eyeballing pheasants on my Saturday evening drive

B

Bob Peters

Well-known member
Heading home after a day of fishing on Saturday, I stuck to the backroads and kept my eyes peeled for creatures(with an emphasis on pheasants). I have been going to this cabin in southern MN for 20 years, and usually I'd see maybe one or two pheasants a year. Maybe. Since getting into hunting I've spent a lot more time on the backroads with my head on a swivel. This trip I saw five different roosters out and about! Oh I was happy. Three of them were out in the middle of ag fields pecking up dinner I assume. The other two birds made me smile. One I was on a tar 2-lane road and spotted him on a quiet gravel road branching off as I passed. I turned around to get a closer look, and saw him on the shoulder, but as I drove down the road he melted off into the slough. The last bird, I had already driven the gravel road earlier and seen nothing, but as I came back a second time, there was a big old 🐔✔️ out in the field 75 yards from the slough. I was still a good ways off, stopped and glassed him. His tail was as long as a yardstick!!! He was running full tilt and was quickly back hidden in the thick weeds. Even at a great distance he wasn't about to set and let me get a good look at him. That is one old wily swamp rooster for sure. I still find it weird that with me being really into fishing my whole life, I don't know many people who hunt pheasants. It seems like in MN it is a dying breed. Plenty of deer hunters, not many bird hunters. I am a public land hunter but will talk with some landowners this summer and see what they say. No matter where I am I'll be excited to be out this coming season in pursuit of America's favorite game bird, the ring-necked pheasant.
 
That's a good report. I love driving early in the mornings in South Dakota looking for pheasants. In Tennessee, we have no pheasants and very few quail to look for.
 
After having spent about 25-30 days hunting the last two seasons it's exciting to think that when you see a good patch of pheasant cover, and then see a lone rooster or hen, there's probably a good deal more of birds hiding in the acres and acres of habitat. In the case of the birds in my last post, they were around nice juicy cattail sloughs, and one was near a really lush buffer around a dredge ditch cutting through an ag field. And also the fact that hopefully there's a really successful hatch this year, and the area could really be loaded with birds(by south central MN standards).
 
Bob Peters said:
I still find it weird that with me being really into fishing my whole life, I don't know many people who hunt pheasants. It seems like in MN it is a dying breed. Plenty of deer hunters, not many bird hunters.
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I don't find it to be that weird. I do agree with you though, I honestly don't know that many pheasant hunters here in MN, especially in the central part of the state. Seems like the only hunters here all head west or south and I think they miss opportunities closer to home. People get this thought in their head that they can't find or harvest enough pheasants if they don't go out to South Dakota, Iowa, or western Minnesota. I can count the number of pheasant hunters I've seen in the last 10 years on one hand and that is fine with me.

Deer hunting is king. There are more deer hunters than all of the other seasons combined. Finding a place to hunt deer that is productive and close to home is nearly impossible now.
 
Having grown up when road hunting was somewhat more popular than it is today, I spent my entire young life looking for pheasants. And I think once that's engrained in you, you don't stop. I still look down every fence line, down the edge of every shelter belt, etc. Still occasionally get fooled by an odd weed, clump of dirt, or tire mark on the pavement ahead in the road. Whether it's a lone rooster or a field full of them feeding in the winter, I still love seeing them, every time.
 
Me and a buddy won a fishing tournament this weekend in southern MN. I knew his wife was cooking up a wild turkey for dinner, but I told him we need to back road it on the way home to look for pheasants. Holy smokes, we saw a lot of roosters out and about! The first one was right by the road ditch, he melted away into the green grass, then a rooster out picking in a field 50 yards away, next we both saw a rooster right on the road edge that stood on his tip toes and flapped his wings in rapid succession before retreating into the weedy ditch. We hit a tar 2-lane road 55mph limit and I figured that was it, but we even saw a rooster step out of the ditch looking to peck some grit there! I know for some guy who lives in rural America this might be an everyday occurrence. For me it was icing on the cake after winning the fishing derby. Oh, and we saw two big roosters that morning driving to the lake in the rain! Hen or rooster, I love seeing a wild pheasant:)! I know some people go through phases, and I'm no exception. I've only been hunting roosters for a few years, but I think I'll be a pheasant hunter and in love with pheasants until the day I die. A day doesn't go by where I don't dream about the upcoming fall season. I've never been happier than when I knock down a pheasant and the dog makes a successful retrieve. I realize I'm stating the obvious to the members of UPH. Here's a picture of when we took Skye to Scheels and she saw the stuffed pheasant😁. Thanks everyone for all the good tips and advice you've given me on this forum. I know I'll never stop pheasant hunting until I'm too cripple to go.

P.S. the wild turkey schnitzel with sriracha mayo was out of this world 😋
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Married a farm girl from Western Kansas and got into pheasant hunting (22 years ago). I would time our trips out to see her parents so we were driving at peak pheasant movement times. I would spend the 4 1/2 hour drive with my eyes peeled to see how many I could see on the way out and back. Another crazy thing is I have a hard time remembering certain dates or people's names but I can remember darn near every place I've seen a rooster over the years while driving!
 
I was lucky enough to see 3 partridge this evening. I haven't seen any in years. Many places I hunt used to have them.

I see a number of roosters and a occasionall hen. A few turkeys lots of ducks and Canadian geese. Both regular and Giant geese. The damn deer outnumber all of them.
 
Weimdogman said:
I was lucky enough to see 3 partridge this evening. I haven't seen any in years. Many places I hunt used to have them.
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Been years since I've seen any. Many years since I've actually shot 1. When I was a kid you'd see a covey practically every time you went pheasant hunting. I've heard several explanations. Herbicides/insecticides cause thinner, more vulnerable egg shells. Herbicides/insecticides greatly limiting the amount of necessary bugs to eat. Predators. But I think, as usual, the biggest factor is habitat. Most of the pheasant cover around here anymore is so ungodly thick, which does partridge no favors. And there's so much less light cover - alfalfa, oats, & that sort of thing - than there used to be.
 
A5 Sweet 16 said:
And there's so much less light cover - alfalfa, oats, & that sort of thing - than there used to be.
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You hit all the high points on chemicals, but the one thing I've heard so much of is this↑↑↑↑. Small grains are what huns need, wheat, oats, barley, etc. and most farms in MN/IA/SD as we all well know only grow two boring crops.
 
So unless you live in Northeast Kansas this won’t mean a lot to you but I almost wrecked the truck about a half hour ago….

I used to hunt often up in northeastern Kansas. It was reasonably close to home, and in an hour or so I could get into a fair number of pheasant/ qual. I never had a day where I limited with boo, but came close a few times up to say 2010 or so. Then as with other place it turned to crap. My job finds me up there a few times a month. And like many up here I am always looking. Well it has been at least two years since I have seen one, but today up out of the ditch flies a huge cock bird. I was so excited I almost wrecked. I fumbled for the phone, but my fat fingers couldn’t get it done. I sat there in awe as he sailed away. Now I am back to looking behind every hedgerow…
 
As I have stated before the deer seem to out number everything. This is a doe with triplets that 10 seconds earlier were clearly visible. Grass like this all over the place due to decent moisture so far. There should be a great hatch and plenty of young birds if weather can stay moderate. Unfortunately indications are we maybe in for a stormy summer/fall. Let's hope the weather guys are wrong about this.20220624_091148.jpg
 
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