Who's going out this weekend?

Hunted the farm as usual, and as usual never saw peep of a pheasant or quail. I did see a TON of doves. Couple dozen at least, so I took 2 home. And 6 ducks, a 4 pointer, and a coyote.

Hopefully the coming spring CRP improvements will bring in a bird or three, because having 20+ acres of CRP and never seeing a bird on it gets a bit old.
 
Makintrax73 said:
Hopefully the coming spring CRP improvements will bring in a bird or three, because having 20+ acres of CRP and never seeing a bird on it gets a bit old.
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What other upland habitat do you have in that area? Anything or is it isolated?
 
1pheas4 said:
What other upland habitat do you have in that area? Anything or is it isolated?
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A fair amount of drainage ditches and grass waterways. It's a fairly rolling part of the state near the quad cities. Awful lot of recreational mowing, including by the county and twp though, and most of the cover is monoculture brome grass from all appearances. It truly doesn't look good, but the PF habitat guy says there are a few coveys of quail by the town 4 miles away. Not terribly promising, but I feel like I have to try.
 
Guys we had the best opener ever. 10 man limit in 3 hrs... heard of two other big groups with limits. Habitat pays... 80 Ac plus blocks of crp makes a huge difference... what an amazing hunt
 
Makintrax73 said:
A fair amount of drainage ditches and grass waterways. It's a fairly rolling part of the state near the quad cities. Awful lot of recreational mowing, including by the county and twp though, and most of the cover is monoculture brome grass from all appearances. It truly doesn't look good, but the PF habitat guy says there are a few coveys of quail by the town 4 miles away. Not terribly promising, but I feel like I have to try.
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Yeah, you have to mix that habitat up;) It doesn't sound like you have anything else (field wise) for 4 miles. Did I understand you right?

Petrey---do you have any photos of your hunt/birds? Sounds like a great time. Nice job:thumbsup:.
 
Opener report:

Nice weather to start, cool and a little frost on the ground. Warmed up quickly into the 50s when we stopped.

First ditch put up a dozen or so and one cock put down.

2nd ditch 8-10 and one cock killed.

3rd spot nothing.

4th quite a few birds and killed 3 cocks

5th spot was full! Cocks everywhere. Had a boil of cocks explode around one of the guys. 10-14 of them. Not a hen in the group. He was so flustered couldnt' hit a thing. Most flew 50yds then right back into the ditch!

Boys high tailed it over there and they couldn't find a one of them. Did manage to down 2 more in that place but there have to be 20+ more cocks still out there. Some more for later in the season.
 
1pheas4 said:
Yeah, you have to mix that habitat up;) It doesn't sound like you have anything else (field wise) for 4 miles. Did I understand you right?

Petrey---do you have any photos of your hunt/birds? Sounds like a great time. Nice job:thumbsup:.
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All I can say is work with your local nrcs office. Tell them your goal. We got two 160s put into crp and getting great rent payments. Added another 20 Ac this week. PF has been a great resource too.
 
Thanks for the photo petrey:thumbsup:. Great day afield with some happy dogs too! Love it.

Murph, would you say you saw more birds this season than last in those areas?
 
1pheas4 said:
Thanks for the photo petrey:thumbsup:. Great day afield with some happy dogs too! Love it.

Murph, would you say you saw more birds this season than last in those areas?
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More in some and fewer in others. Like it always is I guess. Last year was a pretty good one compared to the last 5-10. Saw more birds than I had in a long time.

One spot that we didn't see anything has always had birds - ALWAYS. Opening day saw zip, but it might have been feeding time and we saw more in a ditch close by there than we had in a while so perhaps they simply moved.

Heading out tomorrow morning.
 
So did three places yesterday. Too warm and not much wind.

First spot we put up 25 birds or so. Knocked down three cocks. What was really unusual was as we were unloading the trucks across a bean field from the ditch we were going to hunt two cocks flew up from the other side of the road (a plowed field) and flew into our ditch. :thumbsup:

Good Sign!

Next spot we put up 6 hens.

Last spot put up one cock and 5 hens. No shot but though one of the blockers was going to have a perfect go at him, but it ducked down into the cover 50 yards in front of him. We never could find him. The ghost cock.

Not bad but need some cooler weather and maybe a little snow.
 
Had 5 hunts so far.... group is up to 38 wild roosters in the bag one woodcock and a rabbit.

Established crp is good to great.... new crp and ditches are scarce

We need another good spring and we may have something here again
 
Me and a buddy braved the rain today in central Illinois to hunt a private 160ac crp field. I knew it would be a good day when we pulled up and 10 roosters were standing there looking at us. Scratched our 4 in about an hour and had to let the other 50 go. Just goes to show that great habitat = great birds!

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Good reports guys. Keep them coming. If possible maybe a few pics too:thumbsup:. It's tough for me to get out these days so I'm living through my fellow UPH-IL-wild-pheasant-hunting-friends:D
 
What's everyone's kill count up to for their group so far?

We've been having some great luck. Haven't hunted the same spot twice helps. Going out tomorrow morning and hope to have a few pics for ya.
 
I haven't gotten out yet. Hopefully this week if the weather works out. I did a couple pre-season walks. Bird numbers looked good up this way.

Upland, did you see any birds today?
 
Not a thing, only a couple of guys deer hunting too. Who knows maybe the birds all push into the refuge which opens up on December 1st. Snow and cold would help a lot. Getting depressing
 
Petrey10- Glad someone is having a great season.

I have been out three times with my Dad and we have gotten 8 so far. Seeing a good amount of hens. I would say this season is about the same as last for bird numbers. Wish I had more land access to hunt more than I have but it is what it is. Looking forward to getting some time off and hunting North Dakota in a couple of weeks and Kansas in January.
 
UplandHntr said:
Not a thing, only a couple of guys deer hunting too. Who knows maybe the birds all push into the refuge which opens up on December 1st. Snow and cold would help a lot. Getting depressing
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I received your email Mike;). I know where those little buggers are hiding out:D

I can make some time next week if you'd like. It would have to be a morning hunt though. Would that work for next week?
 
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