Canned pheasant hunting
 

Well,been invitedon a guided pheasant hunt sponsored by a local bank in a couple of weeks. They run the entire show and pretty much do everything but pull the trigger when the birds fly. 6am catered breakfast, they drive you out to where the hunt is, they tell you where to walk and they run the dogs and have "blockers" at the end of the field to make sure the pheasants fly. They said there will be both wild and raised pheasants butnot sure what % of wild vs. raised there will be. After the hunt they have a catered lunch and will even dress your birds for you it you want them to.

This is a free deal for about 30-40 customers of the bank and somehow the breadcrumbs fell far enough from the table where I was able to go this year if I want to.

I've pheasant hunted one time but didn't get anything although a few of the guys I hunted with did. It sounds like this is an almost guaranteed thing to get your limit of 3 birds but I'm not sure how sporting it sounds.

Is this something that will be enjoyable or should I just pass on it.

Thanks for any input.

Nathan

RE: Canned pheasant hunting
 

Always your choice but IMO just the fact that you are questioning it makes it somewhat suspect. My personal choice would be to not go but everyone has their own standards to live with. it sounds a little too set up and quaranteed for my tastes.

RE: Canned pheasant hunting
 

I have to admit that I’ve been tempted to quail hunt on a place like that just because there are no wild quail this year.

RE: Canned pheasant hunting
 

I am questioning it, but at the same time it is going to be a pretty swanky deal from the sounds of it. Just the free breakfast and lunch sounds like it might be worth it.

I just don't know how realistic it is going to be. I talked with a guy who went last year and he said he really enjoyed it, just not to get the impression that because you limited out on that hunt that suddenly you were a great pheasant hunter or anything. He said you don't hunt the same field over and over like I have heard that they do some places where they just restock it between each "hunt" with raised pheasants.

We are in a good pheasant territory and from the sounds of it our wild bird population is really good this year so I think I'll get a chance at some wild birds. We will be out on opening morning of pheasant season so it's not like the areas are going to be hunted out before we get there.

I am leaning toward going, just to keep the good relationship with the bankers if nothing else.

Has anyone else gone on a hunt setup like this that has a mix of wild and raised birds?

RE: Canned pheasant hunting
 

I'd go in a heartbeat. Sounds like a fun. Just watching the dogs work is exciting to me. Go & bang a couple of birds. Any chance of them throwing some clay targets before you hunt? Helps if you have not shot a shotgun for a while. CB

RE: Canned pheasant hunting
 

Well, I told them to put me down on the list so I guess I'm going.

I hunt quail and dove so I am decent with a shotgun. I was pretty happy last time I was quail hunting I shot 4 times and ended up with 3 birds. With Dove it generally takes me a box of shells to hit 10 birds. The time I pheasant hunted with some friends I recall some fairly long shots so I may switch out my chokes to a Skeet on the first barrel and a modified on the 2nd barrel. I've got an improved cylinder and a skeet on right now.

I talked to my co-worker who went last year again and he said they even supply the shotgun shells. The only reason that the bread crumbs fell all the way down to me is that several folks are going to be out of town this year.

I'll update this post after the hunt and let everyone know how it turns out.

Thanks again for the input.

Nathan

RE: Canned pheasant hunting
 

This is a typical hunt or club hunt on any ole hunting preserve. It is the same thing I do all year long while I am dog training. Yes it is a canned hunt but will be as close to typical pheasant one can get.

I have guided many of these hunts, on many different hunting preservesand it is my job to handle the dogs - make sure the hunters are safe and yes they do bag birds.

One thing don't be surprised as you might be required to offer a tip (money)to the dog handler. On most hunt clubs this is a customary.

Now as said do go - it will be a very enjoyable day - watch keenly how the dogs work - that is what it is all about and hunt safe! If you like upland bird hunting or have never tried it - do go.

JW

RE: Canned pheasant hunting
 

Well, the big day is tomorrow. I was talking with some of the guys who have been in the past and they said that some years they don't bring in any raised birds but they did last year because we were in a drought and it took a big toll on the bird numbers around here. After the wet spring and summer we had it sounds like the wild bird population is close to an all time high here and I'm not sure if they will even have to bring any raised birds in.

Any recommendations on what chokes to have in? I'm getting advice to use everything from an IC to a Full choke!

RE: Canned pheasant hunting
 

welp ya still have to shoot em its aint like they kill em for ya
plus even if it sucks watch the dog- best part of upland huntin

RE: Canned pheasant hunting
 

I do release hunts on public land, private preserve hunts and wild birds. With released birds you better have a good dog because those birds will just set. I don't have a dog so it is easier for me to flush wild birds.

There's systemic problems with released birds: You gotta have a reservation in this state or you have to sit standby. That means you may or may not get to hunt that day depending on how many folks show up. Standby is the luck of the lottery. I'm too impulsive andtoo disorganized to make arrangements in advance so I like the wild hunt venues. The couple of times I was on standby I did get out, however.

RE: Canned pheasant hunting
 

Well here's the update. I just cut and pasted the post from my blog.

Well, Saturday I went pheasant hunting for the 2nd time in my life. This ended up being a MUCH better experience than my 1st pheasant hunting experience in nearly every way!

The biggest differences were that this time I actually shot a pheasant, and even more importantly this time we didn’t find a dead guy laying out in the middle of a rarely used dirt road! It doesn’t take much to beat that day of hunting!

I was really wondering how this hunt would go because this would be my first time ever going on a professionally guided hunting trip, meaning that someone was actually paying for it, thankfully I wasn’t the one that was doing the paying. A local bank hosts the hunt for some of their customers and this year I was able to go. They provided a great breakfast at their office, and provided us each with a box of shells, a game bag and a nice blaze orange hunting cap that ended up proving very useful on the hunt. After the hunt they served an AWESOME lunch also.

We hunted 2 areas that were each 300 – 400 acres. Most of it was grown up CRP land, but there were a few areas that were planted in Sudan grass and Johnson grass that was over my head and I’m 6’3”. At some times during the hunt the only way you could keep track of the guys on either side of you was looking for those blaze orange caps!

It had rained the night before and it was pretty windy that morning so the walking was more like wading than anything. The grass was VERY thick and you had to work hard not to trip and fall. There were about 20 hunters and 2 dog handlers running a total of 6 dogs. On both areas that we hunted we would fan out about 15 – 20 yards apart and walk toward the end of the property with the dogs moving back and forth in front of us. Sometimes the dogs would get out too far ahead and I think they actually flushed some of the birds a little earlier than they should have and they just flew ahead of us. At each area one group of guys would go up ahead in a pickup and spread out at the end of the property to act as blockers so the pheasants would actually fly up instead of just running across the road. On the first area we hunted we only had 3 guys volunteer to act as blockers, but the walking was so tough through the thick grass that on the last area we hunted we ended up with more guys blocking than walking!

They did tell us that they had released some pheasants in these areas the day before. I had been worried that this would be a canned hunt with us just walking through the first field and pheasants flying up right and left with us just picking them off as they were released. It didn’t end up being that way at all. For one thing, we saw as many hen pheasants as we saw roosters so I know there were plenty of wild birds in the area. Also with the windy conditions, alot ofthe birds either didn’t flush at all or sometimes they flushed 100+ yards in front of us. I was happy to shoot 2 birds, but it was so thick that even with 6 bird dogs we were unable to find one of the birds that I shot. Overall as a group we ended up shooting just over a dozen birds with about 20 guys so it was not anything like shooting fish in a barrel that I had worried it might be. I had plenty of opportunities and I should have limited out with 3 birds but I hadn’t been bird hunting in a couple months and I was a little more rusty that I thought I would be. I should have gone out and shot some clays a few days earlier. Also I probably should have had a little tighter chokes in my gun for pheasants at least that day. I had an IC and a Skeet choke in and I probably will go with a Skeet and a modified next time I go pheasant hunting.

Overall it was a very enjoyable experience, but it was a lot more work than I anticipated. I was pretty sore the next day as the muscles that you use to wade through that thick grass are completely different that your normal walking muscles.