Anyone have experience on public land, for pheasant? suggestions on what areas, towns to focus on...thanks for any, all comments.

The state game, fish, and parks has a website. They give the locations of public and walk-in hunting areas. I would hunt any where in the central counties on the east side of the Missiouri river as west of the river does not have much public land. The east and western thirds of the state don't have the as good as numbers but the central counties , north cetral and south central, are usually packed with pheasants. And don't come the first few weeks. Wait until about the 4th or 5th week of the season as there are still plenty of birds and not near the amount of hunters.

http://www.sdgfp.info/Publications/Atlas/Index.htm