Roadside Survey

Munster927

Munster927

Well-known member
In case anyone has been waiting for the roadside survey, sounds like it got pushed back until next Monday. It was supposed to be out yesterday. I kept checking online and now the date they say it'll be posted has been changed. Don't they know we need that ASAP so we can have something to read? Haha
 
it will be interesting to see how the numbers reflect areas of highest drought.
 
I'm cautiously optimistic. I read somewhere that during the peak of the drought that there was very little morning dew which might have prevented the birds coming to the roads early morning where they would have been visible for the counts.

I've been conditioning dogs on some WMA's near me and have seen a grand total of 2 young birds in 6 outings. In past years I would have seen several broods in those same areas. Could be a coincidence, let's hope so.
 
Numbers seem about “average” on the public land I hunt. I’ve been out 7-8 times trying to get my 7 year old lab conditioned… he had 2 CCL (ACL in humans) knee surgeries in the last year. I optimistic since I missed the whole season last year.
 
Its out. And damn, its not encouraging (of course). Looks like all the areas I hunt are down, some dramatically.

Down 25%
 
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I expected to see a minor decrease from last season. 25% is more than I expected, but we are in the worst drought since 1988.
 
I believe the count is low partially due to the drought not creating the conditions that causes birds to gravitate to roads in the am…maybe they’re down 15%, and the other 10% is due to the dry conditions? Where I’ve been the last week in MT and ND the pheasant #’s are good…quite good…and these areas were hit by the drought even harder than MN…
 
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I wondered about that as well. Little to no morning dew to push the pheasants to the roads where they would have been counted. The other question.... will the Crop harvest be early this year due to the drought? If so it may make early season better than normal.
 
benelli-banger said:
I believe the count is low partially due to the drought not creating the conditions that causes birds to gravitate to roads in the am…maybe they’re down 15%, and the other 10% is due to the dry conditions? Where I’ve been the last week in MT and ND the pheasant #’s are good…quite good…and these areas were hit by the drought even harder than MN…
Click to expand...

Although I do look at the prospects map, I base most of my predictions based on personal information like you also do, benelli-banger. I hunt a very specific area that is on private land with no other hunters. If I see a lot of hens while I'm hunting and winter is relatively mild, I have optimism for the following season. That is what happened last season when I was hunting. In December I ran into several quite large groups of hens that should have all survived the mild winter to reproduce this spring. When the crops come down (usually in November), hunting is usually pretty good. Not so much before that when there's still crops standing.

Most hunters don't have the luxury of real, in-person scouting so they have to trust that the roadside survey is accurate.
 
25% is not a big deal to me... they normally see 2, now saw 1.5. Normally see 4, now saw 3.

Normally see 8, now saw 6 - what's not to say that last year the conditions were right and they happened to see an extra one they normally wouldn't and this year the conditions were poor and they happened to miss one they should have seen - then both years you're seeing 7.
 
Hunting teal, I was very encouraged by what we flushed up. Best was a dozen birds in 20 minutes. Lots of birds flushing at zerodarkthirty. Pup pointed a rooster at 5 am, under headlamp could just make out the red around his eye. Small birds that didn't fly far.

Also, birds flushing under your feet in pitch black is not fun.
 
I agree, very little morning dew for most of the summer. Little reason to push them out to the road
 
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