Monday, October 17, 2005

Walking and blocking To hunt pheasants in South Dakota, you need a small army of well-organized troops. Travis Haglin was our guide and dog handler today for a half-dozen drives through CRP land, which stretches as far as the proverbial eye can see. I joined the standers for the first three drives, during which I shot three roosters - my one-day limit. For the rest of the afternoon, I walked with the drivers, trying to get photos of hunters and birds. The number of birds we saw today was simply unbelievable. Travis was counting roosters flushed, but I lost track after the second drive. Shortly after a drive starts, pheasants begin pouring out of sides of the corn and sunflower food plots. I posted on the far corner, hoping to cut off any birds heading my way. Dozens of hens took to the air, with a scattering of roosters among them. The guns took their toll of the big birds, however, so I'm betting we'll see fewer of them tomorrow. After two hours, we had 26 birds in the trailer, leaving 19 to fill our 15-gun limit. Darned if we didn't do that in the last drive, which rousted more roosters than all the previous drives combined. I'm simply exhausted from walking, and the incredible number of birds we saw and shot has overloaded my circuits. If you had told me there were this many birds here, I would have scoffed. Whatever the pheasant population is, I've never seen anything like it. Mayber I'll think of something more intelligent to say tomorrow. If you've never hunted South Dakota, you've got to experience it once, at least. Later... 10:37:14 PM    comment []

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