Huntable Areas?!?!?

grossklw

grossklw

Active member
I’m planning on heading west the weekend of January 7th. Normally I hunt near Aberdeen but I’m seeing reports that a guy cant physically hunt, cattails drifted in completely and dogs can’t move. I’m perfectly fine with tough hunting, but it needs to be realistic that my dog can actually work.

I’m not asking for honey holes, but is there an area of the state that’s still east river where the habitat is still huntable? I’m fine figuring it out on my own and always hunt public but Id like a general idea if I’m completely wasting my time coming out. I’ve more or less accepted I’m not coming to where we normally hunt but is there something further south that didn’t get pounded as bad? I have a field golden and spend every second I can chasing roosters and I really don’t want to cancel the trip but I don’t want to drive 6 hours from WI to look at 6-8 foot snow drifts everywhere.

Feel free to PM me if it’s easier that route. I always stay with my uncle in Aberdeen and will continue to do so but I’m thinking I need to find somewhere else for a couple days.
 
I was going to try and leave tomorrow but wondering the same thing you are. I would live feedback or input too. I guess to add one question would be are side gravel roads getting plowed?
 
We hunted Hecla SD last weekend and it was impossible to hunt with the amount of snow. This is coming from a group of 25 year olds too. Looking at the snow cover map we might try the very SE corner in a couple weeks if the weather is decent
 
We were gonna stay SE of Aberdeen in two weeks and hunt. The guy who runs the place and does some guiding says he is shutting all of his private land down for the year due to the snow/weather. We were gonna hunt public land and he said we can still stay there, but that he will give us our deposit back if we cancel. A buddy drove along the entire SD portion of I-90 coming home for Christmas. He said lots of frozen dead pheasants on the fields and ditches adjacent to the freeway. Heck he even saw a few cows froze to death in the fields. I think we're gonna cancel our trip.
 
Bob Peters said:
We were gonna stay SE of Aberdeen in two weeks and hunt. The guy who runs the place and does some guiding says he is shutting all of his private land down for the year due to the snow/weather. We were gonna hunt public land and he said we can still stay there, but that he will give us our deposit back if we cancel. A buddy drove along the entire SD portion of I-90 coming home for Christmas. He said lots of frozen dead pheasants on the fields and ditches adjacent to the freeway. Heck he even saw a few cows froze to death in the fields. I think we're gonna cancel our trip.
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Sounds bad….🤯 This may be one of those years where keeping the old season end is beneficial…
 
haymaker said:
If the GFP had any sense they would shut it down. I bet they don't.
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Food for thought…Does it really matter tho? Not many birds will be shot over the next month due to people not going out in the current conditions…also something to think about, is it more beneficial to the hen’s survival to have less roosters to around to compete with for food water etc? 🤷‍♂️ will the younger/dumber birds that would get mainly shot over the next month die this winter anyways? 🤷‍♂️ I’m sure someone a lot smarter then myself knows how it would really work out 🤔😂
 
If you checked on the neighboring states, most are closed around 1/1…may mean something…SD was always done in early Jan until biology was supplanted by marketing a year or 2 ago…just checked, Iowa goes the latest, Jan 10, but all the rest are right around Jan 1.
 
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Chestle said:
Kansas runs to Jan 31. Personally I think this big storm has reduced pheasant populations in a lot of places.

Upland Game Bird Seasons​

PHEASANT
Regular: Nov. 12, 2022-Jan. 31, 2023
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Not exactly a neighboring state, a good bit further south…different climate…opens 3 weeks later as well…probably right about bird #’s being reduced….
 
By now we should have reduced the rooster percentage enough. If I was a hen pheasant, I would want to be left alone. Many years ago we had a group that surrounded a shelterbelt the last weekend of the season. It was bitter cold and windy, we shot pheasants that were coming back in as we were shooting pheasants still going out. It was a shoot not a hunt. We shot our limit there. The aftermath of that has changed me forever, I will never do that again, and that is the reason we don't book hunts after Thanksgiving. If the weather and conditions are good, we may allow a little more hunting. This year we canceled the last week because of ice and should have canceled the last two.
 
Thinks most states should look at the compensatory mortality for game populataions and end the seasons when it shifts from compensatory to addititive. Meaning at a certain point on the year the compensatory factors have been meet and those birds who survive this should survive and be part of the breeding population the next year. If season goes longer mortality become additive and starts to remove those birds who would should have made it through.

Natural, predators, diseasae, and hunting are part of the compensatory factors. Weather and be both but more additve when severe. I think when SD extended they put the long term population at risk because theyvhave crossed that threshhold from compensatory to additive.

Just my thoughts.
 
benelli-banger said:
Not exactly a neighboring state, a good bit further south…different climate…opens 3 weeks later as well…probably right about bird #’s being reduced….
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January can be a tough month for birds even in KS. December was a lot rougher for birds this year than usual. I’m hoping for a moderate January. The way KS bird populations have been going I don’t think it would hurt to shorten the season AND change the morning shooting hours to 10am.
 
If anyones coming from out of state to SD, stay SE from what Im seeing on the news and talking to people who have been west. We did have an extremely cold stretch with insane winds last week, but the snow is still manageable in most areas. Its gonna warm up a bunch this week. Another cold snap should have the drifts solid. Right now, just when youre confident itll hold you, you break through to your nads after a couple steps.
 
haymaker said:
If the GFP had any sense they would shut it down. I bet they don't.
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When they first extended the season, I told anyone who would listen at the GFP that they needed to be able to shut down the season in instances like we have this year. Sadly, biology and pheasants aren't anywhere near the top of the list when it comes to the hunting industry in SD.
 
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