My brother and I are day dreaming about going out west (we live in Virginia) to pheasant hunt some time. We don't have dogs as there aren't enough game birds to justify a dog in this part of the country. We mostly deer hunt but would love to bird hunt. Is it possible to find public land in South Dakota, Iowa or somewhere else that has birds and can be successfully hunted without dogs?

For me the dogs make the hunt, but I understand your situation. I would suggest getting a retriever or spaniel pup that can be a pet and hunt a little.

You will probably see and shoot just as many birds without dogs, but you will have a very very hard time finding down birds without a dog.

The public ground gets hammered pretty hard, so you will have to find really thick grasses and cattails. As colorful as pheasants are they blend in really good with the cover, and can be extremely difficult to find without dogs.

I hunted years without a dog and did OK. so to answer your question yes you can hunt without a dog, but your success will be better with a dog.

There is a lot of public land in South Dakota. You can go on the SD game and fish website and download a book of all the public land.

It gets hunted pretty hard the first two weeks of the season. After that the pressure lightens up quite a bit. If you wait until December you won't see another hunter. There are plenty of birds on the public areas.

we hunted in north dakota for a while without a dog and it was pretty easy but we were also on private land. with or without a dog you will definitely have lots of fun and if you work hard enough you will get your limit.

Murdo SD is the best pheasant hunting on the face of this earth! You have to go there to belive it! I gurantee you that you will get your limit everyday ( if your a decent shot)
There are thousands and thousands of pheasants on a single farm yard in Murdo. It is worth paying a farmer to hunt is land, But there are walk in's if You have a strict budget their not as good but you will see birds.

My first post here but I thought I'd chime in. If you book a guided hunt (not sure if that's what you were planning on or not,) a lot of guides have their own dogs that they'll use. They oft-times recognize the importance and advantage of having about two well-trained dogs accompanying the hunters.

What would you say about England?

Which public areas?

I think it is possible if you can run fast enough to scare them up before they see you.