Rob and Scott did a great job in their Opening Day reports. These are a few pics from my first "real" Pheasant hunt in nearly 40 years! I believe this has to be the greatest Pheasant hunting on earth… ( Redfield S.D.)I will keep the narrative short…let the pics do the talking.
a BIG THANKS to my buddy Frank Pearson for inviting me and helping me obtain a fine used Bennelli M-1, 12 ga Autoloader. These are all big ,tough and fast flying wild birds and follow up shots are commonly needed. I was pretty pleased with my shooting after many years of "rust"…It didn’t take long to "bond" with the Benelli M-1. We joined with some local hunters to shoot a small private CRP corn strip…Birds came up like popcorn on a hot pan! It was crazy…a limit in an hour for 18 hunters. Man the corn strip was THICK…almost a Maize jungle! I was also given the advice on gear…Frank and some of the other regulars prefer the Gamehide upland clothing…Frank is more photogenic than me (and thinner) but Voila!!! Gamehide is a proud IDO Sponsor and I was able to get geared up through their website (even a big/tall guy like me…)gamehide
Our crew were excellent shots and the dogs were awesome…especially Frank’s "Becca" the 1 year old WaechtelHund (german breed) all purpose wonder dog! We had 10 in our crew with 8 dogs…All roosters were brought to the hunt leaders pick up for the count and distribution. Everyone that participated got an equal share of the birds. No one complained, especially those that couldn’t shoot well.
I had to leave on Wednesday… We joined with the farmers family/friends for a large cornfield push…totally incredible! I was the "stringer" on this hunt. I walked the downwind side of the corn about 100 yds ahead of the drivers/dogs. I can’t imagine all the birds I saw either flushing or running the edge ahead of me. It is important to know that these hunts were well organized. Each hunter wore a walkabout radios and the Hunt leader stood at the end of the corn in his pick up trying to keep track of birds going down. Both big pushes were called off by radio before the end of the corn because we had shot a limit for the number of hunters present. You are allowed a 3 Rooster per hunter daily limit for the 5 day hunt.
If the Good Lord willing, I will be back again next year…maybe even next month!
A few more pictures…
Nice report and pictures, Tom. Glad to see you out enjoying a great hunt.
It was awesome Don. I love to watch these dogs work! The Labs were the best bird “finders”, The best overall dog was a large male Springer, he did it all. We had pointers also but these birds did not stay put at all. When the Wachtelhound was on hot scent she would “yap yap” like a Beagle…they are flash pointers.
But then I need to continue the downward weight trend! 
It was nice to find my old upland clothing quite big on me…
Tom:
Glad to see you out and about again!!!
Mark
Tom,
Thanks for the report and sharing the pictures! Glad you are back at it and having success.
Dave
Looks like a lot of fun Tom!
Glad to hear that you are back in the saddle again! 