Quick Post Because it is Late

Today was heavy on process and light on results. We drove about 175 miles round trip. We changed our mind as soon as we left the house this morning, and hunted pheasants at a State Game Production Area (GPA) about 25 miles SW of Aberdeen (instead of the Casanova GPA 5 mi. SW of Aberden). We figured that we had the time, & the area farther West was reported (by our neighbor and a PF contact) to have higher amounts of birds. If that was the case, we couldn't find them. The GPA looked like it should hold tons of birds, but 2.5 hours of hard hunting produced only 1 shootable bird - it flushed wild in front of Winnie as she trailed it. Dan took a shot & hit it, but it got away after hitting the ground running. In addition to that bird, Winnie had 1 other point and trail that produced a bird - but it was a hen. Maggie hunted very well, but didn't put up any birds for us to shoot either. It was pretty windy (~15-20 mph) and warm (~ 55 degrees). We hit CRP fields, milo/waist high corn food plots, and cattails on the GPA and just scratched our heads of where the birds could be hiding.


Our duck hunting spot was the place where we had seen thousands of geese and some ducks moving into on Thursday night when we were scouting. After setting up a dozen decoys and having 2 small groups of ducks go to a spot 150 yards away, we picked everything up and moved to that spot. We then didn't have another duck nearby until after sunset - go figure... Jax was a good boy and sat with us and probably would have commiserated and complained with us if he could talk.


Since we didn't have any birds to clean, the evening went rater quickly back here at the house and we are heading to bed soon. Alarms are set for 4:30 tomorrow and we are planning to hunt ducks about 30 min North of here and then head West in the afternoon (after a normal lunch here at the house) to the Aberdeen area to hit the GPA we had originally planned for today. I did have time to take some pictures tonight, so at least something somewhat productive happened.