Released birds - the numbers

Bob Peters said:
I was told this story by a buddy.

He had a family trip to SD this year. There's a guy who's lived out there a long time, let's say he moved there from MN 30-40 years ago. He had a good career and bought a chunk of land, the thing is laid out just like one of those prime Game Production Areas, except it's private. I think it's a quarter or half section, can't remember. Foodplots, treerows, crp, the whole nine yards. The guy is older now so doesn't hunt much, but invites his friends to come out. My buddy and his son, along with his cousin(s) etc. were invited out. He was very appreciative of this and had no complaints, all had a good time. Then he tells me after all the stories about birds shot, seen, etc. that the guy bought a pile of pen raised birds and had them released before season. My reply, "??????????" My buddy thought he either felt pressure to produce, or maybe it was ego where he wanted everyone to think he had a great property where they killed a bunch of birds. I was really confused. When you have a sweet property gobsmack in the middle of prime SD pheasant territory the last thing I would ever do is release a pile of distended nostril toe-clipped roosters. This was not any kind of resort or "guide" property. On the contrary very few people hunt it a year. Just an example of how it may be difficult to figure an exact number of released birds are blasted in the Mount Rushmore State every fall.
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That is a good point, in my opinion. Should never release spasms, into a place where you have a solid wild bird population, why would you do that? It seems counterproductive.
 
remy3424 said:
Crap, that is almost as bad as quail. I am guessing part of the issue is the habitat they are released into. Drop them into great habitat, I would guess the rate of survival would be much better....unless those birds are more domesticated than chickens.
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I would have guessed survival rate would be better than quail,
 
Bob Peters said:
Then he tells me after all the stories about birds shot, seen, etc. that the guy bought a pile of pen raised birds and had them released before season. My reply, "??????????"
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A conquest should be organized & that land should be taken from that guy, so that sort of disgustingness isn't happening on cherry land that's probably already lousy with actual wild pheasants.

That said, having tons of real pheasants, even unpressured private land dummies, doesn't always mean they'll be easy to shoot. The guy did probably feel pressure to produce & knew the only sure fire way to do that is with gross, stupid flare nares.
 
A5 Sweet 16 said:
A conquest should be organized & that land should be taken from that guy, so that sort of disgustingness isn't happening on cherry land that's probably already lousy with actual wild pheasants.

That said, having tons of real pheasants, even unpressured private land dummies, doesn't always mean they'll be easy to shoot. The guy did probably feel pressure to produce & knew the only sure fire way to do that is with gross, stupid flare nares.
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Yep, he wanted to impress his friends, and in my opinion he should have just stuck with his natural population.
 
Bob,
You would surprised/shocked how many released pheasants you have shot thinking they were wild birds on public lands/ditches. Maybe you wouldn't be so boisterous about the dreaded 'nare flares.' Don't let your ego override reality.
 
Released birds have terrible survival...we all know that. They grow up in a barn with unlimited food/water and no predators. They're in line with domesticated poultry. If you think a barn raised bird can just observe the wild nature of a real one and duplicate it, you need your head examined.

They are really good for training a young dog because they're dumb and slow.

They do nothing to supplement a wild bird population. The key here is 1) habitat, and 2) weather.
 
gim said:
Released birds have terrible survival...we all know that. They grow up in a barn with unlimited food/water and no predators. They're in line with domesticated poultry. If you think a barn raised bird can just observe the wild nature of a real one and duplicate it, you need your head examined.

They are really good for training a young dog because they're dumb and slow.

They do nothing to supplement a wild bird population. The key here is 1) habitat, and 2) weather.
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Yeah, I think I've only shot one or two of those released birds in Montana. I did hunt at that preserve with my dad in 2004, and that was interesting but those birds were really easy I thought.
 
Bob Peters said:
I was told this story by a buddy.

He had a family trip to SD this year. There's a guy who's lived out there a long time, let's say he moved there from MN 30-40 years ago. He had a good career and bought a chunk of land, the thing is laid out just like one of those prime Game Production Areas, except it's private. I think it's a quarter or half section, can't remember. Foodplots, treerows, crp, the whole nine yards. The guy is older now so doesn't hunt much, but invites his friends to come out. My buddy and his son, along with his cousin(s) etc. were invited out. He was very appreciative of this and had no complaints, all had a good time. Then he tells me after all the stories about birds shot, seen, etc. that the guy bought a pile of pen raised birds and had them released before season. My reply, "??????????" My buddy thought he either felt pressure to produce, or maybe it was ego where he wanted everyone to think he had a great property where they killed a bunch of birds. I was really confused. When you have a sweet property gobsmack in the middle of prime SD pheasant territory the last thing I would ever do is release a pile of distended nostril toe-clipped roosters. This was not any kind of resort or "guide" property. On the contrary very few people hunt it a year. Just an example of how it may be difficult to figure an exact number of released birds are blasted in the Mount Rushmore State every fall.
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There are a ton of factors that go into production/ survival year after year and it has many places to fail regardless of habitat. Case in point… I had access to a farm out around Murdo fifteen years ago. This is the western edge of what would be considered good pheasant hunting. We hunted several years with good not great numbers. He ran hunters through four or so days a week from mid October- December. I always hunted second week in both October and December. One year it blew up and we saw hundreds of birds everywhere both trips. The next year we saw probably 5k pheasants in our trip in December. In fact he kept track and 650 birds were harvested that year. All wild, I knew the guy and his trespassing fee wouldn’t make sense to buy birds. Easy winter, decent spring. Next two years we struggled and it never really recovered. Probably 2k hunt able acres with a few food plots. It’s amazing that they survive year to year.
 
Numbers are in; sort of.
...now I cannot extrapolate how many of these birds listed in info I was given were accounted for twice i.e. one producer may have purchased eggs or day old birds from another producer and then raised and sold those birds as adults. The sale of eggs or day olds would be recorded by one producer and the sale of those same birds as adults recorded by another producer. One producer alone accounted for 570,000 birds.

But the total number of birds raised in SD and sold for 2023 was around 810,500 birds. If 600K were released on licensed preserves per published numbers, 200K plus how many ever came from out of state were released outside of preserves, with 80% or better being roosters. I know for a fact there's at least 200K birds imported from just 3 out of state farms alone. So that puts us at 400K released, but still no way to accurately account for all of the birds released in the state. So the question still remains, how many birds total are released annually, and how many of those are included in the total harvest numbers touted by the GFP each year? Should the GFP be required to more accurately track these numbers? I believe they should, but with SD tourism groups and other state agency figureheads seeming to have great influence over how the GFP operates as of late, I don't believe without an act of legislation that we'll ever see accurate numbers.
 
SPUR60 said:
Numbers are in; sort of.
...now I cannot extrapolate how many of these birds listed in info I was given were accounted for twice i.e. one producer may have purchased eggs or day old birds from another producer and then raised and sold those birds as adults. The sale of eggs or day olds would be recorded by one producer and the sale of those same birds as adults recorded by another producer. One producer alone accounted for 570,000 birds.

But the total number of birds raised in SD and sold for 2023 was around 810,500 birds. If 600K were released on licensed preserves per published numbers, 200K plus how many ever came from out of state were released outside of preserves, with 80% or better being roosters. I know for a fact there's at least 200K birds imported from just 3 out of state farms alone. So that puts us at 400K released, but still no way to accurately account for all of the birds released in the state. So the question still remains, how many birds total are released annually, and how many of those are included in the total harvest numbers touted by the GFP each year? Should the GFP be required to more accurately track these numbers? I believe they should, but with SD tourism groups and other state agency figureheads seeming to have great influence over how the GFP operates as of late, I don't believe without an act of legislation that we'll ever see accurate numbers.
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Does the data show whether the birds hatched in SD were sold to customers in SD? In other words, is it possible to account for birds that were hatched in SD, but sold to customers in other states?
 
Limitless said:
Does the data show whether the birds hatched in SD were sold to customers in SD? In other words, is it possible to account for birds that were hatched in SD, but sold to customers in other states?
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No, and that's a problem in and of itself as to how to use these numbers; but I've talked to a few people in the industry and the consensus is there's really only one farm that sells out of state in any significant quantities. The demand for birds in SD seems to outweigh the supply from in state producers hence there's producers in NE, MN, & WI that sell a lot of their production to buyers in SD.
 
Bob Peters said:
So what you're thinkin' is about a million pen birds released in the state per year?
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Including the 600,000 reported preserve releases? Yes, I think that's a good guesstimate. I've read some people think it's closer to 1.7 million total. Not sure I'm there but I just don't see any other sources of reported numbers to go off of to get any sort of accuracy.
 
Did your research show if there are different strains being released and how many? I am referring to melanistic and others strains.
 
Hmm. Interesting. It could be said that I hunt 3 fairly popular small areas in southeastern & east-central parts of the state. I check every single rooster I shoot, & once in a great, great while end up with a flare nare. I saw 1 on the side of the road this past season, who was lucky I already had my limit. Unbelievably stupid, as are all others I've encountered driving around areas where there are more preserves. 3 of the 4 I've ever shot (ope, 4 of the 5; I just remembered another one down by Platte) have acted very differently than a wild bird. The other, I suspect, had miraculously survived a year in the wild, as he acted sort of wild & it almost appeared his nares had begun to "heal". I just don't get them in my part of the state & I'm happy for it.
 
A5 Sweet 16 said:
The other, I suspect, had miraculously survived a year in the wild, as he acted sort of wild & it almost appeared his nares had begun to "heal".
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The only one I got in SD (which was this past season) was a 2nd year bird and his nostrils looked like they were closing up too. It made me question if he was truly a flare nare. Good to know.

What do people think about wild birds that hang out around farms (where they aren't hunted)? Do they behave differently than those who don't have that kind of protection and extra food sources? Certainly not a scientific observation, but they've seemed less flighty, on average, when I've rolled by them than those in ditches or field edges away from farms.
 
A5 Sweet 16 said:
Hmm. Interesting. It could be said that I hunt 3 fairly popular small areas in southeastern & east-central parts of the state. I check every single rooster I shoot, & once in a great, great while end up with a flare nare. I saw 1 on the side of the road this past season, who was lucky I already had my limit. Unbelievably stupid, as are all others I've encountered driving around areas where there are more preserves. 3 of the 4 I've ever shot (ope, 4 of the 5; I just remembered another one down by Platte) have acted very differently than a wild bird. The other, I suspect, had miraculously survived a year in the wild, as he acted sort of wild & it almost appeared his nares had begun to "heal". I just don't get them in my part of the state & I'm happy for it.
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Just because the nostrils don't show evidence of a blinder doesn't mean it's a wild bird. More and more commercial operations raise non blindered birds. Keeps the releases more discreet and helps keep the illusion of "100% wild birds." Remember, only licensed preserves have to mark their birds to identify released vs. wild for harvest reporting. Toe clips and cutting of a specific segment of wing feathers are two methods employed to mark non blindered release birds. It's this methodology and the lack of reporting requirements that make the annual GFP estimated pheasant harvest numbers laughable.
 
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