ditches and creeks. My Lab Newt turned 6 in September and he is still very much in his prime.
The walking was tougher close to the ditches as the snow had drifted in, and for the first half hour we didn't raise any birds. But as we drew near the outbuildings along a fence line there was about an acre of waste, with heavy brush and two large brush piles. I watched as several birds, hens and roosters, ran along the fence line to the north. We quickened our pace as more and more birds ran or flushed ahead of us--we had never seen so many pheasants on this farm before; we watched as between 25-30 birds total came out of this heavy cover and flew to a wooded fence line about 300 yards to the west.
We walked through the plowed field to the north end of the fence line and I noted this was perfect cover--old rolled fencing, downed limbs, heavy grass and gnarled trees made for a pheasant haven, and it was tailor made for two hunters; I took the west side, my son took the east, and we walked it down. The dog worked the cover, nosing through the grass and downed limbs. About halfway down, my Lab flushed a group of 8-10 birds, some on my side, some on his and we each shot a rooster. As we approached the end of the treeline, another group of birds, mostly roosters, flushed and headed back to the creek bed we originally worked.
We had to head back to the vehicles that direction anyhow, so we crossed the creek and worked the opposite bank south. A rooster flushed ahead of us, maybe 30-35 yards out and he was a good 40 yards by the time I shot. I was using my Browning 12 gauge 725 field gun with 1 1/4Oz. #6 shot
(It is the Federal Hi-Bird load). I'd been shooting that gun well and I dropped the bird, but in a couple of seconds, he recovered and limped into the heavy grass along the creekbed. I felt good about the hit and was pretty sure the dog would find the bird. He worked and nosed the cattails at the bottom of the creek, and about 20 yards south of where the rooster came down, he trapped it and brought it back to me. He really has a good nose for cripples and has made some remarkable retrieves this season. The limit in Illinois is 2 roosters so I had mine and I told my son, "Let's find your last bird." We worked the cover down and within about 75 yards of our trucks, my Lab flushed a rooster hammering low and to the left out of the creekbed. My son fired once with his 20 gauge 870 and just that quick, we were done. Not bad for a 2 1/2 hour hunt on a cold December day!
