Upland Bird report

leadeyedbugger · 10-15-2007, 03:19 PM

He guys and gals. No picks(dead battery) but it was a fun weekend of upland birdie hunting.

The main quarry was quail which is my personal favorite upland bird to hunt. The action is usually fast and furious and quail offer an extremely small target moving at a vary high rate of speed, basically they are pretty tough to hit. Mix in the occasional pheasant and whats not to love.

Anyways between the 4 of us we got 11 quail and 1 rooster. 5 quail for me personally.(did i mention they are hard to hit). Now i consider myself a decent but not great shooter and i am talking about a bird every 3 shots. As far as how many we saw.....well if all 4 of us were exceptional shooters we would have had 40 quail down in less then 1hr. I'm shooting a new gun this year, a o/u 12 ga and its taking a little bit of time to get used to it compared to the ol 870 but i really love it.

I encourage people to get out and give quail a run. Its lots of fun.

arlie · 10-15-2007, 03:53 PM

Quail are a kick to hunt! I like using a .410 on them though, seems right,,,

Hawk · 10-15-2007, 04:01 PM

So where were you guys hunting? I haven't seen a whole lot of quail where I've been?

chukardave1 · 10-15-2007, 06:28 PM

I agree with the quail take. Spent many years targeting quail specifically from Arizona up to Washington. They are an absolute blast and 5 in the bag is a great day. But then I made the turn to the dark side. Moved to oregon and started learning about chukar. I had hunted them before but more of and add on. Now they are the main quarry and the quail seem to be an incidental. But after the dismal numbers of chukar I have seen so far this season I may be making some trips specifically for quail again. Am going chukar hunting tomorrow in an area that I have not hunted this year. I am hoping the birds fared better than they did in SE Oregon. If not will work the thicker cover and try to bust the real speedsters.

LuckyStrike · 10-15-2007, 06:54 PM

We got six roosters opening day.. many more opportunities.. Nothing like a rooster coming at mach 1 over your head and you miss twice, badly..

I probably shot 15 times to get two birds. I skipped dove this year and I really suffered for it.

We also got a couple of quail. Lots of quail around. I don't waste shells on quail..(I miss too much)

LS

leadeyedbugger · 10-16-2007, 07:00 AM

I'm hunting in north central oregon. Private lands in the dufur/the dalles area. Our quail populations are off the charts this year, they are always good but they are crazy good right now. Pheasants.....well i think that there are a fair amount of them around but they are alot harder to locate without a dog and my GSP pup is not ready yet.
As far as chucker goes, i have heard alot of good things about hunting chucker. But i have not targeted them before, mainly because i don't know where to do. We do have a few coveys of hungarians on our properties but i don't hunt them as the population is on the rise but still pretty small. In a couple more yrs maybe.