This coming Saturday, October 20th, the 2012 ring-necked pheasant season opens at 12:00 pm or noon in Wisconsin. I’ve been thinking about the pheasant opener recently since I have a young Labrador retriever, named Katie, who seems to know what time of year it is and that the pheasant and upland game season is soon upon us. Maybe it’s the exercise and long walks that we take on the near-by public hunting land, or the cooler and shorter days that fall has brought, or maybe its just something in the air that hunting dogs can sense. Whatever these signs of fall are and there relationship with upland bird hunting is something that a hunting dog would only understand.
Pheasant hunting has always been one of my favorite outdoor activities going back to the 1950’s and 1960’s when my late grandfather would let me tag along while my grandfather and his friends hunted a couple of farms friends owned in Gurnee, Illinois. This area where I went on my first pheasant hunting trip is now within a mile of condos, large houses, strip malls, and the complex that Bass Pro Shops are in. Little did I know that decades later, I would regularly go to the Bass Pro Shop to give fishing seminars! The farms and fields of corn and soybeans where we hunted are now big houses and concrete. My love for pheasant hunting and training dogs continued though I never could have a dog while in college and for a few years later before I moved to a farm between Mt Horeb and New Glarus.
This was in the late 1970’s and 1980’s when farming was much better for the smaller farmer. I farmed around 200 acres and raised beef cattle and fed hogs to market weight. I also grew corn, soybeans, and market vegetables. I sold produce at Madison’s Farmers Market before it became the popular event that it is now. But, in the rolling hills of southwest Wisconsin in Dane, Green, Iowa, and Rock Counties there were many wild and native pheasants to hunt and I also had a game preserve license that allowed me to raise pheasants and release them on my farm and the surrounding farms.
Pheasants, then, were common and the rich farmland had plenty of habitat and cover for the pheasants. Farmers didn’t plow every possible acre and left greenways and fence rows which gave pheasants more than enough cover to prosper and populate the area. It was easy to go out and within an hour or two get a bird or two without walking for hours. But, things began to change in the 1980’s with more land being plowed under leaving less cover for pheasants and other wildlife. But, then came the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) that helped air and water quality, all wildlife, and pheasants again grew in numbers. Farmers were paid to enter the Federal programs for specific time periods and this may “saved” wild pheasants for a few more years. The CRP program was one of the best programs that the government has ever done to help wildlife plus the other benefits with soil, water, and air quality.
But, farmers found that they could make more money by plowing most of their land and planting row crops. More and more farmer dropped out of the CRP program which meant more loss of habitat and another decline in native pheasant populations.
The last decade has seen further pheasant declines in most areas of Wisconsin and the other “good” pheasant states in the Midwest like Iowa, South Dakota, Kansas, and Nebraska. Iowa alone lost about half of their CRP acreage with the advent of ethanol which needs corn for its production. There still are scattered areas in Wisconsin that hold native pheasants, but those locations are getting smaller and smaller. Hunters can still go to South Dakota and North Dakota where a hunter can go for a few days and have some great hunting, but this isn’t cheap and a trip to the western states can be rather costly. But, if you can afford the trip and have the time and money then you can have a great trip and you’re hunting dog will get plenty of action and see more pheasants than they will in Wisconsin in many years.
Wisconsin is lucky enough to have a DNR that still cares about pheasant hunting in Wisconsin. The DNR reports that they will release over 53,000 pheasants on 32 public hunting grounds in the state. These pheasants are what most of us have to hunt if we stay close to home. The WDNR releases pheasants before the season starts and then twice a week for the first month of the season and then once a week until the birds are gone by the beginning of December. To give you an example of how lucky we are in Wisconsin, the state of Ohio releases only 15,000 stocked pheasants on all their public pheasant lands.
The Wisconsin pheasant season lasts from noon this Saturday (October 20th) and continues till December 31st. The limit the opening weekend is 1 cock per day with a possession limit of 2 pheasants. After the opening weekend, the daily limit is 2 roosters per day with a possession limit of 4 pheasants. A hunter must have a small game license and a pheasant stamp to legally hunt. For any questions on the pheasant season, go to the new DNR website at dnr.wi.gov for further information.
I haven’t been able to hunt for years due to my arthritis in my shoulders and other physical problems, but I find friends who hunt and take me and Katie out hunting with them. That usually is not a problem because I can take Katie out during the week when there is not too many people and we manage to usually find a pheasant or two on public land. There are numerous public hunting grounds close to the Madison area and if you go to the DNR website, you can see the lands that are stocked and the number of pheasants stocked the last few seasons.
Rural land keeps getting smaller every year with more people moving to the country and farmers using all their land for crops. Pheasants are getting squeezed out in most areas and if you’re lucky you may have a private location that still has native birds you can hunt. But, don’t be discouraged because there are many public grounds to hunt that have pheasants. There also is private shooting preserves that have memberships and stocked pheasants or some preserves allow to harvest birds on a per bird basis. MyLabrador doesn’t know the difference between a native pheasant or a stocked bird and to me that is all that counts. You still can drive the county roads in the “good” pheasant counties in Wisconsin and talk to farmers or do some scouting. There still are native birds, but they are losing ground every season. I can’t shoot, but I still can go and watch my dog work a pheasant and to me that is the fun of being in the outdoors with a few friends and our dogs. Stocked pheasants and hunting clubs are the wave of the future for most of us. Serous hunters can save their money for a trip to South or North Dakota every few years, but I’m afraid that native birds will continue to be scarce and find a public hunting ground that you like and hunt the thickest cover you can find and talk to landowners that have land surrounding and bordering public land. Talk to farmers that have bordering land and ask if they see any pheasants in the area.
I had a dream the other night and it was the pheasant opener in Wisconsin. My house was full of friends, dogs, and food as we got ready for the noon opener. This was in the 1970’s when you knew there would be pheasants and a great weekend. Pheasants, friends, food, and dogs what could be better on a nice October weekend. These are fond memories that I’ll never forget and will cherish for the rest of my life. Some of these friends are no longer with us, the dogs have all passed to the “cornfield in the sky”, and pheasant hunting is much harder. But, my memories will remain! Pheasant hunting is not what it used to be, but it still is great to get together with friends in the outdoors, talk about the “old” days, and maybe get a rooster or two! Be Safe !
www.garyengbergoutdoors.com
