# Ashley area pheasants?



## fishhard (Oct 27, 2009)

Every year for the last several three of us have been traveling from WI to the Ashley area for a week of pheasant hunting Ive had heard a lot about numbers being way down from last year. I would like to hear from people who have been hunting in the area and have actual knowledge not hearsay on what the populations look like in the area. We always hunt exclusively on PLOTS I am not looking for spots or a certain area just a general idea of what things look like in a 50 mile radius of Ashley. Anyone been out?


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## southdakbearfan (Oct 11, 2004)

Well, I am not from ashley nd, but Aberdeen Sd, within a hundred miles or so.

Pretty much all over, and I have been in about every direction from aberdeen within 75 miles it looks like 60% down from last year which is about what the GF&P have said on their info. That being said, their are still birds, you just got to work for them. Corn is coming out and the birds have moved into the grass and sloughs next to the combined fields here.


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## slough (Oct 12, 2003)

southdakbearfan said:


> Well, I am not from ashley nd, but Aberdeen Sd, within a hundred miles or so.
> 
> Pretty much all over, and I have been in about every direction from aberdeen within 75 miles  it looks like 60% down from last year which is about what the GF&P have said on their info. That being said, their are still birds, you just got to work for them. Corn is coming out and the birds have moved into the grass and sloughs next to the combined fields here.


My experience this fall would agree with this. You probably won't see 100 birds per walk but after all you only need 3.


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## sstafki (Oct 28, 2011)

Was out there recently, pretty tough hunting. Birds are there but are very few and far between. Plots land is getting hit hard because so little CRP is left. My son and I hunted 2 days with 2 good dogs and saw 30 total birds but only 3 roosters (fortunately we managed to bag all three.) Hunters in our hotel went all weekend without bagging a bird. Talked to several students of mine that saw even fewer in that same general area. My students are telling me that south west Minnesota is actually as good this year as what we saw in ND. Good Luck if you go...


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## Nick Roehl (Mar 7, 2002)

I would say *at least* 60% down in the Ashley area. Like mentioned from others PLOTS get completely hammered and with really low numbers you can imagine how it would be this year.


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## patrick grumley (Mar 9, 2007)

I was in Ashley for a week 60% is an understatement, east of ashley I'd say closer to 80% loss. West of ashley was better.


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## Ref (Jul 21, 2003)

I had farmers in the southwest tell me that their PLOTS land has been walked everyday and on the weekends, 3-4 times a day since the season opened!


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## Dick Monson (Aug 12, 2002)

It takes awhile for reality to sink in. Ref, did you ever get my email?


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## Ref (Jul 21, 2003)

No.


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## tigerdog (Jan 24, 2008)

Patrick Grumley is likely very accurate. I hunt in SD, but within 50 miles of Ashley and have done fine. I've limited on weekends, but it is nothing like the last 2-3 years. I am sure that there are well under half of the birds as there were last year. I used to come home after work and take the dogs out for about a 1/2 hour and would usually shoot at least a bird or two. Those 1/2 hour runs have not been very productive this year (at most one bird per evening). It is still fun. As others have said, you have to work a little harder to find your birds, but when I want to hunt for a day, I want to enjoy a hunt, not 2 hours and done.


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## Katdog (Dec 30, 2009)

7 of us hunted SE Nodak a couple weeks ago. Broke into 3 groups every day. Got 29 birds. 2 of us shot our limit most every day, the others shot 5 total and left after 3 days.

The trick was looking for the 3 Cs: cows, crops, and cover. Cows: most birds seemed to be within a mile of cattle yards, I assume those were the only adult birds that made it through last winter. Crops: Corn, sunflowers, then soybeans in that order, preferably combined within the last week. Cover: mostly secondary (fence rows, edges of swamps, railroad tracks), primary cover (CRP, Plots) was already hammered but held a few birds if you could find em.

We started at sun up and hunted till we had a limit, usually early afternoon. Then switched over to huns and sharpies. Buddy and I kept our 4 dogs busy. We had a blast.


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## indsport (Aug 29, 2003)

Sounds about right. The neighbors took a whole week off to bird hunt around our area before deer season with 3 of them and 4 dogs. A total of 6 roosters for a weeks hunt where last year we could limit out daily with a little work. Grim is optimistic.


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