Winter Roosters

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averageguy
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Winter Roosters

Post by averageguy » Thu Dec 13, 2018 1:25 pm

Winter has set in. The grass waterways that yielded pointed birds earlier in the season are empty now. The pheasants are flocked up in the heavy cover - Tree Rows, Cattails and Kochia Weed Patches. Close range hens flushed off of points outnumber the roosters by 10:1 or more. A few roosters hold for close range shots but more run and sneak out at longer ranges presenting going away shot angles. The few days we are fortunate to hunt fresh snow it is a helpful but more often it is crusted and noisy, which is never helpful to hunting pressured late season roosters and exhausting to walk through to boot. Such is the challenge of late season pheasant hunting. Nothing easy about it.

Its cold.
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Dog loves it!
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Birds Ahead Boss
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But they are running and we need to move up. Point and relocate, over and over ...
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Bunch of em in here Boss
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More often than not my Garmin alerts me to the dog on point buried in cover. And the birds run on those cattails too, especially the remaining roosters.
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A Rooster pointed in those cattails that held for meatball close range shot.
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Bringing in our limited out 3rd rooster for that day while watching more flush out on ahead. Rooster was taken after a long point and relocate pursuit of moving birds up a weedy fenceline. Many hens stopping and holding for a point and close range flush while the roosters ran ahead. Yet another point, with the hen flushing close and a rooster going out long, brought down by a single shot of heavy nickel plated 5s going straight away and high.
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Had been at it a couple of hours this day with not a shot fired despite moving quite a few pointed hens and out of range roosters. Got another point in a Kochia weed patch. Dog out of sight in the waist high weeds, Garmin alerting me and telling me the dog's location. I wade in, a hen goes up close and a huge rooster pops further out, no gimme but a doable shot. I fired once and hit him hard in the back due to the going away shot angle he presents, he starts to fall but then struggles on to land in a weedy road ditch about 75 yards away. Dog is on the scene immediately, bouces into the cover and then back out going down the high side of the ditch, using his eyes and ears and then dives back into the cover/ditch. Emerges in short order with the giant rooster.
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He had a set of spurs on him.
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Most days I was too tired to bother with setting up a pretty photo of birds and my dog. I was focused on finding a place slightly out of the wind, getting my birds cleaned and getting some rest ahead of doing it again the next day. Did take this one however.
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Was hunting a cattail slough one day with the crosswind slightly at our back. Spud was making intelligent casts out and working back towards me when he slammed down on point. Four Sharptails popped about 30 yards ahead of him between us and came at an angle past me presenting a 45 yard high crossing shot. I rolled the first one and shot behind the second one. Spud looking proud bringing in the first one.
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Every one is a trophy, especially the ones in Winter. They are so well equipped to survive on the prairies. Snowshoes on their feet, talons on their toes for digging through ice/snow, lungs twice the relative size of a rooster pheasant enabling them to fly much longer distances between roosts and feed each day. Saw alot of them, many sitting in trees.
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Took some Hardy Folks to live here.
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Natives wearing their winter coats.
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Hunted another state the last two days hunting public lands for the first time. First day there were 2 other pickups parked in different parking lots of an area of a few hundred acres on a Tuesday. Spud pointed/moved 35-40 hens and one lone out of range rooster that first day. Here he is pointing yet another hen. 2 roosters for the trip, the only two we shot at after busting heavy cattails and blown over crusted snow covered grass for several exhausting hours.
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mtlhdr
Rank: Master Hunter
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Location: NorCal

Re: Winter Roosters

Post by mtlhdr » Thu Dec 13, 2018 2:20 pm

Great shots AG. Glad you upgraded your camera this season (bet you are too). Spud looking great, as usual...

averageguy
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Re: Winter Roosters

Post by averageguy » Thu Dec 13, 2018 2:24 pm

Thank You Sir. Been looking for some of your excellent camera work of you and Chance's adventures. Hope all is well and you are in the field often.

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deseeker
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Location: Blair, Nebraska

Re: Winter Roosters

Post by deseeker » Thu Dec 13, 2018 7:54 pm

Nice pictures and glad you had a good hunt :D

ddoyle
Rank: Master Hunter
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Location: Bettendorf, Iowa

Re: Winter Roosters

Post by ddoyle » Thu Dec 13, 2018 10:08 pm

That is really cool. Thank you!
Doyle

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Gt shorthairs
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Location: Woodridge manitoba Canada

Re: Winter Roosters

Post by Gt shorthairs » Wed Dec 19, 2018 7:03 am

Love the pics and the info. Thanks for sharing. GT

averageguy
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Re: Winter Roosters

Post by averageguy » Thu Dec 20, 2018 8:47 am

Thank you Gentlemen. Glad you enjoyed them. I enjoy seeing others photos and hearing about their hunting adventures.

weimdogman
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Location: brookings s.dak.

Re: Winter Roosters

Post by weimdogman » Wed Dec 26, 2018 3:36 pm

So my 3 weim pups and I have been toughing it out here in east central S.Dak. Dogs turn 1 on the 27th of Dec. and we are once again getting snow.
Has been crazy hard to hunt late season without some snow to push the birds together and improve scenting conditions. Gentle snowfall as I type this. Tmrw looks blizzardy 6 to 8 inches and 25 to 35 mph winds.
Really couldnt be happier with dogs performance. We are finding birds, getting solid points albeit mainly hens,and bagging a few roosters.

averageguy
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Re: Winter Roosters

Post by averageguy » Thu Dec 27, 2018 1:22 pm

WiemDM, Sounds like fun to me.

Snow gets a lot of air play as to the benefits attributed to it when hunting pheasants. My experience is highly variable in that area. The times when I am actually hunting in a fresh quiet powdery snow is wonderful. The many more times when I am hunting in old, frozen, crusted snow it is ADVANTAGE rooster! Crusted snow announcing each step I take, dogs feet leaving a trail of blood, cover bent and frozen over making walking all the more tiring. Real mixed bag of benefit and big hinderance to snow is my experience over the long haul, but those days of fresh powder are the ones that get retold over the years. Happy Hunting.

weimdogman
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Location: brookings s.dak.

Re: Winter Roosters

Post by weimdogman » Thu Dec 27, 2018 4:24 pm

Guess I am fortunate in that I have never had a dog with tender feet. My weims get some raw spots at the front of their ankles and that is it. i road the dogs on gravel year round so I suppose that helps. Actually almost never cut toenails either.
My favorite hunts are lighter cover,or foodplots, pushed to heavy borders. Years ago we always hunted a grass crp that ran to the lakeshore. Willow patches and some cattails always held those late season roosters. There actually was a small peninsula that was a blast to work. Years back right at Christmas we busted a wounded Mallard out that was hopping and flopping across the frozen lake. dogs were staunch, a bald eagle nailed that bird 60 yards from us!
Years of high water have drastically changed the topography in this area. That peninsula is all under water now. Slough ice has to be treated with caution as tiling has led to yearround running water.
season ends the 6th and I plan on getting out everyday till then.[starting tmrw cause of todays blizzard]

averageguy
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Re: Winter Roosters

Post by averageguy » Sat Dec 29, 2018 5:32 pm

Had a Blessing of a morning hunt today.

9 degrees with 7 MPH wind, hunting the remaining Public Lands survivors as the last days of season wind down. Spud had a really good day resulting in a 4 shot limit of roosters.

We hunted some tall thick warm season grass around a corn field. Had been at it a short while when Spud went on point. Two hens flushed close and a rooster snuck out long. I watched him fly a long ways into a brushy creek winding through similar warm season grass on the public tract of land on the other side of a gravel road. I made a mental note of my mark and we hunted on.

Spud worked cautious and birdy, pointed again, more hens going up close and then an edge of range rooster presenting a long crossing shot. I fired once and hit him in the back half hard, but he had a full head of steam and powered on across the same gravel road into a plum thicket in the same public land tract as the first rooster. So we headed that way.

As I approached the plum thicket I silently toned Spud in and motioned for him to hunt the plum thicket the shot rooster had landed in. He entered the plum thicket, hit scent, tracked then pointed. The rooster busted out the far side of the plum thicket and I fired once through a wall of brush. Rooster flew a much shorter distance this time and landed in some brush further up the creek. Spud was in thick cover and did not get a great mark but he was quickly in the area and hunting. I moved up, motioned to the brush and told him to "Hunt Dead" and he did. Spud quickly started working a track through the brush and out into the grass. Heated the track up and when he knew the rooster was close he started looping out which then put him downwind of the rooster. Spud then worked the wind/scent, homed in on the rooster, pointed in the grass, pounced and buried his head in the grass and pulled the rooster out. Tail got wrecked.

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We hunted on towards my mark on the first rooster. Spud hit a track as we got nearer and worked it cautiously and intensely. As it heated up he swung downwind and then slammed down in a beautiful head high intense point facing into the wind towards me. I really wanted to bite my glove off, wake up my camera phone and get a photo, but I also wanted to reward Spud's efforts as well. I marched towards Spud, my shotgun at port arms and just as I decided I must have walked over the rooster, it flushed cackling as it went. To miss was unthinkable and I didn't. No point photo but got one of a thoroughly shot rooster retrieve.

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At this point I was happy to head to the truck and leave whatever roosters might be around for another day. Spud had different plans and as we headed towards the truck he hit more birds, worked cautious and intense into a point in big patch of standing cane in the warm season grass. I sounded like an elephant as I approached and the birds moved on with Spud in cautious pursuit. This went on another 100 yards and then Spud came down on an intense point in the heavy grass. I moved in and a bird started beating its way up and out of the grass. My brain processed the gaudy colors of a rooster beating his wings and wringing his beautiful long tail as he accelerated out of the cover. He came down in a shower of cut feathers.

I took the photo of the retrieve a moment too soon.

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A day where everything came together.

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weimdogman
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Re: Winter Roosters

Post by weimdogman » Mon Dec 31, 2018 2:13 pm

3 of us hunted behind my 3 weims a day after the last blizzard. Where these pics are taken is 240 acres of private ground. There is probably 60 acres that had beans. Worst part is the slough here is tile/spring fed and ice wont support walking on it. We watched 40 to 50 birds go into the willows and cattails and literally couldnt go there. Dogs had to be repeatedly called back as they had their noses full.This pic shows 1 on point and the other 2??

weimdogman
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Re: Winter Roosters

Post by weimdogman » Mon Dec 31, 2018 2:25 pm

We limited out between this piece and a 40 acre crp.
Dogs had some good points and retreiving is better everytime we go. I knocked down 2 birds out of 1 rise and was concerned about 1 as it wasnt hit hard. The dogs hadnt been able to mark it down I called 1 over and he immediatly came up with that bird
As I was taking it from him the other male walked up with the other bird.
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weimdogman
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Re: Winter Roosters

Post by weimdogman » Mon Dec 31, 2018 2:30 pm

I apologize for the poor post quality and dont understand why the pic flipped sideways. In that 1 pic 1 is on point,1is backing, and the best dog is telling me they aint here!

averageguy
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Re: Winter Roosters

Post by averageguy » Mon Dec 31, 2018 3:13 pm

weimdogman wrote:I apologize for the poor post quality and dont understand why the pic flipped sideways. In that 1 pic 1 is on point,1is backing, and the best dog is telling me they aint here!
:D That's funny, Thanks for the laugh. Sounds like your young dogs are doing very well.

I upload my photos to Imgur and then copy and paste the link to forums when I want to post a photo. It is free and easy enough for a technically challenged old guy like me to master. Might interest you for your posts.

weimdogman
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Location: brookings s.dak.

Re: Winter Roosters

Post by weimdogman » Fri Jan 04, 2019 9:09 am

The other afternoon I called my friend who has a large farming operation. We worked a cedar grove and drove/flushed about a 100 birds. Never had a shot. So we worked some nearby grass areas and got a couple points and 1 bird which made for a nice - chase - retreive.
We loaded up and were headed out for a short drive to a large slough he has. We were driving past his cousins slough and saw about 50 roosters going into the edge. Called and got permission to " tear em up".Drove 2 miles to check out a small 5 acre slough and saw another 30 to 40 roosters there. 5 acres or 150 acres? We went in the 5 acres he knocked 3 down, dogs made great retreives and we called it a day. Only the 2nd time in 30+ years of hunting with him he has limited out, where he has actually shot the birds. It was he last chance to hunt this season and he was thrilled. He asked why I didn t shoot any birds in the last spot? I told him 1st chance was a bird on the outside going away which prob would have messed up his chances. 2nd chance he shot as I was about too. He replied you would rather hunt the dogs then shoot anyways.

averageguy
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Re: Winter Roosters

Post by averageguy » Fri Jan 04, 2019 8:21 pm

Weimdogman, You live in a great state and that sounds like wonderful late season pheasant hunting. Spud and I have hunted 5 of the last 6 days close to home and have not seen that many pheasants total much less roosters. But I have shot pointed wild roosters each day but one and gotten a bunch of nice dog work on hens along the way. Love it, Live for It. Heading to KS on Monday in pursuit of Bobwhites and really looking forward to it.

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