September Trip Report - Scouting

UGUIDE

UGUIDE

Active member
Our Roscoe-Hosmer Camp owners bought the school in Hosmer and have fixed it up for a hunting lodge. My Labor Day weekend consists of driving out from Mpls across 12 and staying in Aberdeen tonight and then off to Hosmer tomorrow. So far western MN looks pretty dry. Sugar Beets are coming out and beans are dropping leaves and saw one combine harvesting corn. Corn is drying down fast.

Across the border between 29 and Groton on 12 it was quite a bit more lush and green. potholes were holding a fair amount of water and ducks and quite a few geese. Lots of hay bales sitting in the fields.

Tonight I am going to do a cruise up NW of Aberdeen around out Leola camp to check conditions and also head into ND and just see how things look up there for water-fowling as guys that wanted to combo hunt that did not draw a tag may need to cross borders to get a duck tag.

Will hit the Hosmer area tomorrow and then shoot down 45 to my place for weekend. (Note: we are only 15 miles from Nebraska border.) Should be interesting.

Chow for now!
 
Day 1 evening

After I checked into Aberdeen Super 8 I loaded up for a little jaunt NW of Aberdeen. Made it into ND and then back to ND.

I did not see pheasant 1. That's how crazy these bird numbers thing are. This should be an area of the state that would hold some of best numbers in state or at least this year. Not surprising though as temps were in 80's and I usually don't see much in evenings anyways until it cools off.

These farmers will get a crop and there are hay bales everywhere. I can't tell what is CRP or just pasture ground.

Most of the big sloughs held good water and a lot of the little ones are dry.

Saw good opportunities for ducks and saw mallard, teal, widgeon and ringbills and honkers. With the dry up one would think the fall migration would be concentrated.

Hunters are very frustrated with SD lottery for waterfowl. Any body know why SD as lottery and ND does not?

Day 2....Hosmer and then the route south thru Miller and Platte.
 
thanks Chris for all the updates, cover is going to be damn scarce! birds will be concentrated, going to be a lot of disappointed public ground hunters.
are you sure your uguide landowners didn't hay their CRP too?:eek:
 
Hunter, some have. One situation is the 5 year mid contract management requirement where they can bail and give to neighbor this year vs. next year they can bale and have to burn bails. This is stupid and needs to stop. What a waste of resources.

I think just about everything that can be bailed this year has been.

I will say on my trip down from Roscoe to Lake Andes it can be summed up as DRY and I did finally see 3 broods of pheasants. All good size with no color yet. One was between Miller and Wessington and the other two broods right by my farm. Almost took one out with the car for cripes sake. WAKE UP!!

Get this though. On the 3 hour trip from Hosmer to Lake Andes the car read 100 degrees and winds from south at 30MPH. I checked my phone weather to find a RED FLAG report. Never heard of such a thing!!!! Basically when high temps and winds and low humidity of 17% collide you have toxic fire danger. No smoke as of yet so thank you Lord!
 
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Chris,

I also am on a scouting mission this weekend.

I started out in the Mitchell area, and found that half of the CRP is mowed and baled. Ditches, sloughs, water ways, you name it.. There was a early hailstorm here that took out much of the wheat crop. All of those fields were disced up, and replanted late with corn or beans, which got to about 4 feet tall, and no grain anywhere to be seen..
Its pretty sad, actually. I did see some birds, but I cannot help but think the temps have them locked down in the shade till almost sundown..

Yesterday, I left Plank about noon, and headed to the Chamberlain area and west.
I put on over 200 miles yesterday alone, all on backroads..

I think you will do as well to scout with binoculars, as to put a dog down of youre looking for sharptails and chickens..
There are numerous corn, bean, milo and sunflower fields that wont be worth combining. I heard one farmer mention that 15 corn bu to the acre was going to be the cutoff whether they would put a combine in the field or not.

I dont know what they will do with those fields that arent worth combining. If they leave them stand for the fall/winter, they will be the necessary cover that the birds will need. Everything,,and I mean everything is either baled, or very sparse west river, unless it is a bottom ground of some kind..

We came across one corn field north of Presho, where they had a swather in the corn field, laying it down and wind rowing it and were baling it..

About 7ish, we (wife and I) came across a little dried out creek that had a deep washout right by the road. There were 35 pheasants standing in the dried up mud, trying to dig to something that wasnt there... water. Last time I had that sick feeling in my stomach, was a bad ice storm where I felt sorry for the birds. Same thing yesterday...

I am headed back to the east today, as I have seen enough of the west..
I am heading home tonight, to put some things in the hunting equipment tote, most notably, two fire extinguishers, and to try to get my dogs acclimated to some booties, as I have never, ever seen so many sand burs.

If you go out, make damn sure you park in an area that has at least been mowed. I only took one grass road yesterday, and I was extremely nervous the whole way.. You would not want to get something started, or be in the way of something coming your way.. Maybe the mowing will help slow any fires that get started.

Any time you open this country up to late or dry season mowing, you allow germination of alot of crap, and sand burs are one.

You can see where they have mowed the road edges/ditches for haying, and the only thing to grow back is kochia/tumbleweeds..



Its sad..
Its hard to say what the bird population is, but I can tell you one thing, if theres no water, theres no birds..

From 11 am till 5pm, we seen 0 birds..

from 5 till 6:27, we seen one rooster and one PC.

from 6:27 till we hit the interstate at Kennebec, we did see quite a few birds..

We went to Cedar Shores for supper last night.. Nice place, but the cheapest steak was 18.95 for a 10 oz sirloin. My 18 oz porterhouse was $24.95 and probably weighed 15 oz precooked. It was good, but man was it expensive..

Gas is 3.94 in Chamberlain..

Alot of negatives for the day, but we had a great time riding around together..
 
Thanks for the details you guys.
Man! I can't wait until frosty mornings.
It's very dry and hot in Northern Mn too.
 
I'm a bit concerned about the habitat situation folks keep reporting on. If this winter is a tough one it will take a heavy toll on the birds. Time will tell.

Chris, there's more grasshoppers this year than I've ever seen before. It's been that way for some time now. Something about a drought that make them flourish. As you know, they contain moister and nutrients for the birds. Though I'm not sure how long pheasants can go on a diet of grasshoppers before needing straight water:confused:.

Do you know if SD received any sizable rains these past 2 to 4 weeks? Enough to make a puddle here and there for a day or two? Has the morning dew returned yet? I know we've been having dewy mornings lately around here. I hope this is the case for SD too. It can make a world of difference.


Reddog, don't feel too bad for those birds standing around in the dried up pond. They know there's no water there. I'm guessing they were pecking for bits of mollusks/grit for their crops, or insects. (There are very small mollusks in those ponds and their shells can be used as grit).:)

The hail storm story is no good. Particularly one strong enough to knock out a crop. As you know, such a storm can easily knock out chicks too. Even adult birds.

Though, near Mitchel, guys have been working dogs and flushing a lot of them, so maybe the storm wasn't widespread or as damaging as we fear. Let's hope so!


I think for this fall, the thing to be concerned about is where to hunt. Where the habitat will be left standing and how much of it. Not so much if there will be birds in it or not. Birds will be concentrated.
 
1pheas4 said:
I'm a bit concerned about the habitat situation folks keep reporting on. If this winter is a tough one it will take a heavy toll on the birds. Time will tell.

Chris, there's more grasshoppers this year than I've ever seen before. It's been that way for some time now. Something about a drought that make them flourish. As you know, they contain moister and nutrients for the birds. Though I'm not sure how long pheasants can go on a diet of grasshoppers before needing straight water:confused:.

Do you know if SD received any sizable rains these past 2 to 4 weeks? Enough to make a puddle here and there for a day or two? Has the morning dew returned yet? I know we've been having dewy mornings lately around here. I hope this is the case for SD too. It can make a world of difference.


Reddog, don't feel too bad for those birds standing around in the dried up pond. They know there's no water there. I'm guessing they were pecking for bits of mollusks/grit for their crops, or insects. (There are very small mollusks in those ponds and their shells can be used as grit).:)

The hail storm story is no good. Particularly one strong enough to knock out a crop. As you know, such a storm can easily knock out chicks too. Even adult birds.

Though, near Mitchel, guys have been working dogs and flushing a lot of them, so maybe the storm wasn't widespread or as damaging as we fear. Let's hope so!


I think for this fall, the thing to be concerned about is where to hunt. Where the habitat will be left standing and how much of it. Not so much if there will be birds in it or not. Birds will be concentrated.
Click to expand...

16 to 24% RH during the day isnt a great recipe for dew. Fortunately, the evenings/nights cool off nicely, but not cool enough to reach the dew point..
 
reddog said:
16 to 24% RH during the day isnt a great recipe for dew. Fortunately, the evenings/nights cool off nicely, but not cool enough to reach the dew point..
Click to expand...

Do you know if they've been getting any sizable rains these past few weeks?
 
In the south I would guesstimate that at least 95% of sloughs are bone dry. Not seeing as many deer either.

The other thing I noticed is that the main cover in the CRP is the old duff left over from last years growth. The new stuff in even the warm season stands is cooked.
 
I left the lodge this morning. Saw some birds on the road, saw somemore flying from CRP to corn further down road on east far. And then saw a hen fly into corn from road ditch. Couple deer too. Neighbor said is was more dewey this morning. Encouraging.

The rain missed us to the north and hit the Mitchell area from what I could tell.
 
Just got a report from friends that were in the Platte/Geedes area over the weekend--ITS DRY but they did see enough Pheasnats to be encouraged for the season--lots of waterfowl where there was water. They also found 17 dead whitetail deer that died from blue tongue--they were everywhere they went--sad.:(
 
SDJIM said:
Just got a report from friends that were in the Platte/Geedes area over the weekend--ITS DRY but they did see enough Pheasnats to be encouraged for the season--lots of waterfowl where there was water. They also found 17 dead whitetail deer that died from blue tongue--they were everywhere they went--sad.:(
Click to expand...

Nature has a way of thinning things out don't she Jim. Pops were high. It will be interesting to see what is crawling around on bow opener.

Water might be the most overlooked habitat essential we will learn this year. And clean water at that.
 
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