Habitat Piece of our Upland Bird Forecast

Forecast

2008 Forecast

2005

2006

2007

Counterpoints

Rain Piece

Hunt Expectations

Choices

Pheasant

Quail

Kansas

Iowa

Missouri

 

 

Interests

Upland Bird Dogs

Quail Dogs

Dog Power

Pheasant Hunters

Wild Quail Hunts

Self Guided Quail

Self Guided Pheasant

 

 

One snapshot into how we evaluate habitat in terms of our upland bird forecast. For the focus of this article we will examine one pheasant hunting region habitat. All of the pictures on this page are within a 30 minute drive of the other.

It happens that Mule deer and pheasant overlap their most dense population numbers in the same region. While this bird forecast habitat article may seem weighted toward pheasant hunts the same analysis applies to our quail evaluations.

The value of this picture is several. The first beyond being corn and Mule Deer is the height of the corn showing its growing strength relative to the fawn still in spots. The deer are standing in wheat stubble as well. This upland region is multiple cropped with and without irrigation. Corn this well along this early shows it to have been a good growing season (warm with rainfall) and not necessarily a good pheasant brooding season. Nonetheless, with crops this well along the pheasant cover habitat is doing well also.

Always a good thing to see as we travel about our lease land through the entire year are brooding hens and chicks. In this case a pheasant hen along a road with seven chicks. The roadside cover habitat compared to chick size shows this to have been a good cover growing spring (cropped and enlarged below).

The number of chicks for this hen we consider very good and the age of the chicks well into quill feathers indicates a good spring survival rate.

Farming practices also determine what land we will lease just as much as does the pre-existing wildlife habitat areas. The picture below shows limited information until put into context with the text below the picture.

This is a picture of a winter wheat field in late summer (our region does not support spring wheat). This year after the summer wheat harvest the field was left fallow and grew into weeds. This makes the ideal protective cover and food source in the same field combination that will make for some good pheasant and quail hunts.

Then there is CRP land. What should be remembered is that we had in the Mid-America Hunting Association good pheasant hunting before there was CRP. Our organization pre-dates CRP and knows well first hand that there is more upland bird hunting to be had beyond that found in monotonous stands of tall grass.

Not all CRP is equal. This picture is of a poor stand. Poor does not include grass thickness or height in this case. This stand is a poor pheasant hunting spot as it is surrounded by pasture. Not a food source in sight.

Upland bird forecasts and habitat go hand in hand as as does carry over populations for spring breeding, spring nesting and brooding month weather and summer survival to fall hunting seasons are contiguous in their cause and effect relationship. Having up or down carry over populations, good or bad spring rains combined with protective and food habitat indicates more or less birds come fall hunts. The only way to known each of these forecast points and their related effects is through year round boots on the ground observations comparative to during season self guided hunt experiences.