I’m just back from a South Dakota pheasant hunt. The bird numbers were well below average but we found lots of birds. I can't imagine how good it must be on an average year. We hunted at a lodge where they plant birds and of course had all the birds you could want. We also hunted some privet land with only wild birds and did well there too. Our last day we hunted the national grasslands which were really a lot of fun. There we got skunked, but in many ways it was my favorite day. Tye progressed form a decent bird dog to a damn fine one. He did at least seven solid points and he retrieved like a champ, even in really heavy cover.

That a live retrieve Dave? I remember our Brittany chased down a rooster whose wing-tip I broke. She came back with the bird and it wa slooking around like "WTF just happened to me?"

Second most memorable retrieve. The first was when she went into a rain-swollen creek, got the bird, and then got hung up in the brush. Thought she was somehow caught in it. So, I waded out in really cold water, well over my waist. When I got to her and the bird she let go of the bird and swam herself in. Guess I was the retriever that day.

Friends of mine in Pierre are saying this is 1 of the worst years they can remember which means its probably still 4 or 5 times better then pheasant hunting in WA.
I deer hunted there in 99 and there were pheasants everywhere, couldn't believe how many birds we would see everyday.

Yeah, the overall bird numbers are about 1/4 average, but we still saw lots of birds. One small corn patch, maybe 50 feet wide and 200 yards long held more than 20 birds.

Don't get much better then that

Nice cloud of feathers, Dave. Good stuff....

1964 - 1968, I went to college in Spearfish, S. Dakota(wife was from Custer, S.Dakota).

I had never hunted in my life....during my 4 years there:

Pheasant\
Wild turkey
White tail deer
Mule deer
fox/cayote....(got bounty of $5.00)
antalope
cotton tail rabbit
Jack rabbits

all were part of education......pheasant, turkey, deer meat, cotton tail were very important meals to a broke college family.

Winters to cold.....no salmon or steelhead, back home to Washington State and Grays Harbor ever since.

Thanks for the memories!!!!!!!!

Great pictures Dave, thanks for sharing. Had to laugh at the pup's leash in the retrieves!

That leash is so I can SOMETIMES stop him when we are walking toward the field. He is seriously addicted to pheasent.

Sweet pic of you crushing that rooster!