Season Wrap-Up

A5 Sweet 16

Well-known member
I was right. The last weekend of the season was more difficult than the previous weekend, when I got to hunt some private land & the ditch gods shone some light on me. Ace & I hunted the last 3 days of the season. Public land & a few little stretches of ditch. No limits (should've Sunday, but I committed a sin & didn't trust Ace once), but we got 2 each day. And really didn't hunt terribly hard to do it. Hard enough, but we didn't kill ourselves. No all-dayers. I'll post a couple pics from the weekend, but unfortunately, Ace was more uncooperative than usual during picture time.

Last season I hunted 35 times. I had a pipe dream of making 40 this season, but didn't get there. Maybe next year. But I ended with a 2.10* birds/hunt average. The asterisk is because 1 bird I shot (on a WPA) back in early December turned out to be an escapee pen-reared pseudo-pheasant (PRPP) from some nearby ground where the landowner releases a few birds. If we throw him out though, my average was still 2.06. I consider any season over 2.0 "pretty good". Not great, but better than ho-hum. We definitely had to work a little harder for our birds than last year, but nothing drastic. It was like every other year. Some places were up, some were down, some about normal. Public land warriors are used to that. Someplace that's really good one year might be rough the next, typically because of what's going on with the nearby crops. Weather seemed weird this season. LOTS of wind. Like obscene wind, at least on the weekends. Almost no snow. But that's South Dakota. Always trying to throw you a curveball. I hunt within maybe a 1,200 sq. mi. area in the east-central part of the state. If I had to guess, I'd say that across that area, on the whole, pheasant numbers were down maybe 30% from last year. An unfortunate, but not terribly abnormal jump. So far, winter has been unbelievably easy on pheasants. So that's a good thing.

I shot pretty well this season. Only a couple that I really was mad about missing. Any other misses were either real long ones, curving with a 30 mph wind, or something nearly impossible. Not good shot opportunities to begin with, so they really don't count as misses. ;) Ace was again, far & away the star of our little show. He'll be 3 in April, and this was his 3rd season. I just wish I knew how they do what they do. Just amazing. I can't get enough of it, but it seems like next season comes a little quicker each year.

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Livin the good life Amigo !!
I had to shut it down the second week of December as Annie has some kind of puncture wound that we are still chasing. Multiple surgeries later, we are hopefully on the right track. Soo many plans this past year and only a couple of them came to reality. There's always next year I suppose.
Hope the winter stays mild.. You hit the Jackpot with Ace!!
 
Livin the good life Amigo !!
I had to shut it down the second week of December as Annie has some kind of puncture wound that we are still chasing. Multiple surgeries later, we are hopefully on the right track. Soo many plans this past year and only a couple of them came to reality. There's always next year I suppose.
Hope the winter stays mild.. You hit the Jackpot with Ace!!
Thanks Mike. Hope they have Annie figured out!
 
Great pictures, thanks for sharing! Sounds like you and Ace had a really fun season! It’s great to spend so much time with your best friend out there.
 
Good season recap. The part about the bird average numbers and your estimate of the population I found to be very interesting.

Its always odd to me seeing photos of the countryside essentially devoid of snow in the winter. There's been like 20 inches of snow on the ground where I hunt since the middle of December and we just had the coldest January in almost a decade.
 
Good season recap. The part about the bird average numbers and your estimate of the population I found to be very interesting.

Its always odd to me seeing photos of the countryside essentially devoid of snow in the winter. There's been like 20 inches of snow on the ground where I hunt since the middle of December and we just had the coldest January in almost a decade.
I really only had 2 hunts this season with any kind of "snow advantage", one in mid-November & one when I traveled quite far north to hunt with a friend. Otherwise very little to nothing. Consequently, the birds bunched up, but not like they typically do. And it was odd to hunt an area in December or January & not even have enough snow to tell where birds HAD been.
 
A guy doesn't have to go very far south or west of me to come across dry ground. Which is tragic. These guys need some moisture.

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High 40’s have been common as of late where I hunt…more of that coming up, like 3-4 days worth…actually 5 days of 40’s-50 or so…out of the next 7 days…🍺🍺
 
BB I was in your neck of the fields the last 3 days of the season and man - coming from MN with a foot of snow standing, boy was it nice to not trudge too much. The birds were spooky, but man we saw birds. (100 yards away lol) My new hunting buddy did amazing for an 8 month old pup and actually retrieved 2 of the 5 birds I shot to hand (yes!)

Our group of 6 bagged 15 birds, it was actually too nice on Monday and the birds had their survival instincts on full alert :)

A lot of fun, and gorgeous weather for the last hurrah. Blessed with health and good friends and family.
 

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