Ace Up My Sleeve

A5 Sweet 16

Well-known member
Ace (aka: Ace, PPP ; aka: The Spaceman) & I had another great weekend on southeastern SD public land. This pic was yesterday. We continue to see better numbers in the areas we hunt than we've seen in several years. I kind of saw this coming, partially because of the early crop harvest, but also because real late last season, we saw more birds on public land than I'd seen in a long time.

Had an interesting thing happen yesterday (and somewhat surprising, even to me). Hunting around the edge of a slough late in the day, surrounded by CRP type grass. There was maybe 3" of snow in the area (4 at most). My boy popped a rooster out of the cattails that gave me a 25-yd left-to-right crosser. Pummeled him & it seemed like he fell DOA in that clumpy, thick garbage that surrounds a lot of sloughs. (FWIW, good floating feather fallout.) Ace only gave me about 1 second to marvel at my shooting prowess before he flushed another rooster that gave me about a 35-yd left-to-right quartering away shot. Not difficult. Hit him once. Grrrr. The 2nd shot broke a wingtip & he did one of those 50-yd gradual descents, almost certain to hit the ground & turn into the most elusive sprinter known to man.

Ace apparently hadn't seen the 2nd bird fall (to use the term loosely), but had made his way out of the cattails and was searching for the first victim. But since bird #2 had become top priority, as quickly as possible I got Ace over to the grass/snow area where the bird had crash landed to begin a search. My practice in these situations is to get my dog in the area & stand there while he figures it out. As needed, I command "fetch" only. Nothing else. And I don't walk around searching, spreading human scent all over the place. So Ace starts looking. Close. Far. All over. I'm thinking if we're lucky enough to recover this guy, he'll either be buried in the snow, or Ace will bump him out somewhere & have to run down a bird that can almost fly. So Ace gets on something that leads him maybe 75 yards from me. I'm thinking we got him. Ace proceeds to flush 1 tight-holding rooster, another tight-holding rooster, & a tight-holding hen, all of which appeared to be perfectly healthy. So now I'm thinking oh great, we got a very much alive escape artist in an area with plenty of other scent. My hopes were diminishing. Then Ace made his way back closer to me, still acting like there might be birds around. "Fetch" again, to remind him we hadn't completed our first task. Then about 10 yards from me he stops, does one of those "flash points" I think they're called - head up, ears perked, eyes focused in front...for about 1/2 a second, & pounces. There was bird #2, lying dead on top of the snow. I sure didn't expect that. 2 broken legs. The wingtip. Bleeding from the beak, so at least 1 pellet in the boiler room. He was good & messed up, but upon being shot twice, apparently had no intention of hitting the ground before expending his last breath. Typically when I see that, they fly quite a distance before dropping like a stone, sometimes straight & low; sometimes doing the dead rooster "tower".

I was elated to find that one. So after laying the "good boy" on pretty thick, I get Ace back to the area where bird #1 should've been lying dead. Didn't take Ace long to find him, and he was still on top of the snow/grass....but he wasn't quite dead. This bird had been smacked HARD. Then laid there for maybe 20 minutes while we addressed his buddy. And still wasn't dead (granted, he wasn't far from it).

These birds possess a will to survive that never ceases to amaze me. They prove to me over & over the importance of a furry friend who REALLY knows his stuff when it comes to "dead" birds. Without my little Ace in the hole, my love for this game & my success rate both drop to about nil.
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Sounds like another great hunt and a good job by Ace. That pic really reminds me of my now gone Copper. Glad your season is off to a good start. We are counting the days until we leave. Down to 8. 😁😁
 
I love pheasant hunting stories as they always seem to revolve around some pretty amazing dog work. You're blessed to have the PPP at your disposal!
 
I love pheasant hunting stories as they always seem to revolve around some pretty amazing dog work. You're blessed to have the PPP at your disposal!
That I am. That I am. (most of the time) :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO: I'm sure he & Sage would hunt well together & be mostly business. But off the clock, my guess is the ridiculousness would be nearly unbearable.
 
A5 your comment is so true, without a good dog success goes down exponentially on those roosters that just don’t seem to die.
 
I once heard crippled roosters described as being able to run like a purse snatcher. Once I quit laughing (it still makes me chuckle) I decided that was an apt description. It's also where our dogs show their true value. Can't say I've ever run one down by myself...
 
I once heard crippled roosters described as being able to run like a purse snatcher. Once I quit laughing (it still makes me chuckle) I decided that was an apt description. It's also where our dogs show their true value. Can't say I've ever run one down by myself...
Wait till you see one go down in a picked field or light cover where you can still watch it run. Man, they are FAST!
 
Wait till you see one go down in a picked field or light cover where you can still watch it run. Man, they are FAST!
FAST is right. When a dog's on 'em, they'll run head-up. But if the dog hasn't seen them & they still think they have a chance, they'll run head-down. Then you don't see them very long. And they leave very little scent.
 
Last week I knocked one down in heavy cover with snow that was edged by a cut cane field. Dog went right to the fall then started nose down trailing out into the cut cane. She was doing little S turns along the track. I'm looking trying to see the bird...nothing. She then makes a sharp 90 degree left turn and lights the afterburners, still nose down. In just the blink of an eye, I see the rooster jump up and try to fly about 20 yards in front of her and then crash back down. I had rendered him incapable of flight as we say in my biz. She was on him in a flash and returned him to hand. I >WISH< I had dug out the phone for a video for that one but I had to standby with the scattergun I guess.

They can skulk and slink along like the invisible bird in an inch of grass it seems. While running like Ussain Bolt.
 
... hit one last week on the second shot, plummeted to the soft, open ground which it used as a trampoline to bounce to its feet, glanced over at me and high tailed it, literally, to the lunch date I temporarily interrupted...
 
I knocked one down hard.. at least it looked hard. It went tumbling through the air and behind a tree line. My buddy sees it go down land and lay there for 15 seconds or so. It then tried to fly and flapped along the ground for 15 feet before crashing lifeless into the snow again. Another 30 seconds goes by and the thing gets up and flies right at my buddy towards a sunflower field. It was only maybe 8' off the ground but it would have been trouble if it would have made it to the sunflowers. I have no idea what is happening and think it is a different bird all together because of the time that has passed and seeing how hard it went down. Luckily he shot it before it got out into the sunflowers. The will to live is something else. Roosters are tough as nails. The question is who gets the bird or is it a half a bird each? Ha! We had another bird he shot that did almost the same thing went down and laid there for awhile then got up and flew weakly into a shelter belt. It couldn't run and was losing energy so once the dogs got on him the game was over.
 
I had one last year that I shot it, never saw a feather come off, never saw a change in flight pattern, and it kept flying higher and higher - I swear it was 100 yards in the air and flying off into the distance, a sure miss. Then all of a sudden like a helicopter that just had it's motor die, it fell straight down out of the air. Found it laying dead right where it went down, maybe 150 yards ahead.
 
I had one last year that I shot it, never saw a feather come off, never saw a change in flight pattern, and it kept flying higher and higher - I swear it was 100 yards in the air and flying off into the distance, a sure miss. Then all of a sudden like a helicopter that just had it's motor die, it fell straight down out of the air. Found it laying dead right where it went down, maybe 150 yards ahead.
One pellet through the boiler room. The dead rooster "tower". Whether I hit 'em or appear not to (rare, btw ;)), it pays to watch every one until it's out of sight.
 
One pellet through the boiler room. The dead rooster "tower". Whether I hit 'em or appear not to (rare, btw ;)), it pays to watch every one until it's out of sight.

Especially if you're young like me, because I'll see where they land a half mile away and track them down, shoot at them 2 more times, track him another quarter mile and then arkansas the bugger to finish the duel.
 
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