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Scouting, what to look for?
- Thread starter Jonjhawk
- Start date
KSBrittman
Active member
Covey headquarters is often a good sized plumb thicket , I look for native grass in the area .
Hunted couple weeks after a blizzard in western ks , we found most birds within a 1/2 mile of homestead or shelter belt . These areas weren't filled with snow .
I love a wheat feild with weeds and sunflowers , hard to find these days but when you do action can be good .
Hunted couple weeks after a blizzard in western ks , we found most birds within a 1/2 mile of homestead or shelter belt . These areas weren't filled with snow .
I love a wheat feild with weeds and sunflowers , hard to find these days but when you do action can be good .
As a general rule for pheasants I like to see mixed native grasses with some heavier cover nearby. If I see a lot of Brome Grass I usually move on. I don't really like solid Switch Grass fields either, birds don't seem to hold well in it.
I don't get too worked up about food sources for pheasants. I've seen them with a lot of different feed in them. They seem to find a food source if the loafing and roosting cover is good.
Newer idle ground is great if you can find some. Newer cover is usually the best. That overgrown weedy stuff will hold a lot of birds. It's harder to find now that CRP acres are going down instead of increasing.
But like I say those are generalities. Pheasants are where they are at. Last fall I found birds in some Brome I just happened to be walking by on the way back from better cover. It was quite a shock to flush roosters off of points in a shin high hay field.
Tim
I don't get too worked up about food sources for pheasants. I've seen them with a lot of different feed in them. They seem to find a food source if the loafing and roosting cover is good.
Newer idle ground is great if you can find some. Newer cover is usually the best. That overgrown weedy stuff will hold a lot of birds. It's harder to find now that CRP acres are going down instead of increasing.
But like I say those are generalities. Pheasants are where they are at. Last fall I found birds in some Brome I just happened to be walking by on the way back from better cover. It was quite a shock to flush roosters off of points in a shin high hay field.
Tim
The two best sources I use for scouting is trying to find and talk to the local school bus drivers and rural letter carriers. If you are new to the area hit a barber shop.
I had a friend who was the school bus maintenance supervisor for a school district in central Kansas. Worth his weight in gold. First the drivers spend every day driving the back roads and know where they see birds. Better yet, most of the drivers were the wives of local farmers. We got on so much unhunted land it was almost sinful. If you can make the intro, these guys are a gold mine. If you're nice, you might even get an invite to hunt.
I had a friend who was the school bus maintenance supervisor for a school district in central Kansas. Worth his weight in gold. First the drivers spend every day driving the back roads and know where they see birds. Better yet, most of the drivers were the wives of local farmers. We got on so much unhunted land it was almost sinful. If you can make the intro, these guys are a gold mine. If you're nice, you might even get an invite to hunt.
The two best sources I use for scouting is trying to find and talk to the local school bus drivers and rural letter carriers. If you are new to the area hit a barber shop.
I had a friend who was the school bus maintenance supervisor for a school district in central Kansas. Worth his weight in gold. First the drivers spend every day driving the back roads and know where they see birds. Better yet, most of the drivers were the wives of local farmers. We got on so much unhunted land it was almost sinful. If you can make the intro, these guys are a gold mine. If you're nice, you might even get an invite to hunt.
That's funny, we came across a lot of our places from a bus driver as well back in the day