Mid-season Roosters.

[JJ]

I got off work at 10pm Friday night, ran home grabbed the dog and headed out. We rolled into the farm a little after 3:30 am and crashed on the couch's to keep from waking up the entire house. 6 am we were up and out the door, because my cousins had seen a couple nice flocks of late season curlytails in the state slough up the road. We grabbed the skiff's and headed out to find the ice that had been open in the center was around 3/4" thick and was not breaking well. We got some deke's set, and cleared out a landing pocket in the ice, but couldn't even fire a shell for our trouble. Its been a while since I've sat in 15deg weather with a 15mph wind blowing down my back.

With duck hunting being a bust for the morning these Popsicles's headed back to the farm to catch a cup of coffee, and get changed into our rooster-wear. Headed over to some other investment land in the portfolio to hunt a five acre corn foodplot. We pushed that and only watch about twenty hens come out, not a target to shoot at. Now the wind had really picked up, and was gusting to about 25mph. 15deg felt a hell of a lot colder than that! With the wind roaring, we started to look to the willows and cat-tail edges and started to pick up birds.

We picked up a couple there, and headed back to the farm to finish out the day. With the heavy winds our home farm really paid off. The valley that runs through our property gave the birds ample wind coverage and gave up some great shooting opportunities. By the time we wrapped up for the day, we had 15 in hand (and 7 HUGE MISSES by my brother), so we could very well have had 22. (pics below missing a couple birds, stuffed in a vest)

Sunday was tough, we hunted the farm, and picked up a couple birds, but you can only go to the well so many times and have great results. With the ice on the roads (even gravel) it kept our chasing habits to a minimum, and we stayed close to home. We only ended up with six, with one big miss, so a theoretical seven.

All in all pretty darn good weekend of hunting. It ain't SoDak, but still SW MN has some phenomenal pheasant hunting opportunities. Right now the birds are pretty scattered without a bit of snow to concentrate them. 99% of all crops were out in our area and only saw a few corn fields. The State has done a great job on a lot of the WMA's of leaving some standing corn that can give you pretty good chances. With the snow that is forecast, we can guess that next weekend there will be some pretty good opportunities in the cattails. Really look for the good thick cover in low-lying areas with a decent food source nearby and you will yeild some chances.

[yukonjasper]

Looks like you had a great time. I usually go out with a group of guys in early December and we do pretty well - not as good as you guys, but pretty good. We hunt the area between Morris and Ortonville. We own and lease some land around Morris and have some In-Law connections on some property around Ortonville. What area do you hunt?

thanks for posting the photo's gets me a little fired up to see success like that. I'm going to make sure that December hunt happens.

[JJ]

Edited the original post to fix the pics.

This weekend was more of a dry run for next weekend than anything. My wife and I will be down next weekend, and are praying a little snow will concentrate them a bit further. We hunt west of Marshall, with our home base being three miles from the SoDak border. Late season roosters are my favorite thing in the world We still aren't seeing large groups of birds, but snow will change that in a hurry. Hopefully with the weather forecast this week, we will be spending the entire weekend hunting the cattails, where the big numbers will be holding.

[Heffay]

I need a dog. Hunting birds without a pooch both sucks AND blows at the same time.

[JJ]

I need a dog. Hunting birds without a pooch both sucks AND blows at the same time.

Without a dog it only gets tougher as the season progresses. If you get fresh snow, I have had luck tracking birds in the cattails in the years I did not have a dog. But days like yesterday, the birds were holding way too tight. I think yesterday we had three or four instances of dogs coming up with tail feathers after a flush. We are really spoiled in the dog category, as we had 7 dogs for 9 guys this weekend, and I only brought one of my two.

[lenny7]

I love that first picture!

[justinvan]

Let me guess.... canby mn area?

[JJ]

Let me guess.... canby mn area?

We are south of Canby a ways, but yes same general area.

We were down again this weekend with just the wife and my dad hunting. Hunting was tougher this weekend. Its obvious we have put a pretty good hurt on our population, and will have to start pounding more state land. Considering we have already taken 75 for the season, we can't complain. Right now the birds are spread out with no concentrations of birds. It sounds like we have snow coming this week, so the cattails will start producing big (we were blanked in the cattails this weekend).

[SAM]

Probably more like Ivanhoe/Hendricks.