Prairie Chickens

hotrod13

hotrod13

New member
Looking for some information on some good areas to try and at least get to see one or possibly shoot one after the season opens. I have heard they are around the flint hills and you can walk them up or wait to see where they fly into to feed. I know they are extremely fast and hard to locate, if any one has any tips or information I would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks,

Rod
 
chickens

i like the beloit area ive killed them on walk in and seen many fly over and around walk in one of my goals is to kill a phez, chicken and quail and get a pic with a cool mount of them some how
 
hotrod13 said:
Looking for some information on some good areas to try and at least get to see one or possibly shoot one after the season opens. I have heard they are around the flint hills and you can walk them up or wait to see where they fly into to feed. I know they are extremely fast and hard to locate, if any one has any tips or information I would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks,

Rod
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The information you have so far is accurate. They don't look very fast but they're truckin'! You won't realize how fast until you attempt pass shooting them. Depending on their altitude, you should be 1 to 3 (not exaggerating) bird lengths ahead of them. 1 if they're just above the fence posts.

I prefer pass shooting them though I have got up on em' with my dogs. Using the dogs is much easier in the September season. If you're coming to hunt pheasants and get one up with a point, 1. you're not in very good pheasant habitat, 2. you're damn lucky, and 3. you got one helluva dog! I'd recommend scouting a bean, corn, or milo (beans seem to work best) field. Watch them enter and exit the field at least once, then position yourself accordingly the next day at the same time. They don't always come in at the exact same time so be positioned for about a 2hr period of time. Chase pheasants all day and quit about 2:30 pm, pick a field and watch until dusk. Make sure there is roosting grass somewhere around the field you pick. You're not looking for 7ft. tall CRP for roosting grass either. Most times I see them in the hills, in grass I wouldn't even consider hunting pheasants in (about as tall as ND grass and very sparse).

NC KS has plenty of chickens. Osborne county up to Jewell county and almost all the way E to Topeka, then south to Wichita and maybe beyond is their range. The Flint Hills is the best I've seen, but Osborne county was pretty good too. I can point you to some good WIHA tracts and public areas with chickens if you decide to come and hunt them. The pressure on chickens is pretty low b/c many people find "success" hard to come by.
 
This is the full picture. This was one of her first points at about 7 months. She is very intense on her pointing.
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I am a major lurker in this forum, and always enjoy reading and getting information from this site. This is my first bird dog and I am really enjoying the training and learning so far, I hope to have her ready this season, I wish 5 months would hurry up and get here.

Thanks for the info. so far and the compliment on my pup 'Mandy'.

Rod
 
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Kansas brittany, thanks for information. I have family land north of Pratt for pheasant hunting, but of course no chickens. My plan is to do some scouting of walk in areas and hunt them within the first couple of weeks of the season. I planned on walking them up, because I have never yet hunted behind a dog, and don't know if I will have the one I have finished out by then.

Thanks for the info.,

Rod
 
1st dog

wow i tell you what i wish my first dog was as sweet as that dog looks you should be proud my man! hell i would even hunt behind that dog lol
curious to see how he or she does on pheasants and how he handles them then you have a bird dog far as looks though best ive seen on here!
 
I see quite a few birds in NW Kansas during the pheasant hunt, but I have a hard time finding them in the eastern part of the state during the early hunt. I have been hunting the Paxico/Wamego area with no success, any suggestions?

Thanks,

Rut
 
RuttCrazed said:
I see quite a few birds in NW Kansas during the pheasant hunt, but I have a hard time finding them in the eastern part of the state during the early hunt. I have been hunting the Paxico/Wamego area with no success, any suggestions?

Thanks,

Rut
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No success there? That should be a good area. Are you hunting the short grass on the sides of hills? Just continue to move about in the Flint Hills until you find them. In NC KS I've kicked them up in light CRP. I'd think it would be fairly easy to get private permission around here as the landowners aren't constantly bombarded by people wanting to hunt chickens. Some of them won't let you b/c they think they're doing the population a favor by keeping hunters out, but many others do not feel that way. The public land near Paxico and Wamego probably gets hit pretty hard b/c it's so close to the interstate.

Try Jeffery Energy Center public area. I see some chickens nearly every time I'm there.
 
Thanks for the reply. I would imagine some of the problem is the fact that there is so little WIHA in the area and it probably gets pounded and there really is no reason for the birds to come back to it because there is so much good private land surrounding it.

Rut
 
it's far out west, but Osborne county walk in has some chickens, pretty tough to walk them up, but if you can establish a daily flight pattern, setting up for some pass shooting is the best way to go. the coldest, snowy part of the season makes it much easier to define their patterns.
 
hunter94 said:
it's far out west, but Osborne county walk in has some chickens, pretty tough to walk them up, but if you can establish a daily flight pattern, setting up for some pass shooting is the best way to go. the coldest, snowy part of the season makes it much easier to define their patterns.
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I've seen good #'s of chickens here as well. Walked a few up in some thin CRP during the youth season a couple years back. Saw several flocks in flight while driving and even 20 or so on a high-wire.
 
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