Forecast
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| First month of the 2007 - 2008 upland bird season has validated that most of our forecast was right and some of it was wrong. Where we were right includes all of our Iowa region, north Missouri, southeast Kansas and south central Kansas. In these regions we were accurate in our forecast of pheasant and quail population densities relative to the previous season. We were wrong in north central and northwest Kansas having overestimated the pheasant and quail populations in those two regions. For the regions we forecasted correctly our environmental indicators employed to assess reproduction and previous carry over estimates indicted either up or down bird numbers relative to the previous year proved to be the correct indicators to watch. In north central and north western Kansas we employed the same forecast indicators with less accurate results indicating to us un-measurable influences adversely impacting the forecast accuracy. Possibilities seem to include the previous years' carry over to have been more adversely impacted by late January and February winter weather than believed leaving a lower breeders for spring than during season (ending January 31) bird counts indicated. Further contributions may have been the highly sporadic rains late summer and early fall most noticed by locals in north central Kansas. These rains were largely un-measured due to their isolated nature seemingly to avoid NOAA rainfall collection sites. The end result was rather than the increased number of upland birds in north central and north west Kansas pheasant and quail forecasted the actual numbers were equal to or evaluated as lower than in 2006 - 2007 season. The value of these early and end of season upland bird forecast reviews extend beyond confirmation/denial of observation indicators and lend themselves to a more accurate forecasting of the 2007 - 2008 season.
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