pheasants

[birddog3412]

Leaving Friday for South Dakota. Will be hunting public and private ground between Webster and Aberdeen. Looks like it is going to be pretty cold, maybe the birds will sit tight. How has the hunting been? Are most of the crops out?

[birddog3412]

Awesome hunt. really cold on Monday, but we still got 15 of our 18 birds. Saturday and wednesday we had great weather (high teens) birds sat good, had some really good dog work. 6 of us hunting we got 12 to 16 birds the first four days, limited out our last day. Really good time

[Downtown Bang!]

Originally Posted by birddog3412

Awesome hunt. really cold on Monday, but we still got 15 of our 18 birds. Saturday and wednesday we had great weather (high teens) birds sat good, had some really good dog work. 6 of us hunting we got 12 to 16 birds the first four days, limited out our last day. Really good time

Nice work. I spend a little time hunting in that general area most years.

Did you see a lot of other hunters? The last couple years I have seen hunting pressure on the public areas increase quite a bit in NE SD. Not convinced the overall bird numbers really justify the amount of attention the area has started to receive.

[birddog3412]

We saw very few other hunters. We hunted public land our first few years going to south dakota. This year we only hunted one 40 acre lot of public ground, and that is just because it looked good. The rest was all private ground. We have gotten to know some of the farmers and they let us hunt on them for free. We bring them ribs, shrimp, etc as gifts. People from South Dakota are some of the friendliest you will meet.

Our last day hunting (the day we limited out) we hunted a cattail patch that we had never had permision to hunt before. We got up well over 200 birds from this 1/4 section. It seriously looked like we were on a hunting show, they just kept on flushing.

[niceshot]

birddog 3412, consider yourself very blessed. A caution to other hunters considering a trip to South Dakota. You have a better chance of hitting the SD lottery than trading shrimp cocktail for permission to hunt a late season cattail honey hole.

[birddog3412]

Originally Posted by niceshot

birddog 3412, consider yourself very blessed. A caution to other hunters considering a trip to South Dakota. You have a better chance of hitting the SD lottery than trading shrimp cocktail for permission to hunt a late season cattail honey hole.

NICESHOT, if I where you I would go buy that ticket then, because we have never been flat turned down just driving up to a farmers house and asking to hunt. The people of South Dakota are some of the nicest you will meet.

The people we are bring food to are the ones who have let us hunt in the past, we bring the food to say thank you.

[niceshot]

birddog3412, when you see a draw or a slough that you would like to hunt how do you figure out who the landowner is and where he/she lives?

[birddog3412]

If that is what you want to do, go to the courthouse of that town and buy a plat book. It will show you who owns what. Most of the farmers out there dont just own one 40 or 80, they own thousands of acres.
We usually just ask the farmer if they have any ground we can hunt, then ask them who owns other ground. Go to local bars and resturaunts, buy the locals some drinks and talk with them.

[niceshot]

Originally Posted by birddog3412

If that is what you want to do, go to the courthouse of that town and buy a plat book.

Interesting that you mention plat map books because I have a library of Iowa, South Dakota, and Nebraska books dating back to my college days over 20 years ago. I have never actually bought one at a courthouse because they are printed and sold by private publishing companies. The other thing about plat books, the companies that publish them are dependent on the info from the county government which shall we say can lack some motivation in keeping the maps updated so even a brand new one can be outdated and unreliable.

As a poor non land owner myself I am genuinely happy for your success, but I think your experience is probably quite unusual in South Dakota or anywhere there are pheasants.

[rubberduck]

I find it very easy to get on land this time of year. Typically when deer season is over farmers have no problem letting you hunt. now that being said, i don't hunt the "popular" area's. Most farmers I find are very happy when you have success on there land. I always offer the farmer birds after we hunt their land and this also gives me a 2nd chance to say thanks, thus possibly earning a 2nd opportunity to hunt a different day. I could just be extremely lucky but i don't think so. Be nice, be respectful, and maybe even visit a while. If they don't let you, they probably know someone who will.

Maybe your asking wrong? There is an art to it. I have a buddy that never gets denied. Must have a honest face.