Pheasants in ND.

[KEN W]

I attended the GNF Advisory meeting last night in VC.The commissioner said....."The way it looks,the pheasants may have been in a train wreck."They won't know for sure how bad until they start taking spring crowing counts and later in the summer.....brood counts.

But it doesn't look good.I asked if they might be looking at reduced bag limits.And the commissioner said that could happen.The last time it was this bad was in 1997,The fall season bag limit was reduced to 2 per day and 6 in possession until Dec. 1.....then 3 and 12 the rest of the season.The following year it was 2 per day for the first 2 weeks.Then 3 per day.Done not for biological reason but to spread out the harvest amongst the hunters.

He also said there was a 15% drop in NR upland hunters as compared to 2007.2 reasons.....$4.00 a gal for gas and almost all the states around us had good pheasant hunting and people may have decided to hunt closer to home.

[Dan189]

As an avid pheasant hunter in the area. This really saddens me. I really hope they do throw reduced bag, so that we can start to save what ever birds are left. I may have to stick to deer and waterfowl next fall, or go out west.

[KEN W]

A reduced bag would basically be a public relations thing.They said it wouldn't reqally make any difference but it would spread out the harvest.Of course the commercial and tourism people would all be against reducing the limit.