I hunted in South Dakota last week. It was my third pheasant hunt, the other two being in North Dakota. Our five man group got limits every day in an hour and a half to two and a half hours. Once we got dialed in it took an hour and a half. The South Dakota hunt was very orchestrated in that we hunted standing milo in limited sized fields with either smallish cedar trees or open pasture on the side. We changed plots about five times and we were done. But I left thinking this was only a step up from shooting pen raised birds. The North Dakota hunting was a bit wilder where we made longer drives in grassy draws and fields. Anybody done the same thing?

I used to go to SD every year. Spinks County. Private land, CRP and food plots, push/drive style hunting. We hunted with the farmer and his family and friends. It's a fun hunt, but the most fun I had was hunting behind a guy's dogs there in grassy pastures. No driving/pushing, no blockers standing at the end of the food plot to blast everything you push their way, just me, the guy, and his 2 pointers. That was pretty cool. I had never done that on a "wild" hunt.

Have been to SD and ND. Depending on the farm they can be similar or different imho.

Sounds like an awesome day of pheasant hunting. Have always hunted the panhandle and Kansas. It's been rough the last decade if not longer. Would welcome some quick and leisurely hunts after the beatings I've taken the last few years.

We have a handful of panhandle spots that still produce! Pen raised birds just aren't the same as wild ones though.

Dirty-8-thirty Ag said:

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Sounds like an awesome day of pheasant hunting. Have always hunted the panhandle and Kansas. It's been rough the last decade if not longer. Would welcome some quick and leisurely hunts after the beatings I've taken the last few years.

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Three hunting days and 15 birds per day (for five hunters), 45 total. One is going on the wall.

806aggie18 said:

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We have a handful of panhandle spots that still produce! Pen raised birds just aren't the same as wild ones though.

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How did you train that cat to retrieve them birds? Does it hold a point well?

Every time I hunt South Dakota I always spend to many $2 bills at Franky Days and Codys. If you know you know!!!!

Yeah, much more fun to be hunting behind a couple of good dogs.

That can be said about any bird hunt…

I'm in if anyone putting together a group.

They were all labradors.

We have hunted true wild birds in North and South Dakota with pointers and it's lots of walking. Not with an outfitter but with locals- friends of my wife's family. In the snow some years it was pretty brutal. Awesome hunting the wild birds and I would like to be able to go every year for the openers in both states. Usually not much snow on the ground there the first two weeks of October.

Also hunted the pen raised pheasants several times while duck/ goose hunting near Tulia with an outfitter. That's fun for an afternoon activity but no comparison to real, wild pheasant hunts. I'm not even sure if there are many guides that offer the real wild bird hunts in the Dakotas anymore.

806aggie18 said:

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We have a handful of panhandle spots that still produce! Pen raised birds just aren't the same as wild ones though.

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Are those wild ones you found or pen?

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We have a handful of panhandle spots that still produce! Pen raised birds just aren't the same as wild ones though.

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I did a pen-raised hunt where the guide was having to walk over to the bushes and literally kick the pheasants into the air. They took about 10 seconds of furious flapping to get any sort of lift.

Not exactly a thrilling experience. I guess if there whole life is being locked in a confined space and eating feed, that is what you get.

Half and half. A friend of mine up here raises them for fun and sells them to us so we open the cages and let them fly out into the grass and let the dog go find them. The wild ones are from the one random corner of a corn field that has grass on it and consistently holds a lot of birds.

806aggie18 said:

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Half and half. A friend of mine up here raises them for fun and sells them to us so we open the cages and let them fly out into the grass and let the dog go find them. The wild ones are from the one random corner of a corn field that has grass on it and consistently holds a lot of birds.

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What is needed in the panhandle? More rain or more fallow grassy areas? One outfitter in Nebraska near the Colorado border said the drought had about destroyed the pheasant hunting there. I hunted ducks a few times near Brush, Colorado and we at times saw a ton of pheasant.

JayM said:

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806aggie18 said:

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Half and half. A friend of mine up here raises them for fun and sells them to us so we open the cages and let them fly out into the grass and let the dog go find them. The wild ones are from the one random corner of a corn field that has grass on it and consistently holds a lot of birds.

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What is needed in the panhandle? More rain or more fallow grassy areas? One outfitter in Nebraska near the Colorado border said the drought had about destroyed the pheasant hunting there. I hunted ducks a few times near Brush, Colorado and we at times saw a ton of pheasant.

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In my opinion it's a combination of things. Drought, lack of CRP, no more row watering crops or the need for tail water pits. It's done a number on the once robust population in the panhandle. They are still there in numbers in certain pockets where habitat is just right.

Those South Dakota farmers and outfitters make sure they have preserved habitat. The pheasant are free to come and go. But they are always in the milo. We couldn't hunt the grassy depressions. Those were off limits.
I was told in the winter in three feet of snow, they live in the milo tops and tunnel down to get what is below.

I used to hunt near Salina Kansas years ago The hunting was great. Pheasant, prarie chicken and quail. Now it is all turkey, deer and coyote. Not sure what happened.

In the panhandle we had pretty much no rain and extreme heat 3 years in a row from 2011 through 2013. The population has never recovered to 2010 levels.

I haven't hunted them locally in years because I want the population to recover. But I just got back from Greensburg, Kansas and had an awesome 2 days of hunting with an easy limit both days .

SunrayAg said:

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In the panhandle we had pretty much no rain and extreme heat 3 years in a row from 2011 through 2013. The population has never recovered to 2010 levels.

I haven't hunted them locally in years because I want the population to recover. But I just got back from Greensburg, Kansas and had an awesome 2 days of hunting with an easy limit both days .

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Upland Inn?

RCR06 said:

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SunrayAg said:

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In the panhandle we had pretty much no rain and extreme heat 3 years in a row from 2011 through 2013. The population has never recovered to 2010 levels.

I haven't hunted them locally in years because I want the population to recover. But I just got back from Greensburg, Kansas and had an awesome 2 days of hunting with an easy limit both days .

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Upland Inn?

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yep.

Heading to Mitchell in a few weeks. No trip to Dallas this year though (IYKYK)

cheeky said:

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Heading to Mitchell in a few weeks. No trip to Dallas this year though (IYKYK)

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I was beginning to think I was the only one that hung out in Dallas

The Cabela's in Mitchell on the Friday before opening day is a crazy place! I've never gone into a store on black friday, but I imagine it's close to what black friday is for men. Never walked out of there without dropping at least a couple hundred bucks.

You guys ever looking for a place to go one of my customers owns Copper Ridge Lodge north of Draper. Great setup and lodge that sleeps 18 (8 rooms). Just got back from three days there. Walking the milo in 65 degree weather on Wednesday was nice.

JayM said:

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806aggie18 said:

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What is needed in the panhandle? More rain or more fallow grassy areas? One outfitter in Nebraska near the Colorado border said the drought had about destroyed the pheasant hunting there. I hunted ducks a few times near Brush, Colorado and we at times saw a ton of pheasant.

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True dont go

Been there, we just ate and stayed at the lodge. BIL won a trip and just so happened to be up there hunting wild birds so I went.

We hunt wild birds in wild places every year usually me and 2 buddies. It's 3 long days in the field, no lodge all wild birds on public access land. You're busting CRP walking dangerous cliff draws. Fighting plum thickets, no food plots (well except the 640 acres of corn on all 4 sides). Kansas to North Dakota

Many years I worked on a cattle ranch in north Kansas. We would spend afternoons hunting in wheat stubble and blackberry thickets in the coulees, behind a Blue healer.

You had to hold your shot until the Healer had jumped after bird and then dropped out of line of fire. He would then retrieve the birds.