Upland Forecast

I just read it and I am looking for some private land to pay for access to hunt for a day or two. I figure that might help my chances. I have a 2 year old bird dog that hasn't seen many birds yet.
 
stinkbelly said:
I just read it and I am looking for some private land to pay for access to hunt for a day or two. I figure that might help my chances. I have a 2 year old bird dog that hasn't seen many birds yet.
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I hunt almost exclusively private land in Kansas and I'll warn you frankly, it is not worth paying to hunt pheasants in Kansas. If I wasn't from there, or didn't have access to private land, or didn't have a pretty deep emotional investment in being there, I wouldn't even spend the gas and hotel money.
 
We had private CRP corners and didn’t even bother last season. Landowner had seen one pheasant all year. This was Kiowa and Edwards counties. I can’t imagine it’s any better this year.
 
There is no where to hunt even if there were a few birds. I would say close to 90% of the properties I hunt are completely gone. And if I were to add up all the acres I have permission to hunt, it has to be close to 50,000 acres and that doesn't include WIHA. WIHA has been wiped out. My fear is that pheasants are now going to face the same fate as prairie chickens and will never bounce back. Unless we somehow manage to triple the CRP in Kansas and landowners leave the CRP alone, I don't ever see them rebounding. Farmers are knocking on landowners doors begging them to apply for emergency grazing. They are fencing off a large portion of the CRP here to graze cattle. It's sad to see. I will add I live in the region that the KDWP reported the highest roadside densities. The biologist here who does the pheasant count told me personally that he saw a total of 4 birds driving his routes. It is worse than the KDWP made it out to be in the report.
 
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Was tentatively planning a trip to the Norton Co area the first week of January......coming from out of state for the first time to Kansas. Not looking for or needing limits of birds, but it would be nice to bump some roosters and quail daily......I know hunting is hunting, but with the information out, is this a shot in the dark?
 
The "New Desert" of the Midwest. We, Kansas, are the saddest wildlife/habitat story in the country in my opinion. Tough to stomach driving through the west half of the state anymore.
 
About what expected. The only thing positive, if you can even say that, is that there was no dew pushing roosters to the road when they were running counts. So maybe there will a few more than expected,
 
wingsnfins said:
Was tentatively planning a trip to the Norton Co area the first week of January......coming from out of state for the first time to Kansas. Not looking for or needing limits of birds, but it would be nice to bump some roosters and quail daily......I know hunting is hunting, but with the information out, is this a shot in the dark?
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Save your gas. Walk-in is tough enough in November but by January anything that was any good will have been walked a gazillion times.
 
To be sure it's not very good, but I'm not sure it's as gloomy as everyone is making it out to be. There's less habitat than there was, that's undeniable. Weather was unfavorable during nesting season; but generally favorable for brood-rearing. That's also undeniable. Where there is habitat, there will be some birds. I spent close to 15 days in Kansas last year, and I pulled the trigger every day except one. Two of those days at least were pretty good. I hunt a mixture of private and WIHA, and had success on both.

I'll be out there about as much again, and I'm looking forward to it. Maybe this year I'll target more quail. I think those numbers are somewhat better. This might even be the year for that wild-goose-chase trip to the far SW for scalies.
 
Thanks for the info.
I'm used to hunting heavily hunted public land.....Wisconsin does not have much public land for pheasant that isn't pounded, at least the 1st month of the season or the few days after guys follow the release trucks!
I typically don't even bother hunting public land here until end of November to the end of the season because of that.

Was looking forward to a change of area.......but not a complete bust of a trip.
 
matto said:
To be sure it's not very good, but I'm not sure it's as gloomy as everyone is making it out to be. There's less habitat than there was, that's undeniable. Weather was unfavorable during nesting season; but generally favorable for brood-rearing. That's also undeniable. Where there is habitat, there will be some birds. I spent close to 15 days in Kansas last year, and I pulled the trigger every day except one. Two of those days at least were pretty good. I hunt a mixture of private and WIHA, and had success on both.

I'll be out there about as much again, and I'm looking forward to it. Maybe this year I'll target more quail. I think those numbers are somewhat better. This might even be the year for that wild-goose-chase trip to the far SW for scalies.
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Pheasant populations are undoubtedly down in a big way, no question about it. That said, it’s not totally as bleak of a picture as some here paint it. I don’t doubt anyone’s account of very poor numbers in the areas they’re familiar with. The places I hunt (nearly exclusively WIHA), are no shooting gallery, to be sure. But I see a hell of a lot more pheasants than many here report.

I’m a resident who has hunted the same areas for several years now, so I have my “honey holes” where I can find quite a few pheasants year in, and year out. So I will be hunting them here in KS as much as I always do. In our current climate, If I wasn’t from here, I wouldn’t drive a long distance to hunt pheasants here. I go to Iowa and the Dakotas to get in to lots of pheasants .

Fortunately, the quail around home in SEK did pretty well this year, so I will chase them as much as anything. I’m really looking to target prairie chickens more, too. Heading out after them tomorrow!
 
matto said:
To be sure it's not very good, but I'm not sure it's as gloomy as everyone is making it out to be. There's less habitat than there was, that's undeniable. Weather was unfavorable during nesting season; but generally favorable for brood-rearing. That's also undeniable. Where there is habitat, there will be some birds. I spent close to 15 days in Kansas last year, and I pulled the trigger every day except one. Two of those days at least were pretty good. I hunt a mixture of private and WIHA, and had success on both.

I'll be out there about as much again, and I'm looking forward to it. Maybe this year I'll target more quail. I think those numbers are somewhat better. This might even be the year for that wild-goose-chase trip to the far SW for scalies.
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Actually weather was very favorable for nesting. We just didn't have the carryover then extreme heat set in when the broods were young. Lots of hail didn't help either. Especially with limited cover.
Kansan said:
Pheasant populations are undoubtedly down in a big way, no question about it. That said, it’s not totally as bleak of a picture as some here paint it. I don’t doubt anyone’s account of very poor numbers in the areas they’re familiar with. The places I hunt (nearly exclusively WIHA), are no shooting gallery, to be sure. But I see a hell of a lot more pheasants than many here report.

I’m a resident who has hunted the same areas for several years now, so I have my “honey holes” where I can find quite a few pheasants year in, and year out. So I will be hunting them here in KS as much as I always do. In our current climate, If I wasn’t from here, I wouldn’t drive a long distance to hunt pheasants here. I go to Iowa and the Dakotas to get in to lots of pheasants .

Fortunately, the quail around home in SEK did pretty well this year, so I will chase them as much as anything. I’m really looking to target prairie chickens more, too. Heading out after them tomorrow!
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Everyone's opinion of what "bleak" is will differ. But going from individually shooting 75 birds per year to 25 or less is bleak. Living out here, I hope to shoot 12 birds this year. Problem is a lack of places to go. I suspect I will shoot more than most this year but it is poor. My friend is the former upland biologist for KS and when he doesn't have many birds on his properties it's bleak.
 
in the 2000s four or five of us limited on WIHA opening weekend almost every year we went. Hunting that same general area the last five or six years, we managed to kill around 10 birds opening weekend. That's with four to five guys but hunting private CRP corners instead of WIHA. That area doesn't even resemble the place we knew from the 2000s.
 
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