Late season pheasant tactics....when the weather is mild?

[rundrave]

I hunted from 10am to 4:30pm this last Saturday by myself and my 2 dogs here in SD. I put on about 150 miles of driving, and walked probably a dozen different walk in areas. I hunted until I physically couldn't hunt any more, I was beat. I can cover a lot of ground with 2 pointers but still end up doing lots of walking and I enjoy every minute and every mile walked. But man that was a lot of effort to come home with zero birds.

I was in Turner and Hutchinson counties so not prime areas by any means. None the less I hunted public land that I have hunted several times this year, and other years and always see and have an opportunity to shoot birds, but I ended up getting skunked.

What changed? Nothing, the only wild card was that instead of being 15 degrees with snow on the ground, it was 50 degrees on drought plagued land with no snow and zero moisture and the birds just weren't in there usual places.

The first place I walked had a standing crop about 3 acres in size and we flushed one rooster wild that was just out of gun range. The rest this area had several acres of great CRP, hills and valleys out of the wind with a couple stock dams and cat tails marshes. We always do well here, but not even a single hen this time! Only action we had was a doe. I had the first dog on point about 40 yards out nose into the wind. 2nd dog was backing about 10 yards behind. I slowly made my way in for a flush when I see 2 big ears perk up just. It was a doe and she sat forever. I let the dogs soak in the aroma for about 30 secs and I finally made some noise and she bolted. Not what we were looking for but neat to see and experience.

2nd WIA area is comprised of a nice large slough full of water and some pretty thin grass. Wouldn't you know it we worked the thin areas of cat tails around the water and dogs never got birdy. As soon as I let them open up and really start to cover some ground out in the bare stuff we started to get into birds. Had a great point on a hen where there was a just a tad bit more cover where some water would normally flow into the main slough. Bird sat tight forever but unfortunately was a hen. Ran into a 1 more hen in the same type of cover but no roosters.

I then proceeded to another WIA that is stripped with nice heavy CRP, pine trees and some plum thickets. Dogs quartered it with a meticulous fashion like always and never got birdy. We worked our away through a heavy tree grove into some standing corn. I am not one to work corn with pointers but was willing to give anything a try after not having many bird encounters. Didn't see anything come out of the corn so we worked our way through what was left of the neighboring CRP and found one hen and that was it.

At this point I was just baffled. Having worked 3 nice large areas that always produce birds I didn't know what to try next. So we just kept driving from one area to the next trying to find birds. Only to repeatedly come up empty one place after another. Now I am not expecting hot and heavy action bird after bird but I should be seeing more than this.

My only rooster encounter of the day that yielded a shot was in a smaller walk in area that comprised of fire weed, sand burs and a few random unharvested corn stalks. If I owned it, it would have been plowed under as it looked worthless. I think it was one of the CREP properties that was too wet to do anything with this spring. But it was a piece of public land that didn't currently have anyone hunting on it. With the weather this nice and lots of other hunters enjoying the weather I had no choice to give it a shot. I had no more and parked and got the dogs unloaded and already had competition that thankfully let me keep it to myself. We quartered it thoroughly and saw more birds in this thin cover than we saw all day. Unfortunately they were all hens but I was surprised how many we were seeing in this cover basically out in the open with no food sources or water to be found in sight. As we made our last pass toward the vehicle I had one dog get birdy and go on point. I made my way as fast I could with out rushing or making too much noise. 1 rooster gets up and hes a ways out but as I ready my aim for a good shot, another gets up and I over think the situation hoping to achieve a nice double. I rush the first shot and then completely shoot under and behind on my 2nd shot. Break open my O/U with some 4 letter words of encouragement immediately followed by the stare down from my 2 short-hairs.

What is just bad luck for the day? For all I know each place I walked was walked by someone else 30 seconds prior to me hunting there. That's the chance you take hunting public land and I am always up for the challenge, rather than getting my limit in 15 mins of hunting. Regardless for the amount of area we covered, the number of places we hunted, it just didn't add up.

My only theory is that with the cold weather the birds got their feed on as they would typically do. We get an abnormal extremely warm day and they were sitting out in the open enjoying a nice mild winter day vs being hunkered down in a slough or heavy grass trying to keep warm. Being out in the open made it harder to get close to them. Maybe should have focused on areas with less cover than typical?

With that said we got a lot of exercise and explored many areas on the prairie. I really really want some snow as its a whole new ballgame once its on the ground and the hunting is so fun.

Does anyone have any late season rooster advice, when the late season weather is more like early season?

[pureinsanity]

Do your pointers wear beapers or bells? One thing in late season snow or not is the birds now you are there as soon as you stop the car! Once reason I like my flusher is he doesn't make a loud noise that travels far. If you have any beepers or bells take em off.

My late season I usually find birds in thickets, sloughs, shelter belts. I think the only advice anyone can give is keep trying. This year was a weird year for pheasants. Most my normals spots where I can plan on limiting out (if I shoot straight) didn't hold the birds.

I noticed through out the year that infact spots that were proven good spots for the past 15 years, just didn't hold birds.

Another suggestion would be if you can come in from another angle do it. By now birds are use to people coming in the same direction all the time. Sometimes when you change up where you enter a field you can get closer and surprise some of the birds. Good luck! And always work into the wind. Not just for your dogs but so the birds have a hard time hearing you.

Sometimes I think the birds hearing is better then their eyesight

[rundrave]

Do your pointers wear beapers or bells? One thing in late season snow or not is the birds now you are there as soon as you stop the car! Once reason I like my flusher is he doesn't make a loud noise that travels far. If you have any beepers or bells take em off.

[reddog]

Dustin,

I have seen the writing on the wall on the last several trips. The birds dont need much cover, and can feed anywhere in weather like this..

I actually boat fished on Saturday till 2, and then went for a short run with the new dog. I had a flock of about 20 chickens fly across the road and land in some heavy grass in a WIA. I geared up and let the young dog out. I got an absolutely beautiful point on the chickens,(which strangely held) and I walked in telling myself to take your time. They all flushed 20 yards away, and I double whiffed on em. Unbelievable. Then, I went back to fishing....

It sure doesnt seem like late season hunting without the snow.

[Dave S]

I'm heading West next week in hopes of finding the birds again. One of the tactics I try to do is to zig-zag the oppposite direction the dog is going (when hunting with others). This might help in kicking up the birds that sit tight and attempt to run between the dog and I.

[Jmnhunter]

going out next thursday west of mitchell, but weather looks like 40's need some snow! or atleast some cold weather!!

[Rick]

We went just before Christmas. During the day those birds were feeding in very lightr cover and even in the middle of cornfields with almost non-existent cover.

However about an hour before dark they were piling into their cover filled nesting areas.

This warm weather allows the birds to venture much further from their cattail sloughs and grassy cover areas they normally like to frequent this time of year. It can be tough to get on them during the day doing what we normally do

[Jmnhunter]

how did you do out there? public or private land? plan on doing both, but the public land we are planning is mostly cattails...

[rundrave]

im headed out tommorrow and have plans to hunt everday till sunday all over the state