Chance encounter, good news

[Bob Peters]

I was down around where I often hunt and was at a country boat ramp. There was a truck/boat with pheasant plates, so I walked over and asked the guys "Are you ready for pheasant season?" We struck up a conversation. The guy said he was, and it turns out he's got a lot of land. He's got food plots, crp, and manages the land for all wildlife. Fields he leases, part of the agreement is no mowing of ditches or hayfields until August. We talked and talked. And I told him I hadn't seen any pheasants for a while. He told me he's seen a lot of them lately and it should be an above average season. A nice thing to hear from a guy who is out every day in pheasant country. It was really refreshing to hear from a landowner doing everything he can to help the birds, be it his crop acres or set aside.

And I caught a whopper bass to boot.

 

[gimruis]

On a frog too!

 

[SDinWI]

Sweet! Broods and bass

 

[BritChaser]

Hope it wasn't a big load of smoke

 

[Bob Peters]

Hope it wasn't a big load of smoke

I don't think it was based on intuition. You can get a good idea of someone on the way they talk about things. He told me a lot of cool history. Back in the day there were partridge around. He related their decline to the removal of woody fencelines and the change of ag to the boring crops of corn and beans and nothing else. When he was young they had peas, sweet corn, and wheat. Fields weren't often turned over until spring, etc. You know the story.

 

[KEOutdoors]

I don't think it was based on intuition. You can get a good idea of someone on the way they talk about things. He told me a lot of cool history. Back in the day there were partridge around. He related their decline to the removal of woody fencelines and the change of ag to the boring crops of corn and beans and nothing else. When he was young they had peas, sweet corn, and wheat. Fields weren't often turned over until spring, etc. You know the story.

People don't realize how good sweet corn fields used to be. Before everything went chemical fertilizer they would hand pick the ears and leave the stalks standing all winter to prevent nitrogen loss and top soil erosion. These days, like everything else, they get mowed down/discd as they are picked and winter wheat planted in the fields if anything. No winter food/cover for a bird. Not to mention they need about 1/5th the acreage to yeild the same amount of food with these new hybrids and all the chem fertilizer programs. You dont see many 40-50 acre sweet corn fields anymore, now its 10 acres if that.

 

[dawgs14]

I don't think it was based on intuition. You can get a good idea of someone on the way they talk about things. He told me a lot of cool history. Back in the day there were partridge around. He related their decline to the removal of woody fencelines and the change of ag to the boring crops of corn and beans and nothing else. When he was young they had peas, sweet corn, and wheat. Fields weren't often turned over until spring, etc. You know the story.

We had lots of quail/partridge here in my part of Georgia until the fire ants arrived in the mid-70's.