quail hound
Moderator
Well as my trip winds down I thought I'd share a little of what I've seen. We are hunting about 500mi north of home just on the edge of the Oregon border. The folks up here are very nice and the hunters were very helpful to my brother and I. Birds? Yeah there are quite a few, we saw more in our first two hours of hunting this new ground than we'd seen all season up until now but these birds are the jumpiest I think I've ever seen. The first day we talked to a local guy and his young son and invited them to hunt with us and the dogs (they were dogless) and in return the man took us straight to his honey hole.
As soon as we pull up a dozen birds fly from the sage brush into the field we are about to hunt, 20yds into the field and we're moving birds already, 50yds in and the first rooster is in the bag. In all we must have moved 50 or so birds in about an hour and a half but only one came home. I really hoped the dogs would put up a bird for the boy to shoot but it didn't happen.
Day two we hunted with the same guy minus the boy. We hunted hard, sage, grass, cattails everything but only put up a handful of birds and no shooting to be had. We thanked him again for showing us around and offered to take his family to dinner but he declined and we parted ways.
Day three started off slow until we talked to another guy who pointed us to a spot where he said we should see a few dozen birds and he wasn't lieing. The spot was a wheat field bordered by about 10 acres of nice grass bordered by sage hills. We worked the grass with the dogs birdy the whole time with no luck. I stopped for a minute to water the dogs and 25 or so pheasants pile out about 40yds left of me and fly straight into the sage where you can't hunt. That was the most birds I've ever seen in one flush in my life. I worked JP over that way hoping for a dumb bird who missed the exit and I found one. Bird two in the bag, a nice change after much frustration. We moved another 10 or so birds on the way back to the truck but only hens let us within range.
Today my brother and I devised a plan to tame these wild birds and about halfway down a piece of cover I hustled to the end to block as my brother and Daisy pushed towards me. As they near the end hens start to pile out just in front of me. In all about 15 hens came out and not a single rooster. Whether they gave Daisy the slip somewhere along the way or there just weren't any in there I'll never know but that's how the whole trip has been. The birds have just been a step ahead of us all along.
We'll hunt a little in the morning before we head home but we'll be back... someday, we'll be back. Its been an awesome trip; beautiful scenery, nice weather (cold but no snow), and lots of pheasants to make us scratch our heads. Next time I hope there's snow to even the playing field.:cheers:
As soon as we pull up a dozen birds fly from the sage brush into the field we are about to hunt, 20yds into the field and we're moving birds already, 50yds in and the first rooster is in the bag. In all we must have moved 50 or so birds in about an hour and a half but only one came home. I really hoped the dogs would put up a bird for the boy to shoot but it didn't happen.Day two we hunted with the same guy minus the boy. We hunted hard, sage, grass, cattails everything but only put up a handful of birds and no shooting to be had. We thanked him again for showing us around and offered to take his family to dinner but he declined and we parted ways.
Day three started off slow until we talked to another guy who pointed us to a spot where he said we should see a few dozen birds and he wasn't lieing. The spot was a wheat field bordered by about 10 acres of nice grass bordered by sage hills. We worked the grass with the dogs birdy the whole time with no luck. I stopped for a minute to water the dogs and 25 or so pheasants pile out about 40yds left of me and fly straight into the sage where you can't hunt.
That was the most birds I've ever seen in one flush in my life. I worked JP over that way hoping for a dumb bird who missed the exit and I found one. Bird two in the bag, a nice change after much frustration. We moved another 10 or so birds on the way back to the truck but only hens let us within range.Today my brother and I devised a plan to tame these wild birds and about halfway down a piece of cover I hustled to the end to block as my brother and Daisy pushed towards me. As they near the end hens start to pile out just in front of me. In all about 15 hens came out and not a single rooster.
Whether they gave Daisy the slip somewhere along the way or there just weren't any in there I'll never know but that's how the whole trip has been. The birds have just been a step ahead of us all along.We'll hunt a little in the morning before we head home but we'll be back... someday, we'll be back. Its been an awesome trip; beautiful scenery, nice weather (cold but no snow
), and lots of pheasants to make us scratch our heads. Next time I hope there's snow to even the playing field.:cheers:
