Bad news for pheasant hunters

[AspenBud]

Is this happening here too?

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/01/us/as-pheasants-disappear-hunters-in-iowa-follow.html

[Bob33]

Yes.

"Over the last two decades, Iowa has lost more than 1.6 million acres of habitat suitable for pheasants and other small game, the equivalent of a nine-mile-wide strip of land stretching practically the width of the state. And these declines have been occurring nationwide."

[turkeyfeather]

Unfortunately, Bob is right. This kind of thing is happening everywhere. Good habitat is being lost and farmers that used to let people hunt birds are closing their property and CRP land is declining as well. I wouldn't be surprised to see pheasants pretty much nonexistent in another two decades.

[Moose-head]

   Something that is mentioned on the second page of the article is the lack of public land opportunity in Iowa.  I moved there for school and there is no place for a “newb” to hunt.  The article points out that landowners usually do not charge for hunting on their land.  They also don’t welcome new hunters.  It is not that they are rude about it, but they have promised the same groups of people that they will have exclusive access to hunt their property by themselves like they always have.  I eventually gained access to some deer property, but never bought a license.  On web forums out west people who have never hunted can ask how to go about it and advice is often to go look at the large tracts of public land and then narrow it down from there.  There are even offers to help to find some good places.  If you are new to the area or new to hunting there is no incentive to buy licenses and hunt.  There are some beautiful deer out there, but not enough opportunity for new hunters IMHO.

[MR5x5]

I do not believe this is happening in WA. 
Take the state by regions;
Columbia Basin - Irrigated and generally farmed to the edges.  Canadian beef issues, bio-fuel stock etc have driven feed corn production in the basin area hugely over the last 5-10 yrs. There has been so much corn that hunting has been pretty tough until the end of Nov when enough came down that the birds were around. I believe hawks, eagles and yotes are the biggest pressure outside of weather.  And the spring weather this year was tough.  Birds in the basin are down this year.
North Central Wheat/Barley - Dry farmed scab lands - does not support corn - what is farmeable is largely already in crops.  In fact more crop lands would help by producing more feed.  Predators abound in this area.  Last spring the weather was moderate.  Bird numbers were good but not great this year.
Central/Central - Dry farmed scab lands - dry dry dry - a lot of years to damn try to support spring chicks.
SE WA - Oh the Palouse...  Same as it ever was - Dry land wheat - will not support corn.  The ground that can be farmed is being farmed.  Lots of CRP.  Lots of natural cover that can't be farmed - to steep - to wet - river bottoms etc.  Bird numbers in this region were just fine this year. Helps to be half mtn goat to hunt the Palouse.  Pine forests are your friend in this region.

Lots of rambling indeed - nope we don't have the bird numbers of the 70's when the fields were ripe with sugar beats.  But there are a lot of birds for those willing to figure them out.  My advice is to consider the spring rains. Too wet is bad, too dry is bad.  Their are multiple micro climates and rain shadows on the east side.  You need to think it through and check regions to find the where the birds are doing well that year.   

No BS - we have literally been seeing better than 100 birds a day over the past month of hunting a couple different regions.

[turkeyfeather]

WOW MR5x5! I need to come hunt with you then. My wife and I walked fields two weekends ago here south of Spokane and in 2 hours only saw 3 birds (only 1 rooster).

[elkinrutdrivemenuts]

I don't think it's happening here either, I have been spending my time around South of Spokane and have been seeing tons of birds.  Big groups of 10 30 birds, on state land and hunt by permission land. They aren't dumb either, they have been hunted a lot so getting them to flush close enough has been a challenge!  When the snow hit,  they grouped up and seemed to be everywhere! I think we got a few more decades of good hunting down there.

[boneaddict]

Hawks bug me more than anything.   They seem to be as common as starlings these days. I could see and photgraph 10 or more in a ONE MILE drive from my house. 

I planted an acre of corn and left it unharvested.   The pheasants are loving it.   Got some great photos just this morning.   Its one little small thing I can do to help.   

[rasbo]

I seen more pheasant in west grant county this year than the last 3ys..

[JLS]

Hawks bug me more than anything.   They seem to be as common as starlings these days. I could see and photgraph 10 or more in a ONE MILE drive from my house. 

I planted an acre of corn and left it unharvested.   The pheasants are loving it.   Got some great photos just this morning.   Its one little small thing I can do to help.

I agree, there has been a huge proliferation of raptors in the last couple of decades.  I think that is a big reason why the "marginal" habitat areas now hold very few birds.  A lot of the CRP in Adams County  and many other eastern counties is just not heavy enough to provide cover from aerial predators.  The good habitat areas still produce birds.

[Special T]

I know in the basin area another HUGE killer of pheasant are the swathers knocking the heads off of hens sitting on eggs. MR5x5 a LOT of the problem with pheasant numbers comes down to  Crop harvest cycle and Winter cover from predators. "Clean Farming" has made it hard for pheasants to do good. This state could do much better if it got a handle on its predators. In the basin on/near my brother in laws farm we kill every predatory we can legally. No matter how many coyotes we kill we never seem to thin them enough to make a dent. Mag pies... For what every reason people are weary of shooting them. You can shoot them in the act of depredation.

[singleshot12]

Shrinking conservation lands,predation,cold and damp weather yes, but it doesn't look like anyone has mentioned the use of pesticides by modern efficiant farming practices. Pheasant chicks solely depend apon a variety of bugs,insects and worms for their first couple weeks of life. Is it just coincidence the decline started about the same time the pesticide revelution started?

[Birdguy]

It is actually a pretty good testament to mother nature that we even have what we do have. I was talking to my wife and kids on our trip home from the east side on Monday about all the predators. Seems anymore every light pole or power pole, tree, bush, even street sign has a hawk/owl/eagle on it. I remember as a kid we owner a Toyota landcruiser with a sunroof  , and man it was cool to see a large hawk or eagle through it as we drove east or west. Now all I see is prey animals that are taking out all the gamebirds I would love to hunt. I can only remember a coupe times seeing coyote killed on the road in the hundreds of trips we took as kids now it seems ever trip has a couple on the road and if you are looking a half dozen along the road as you drive. We have lost chicken to eagles right out of our pens this year and several of them. I have lived in the same general area for almost 40 years and we have NEVER covered our chicken pen form aerial predators until this year. I am delighted to see the return of the bald eagle and many of the birds of prey but too many of anything is not a good thing. I think the state should issue a few hawk tags, and coyote harvest should be mandatory with every small game license just to help out the cause.

[eastsidemallard74]

We were goose hunting near Moses , and 2 Yotes came within 100yrds of our blinds this last weekend,unfortunately I only had a shotgun.The rifle was in the truck.Living out here you see tons of them, and for the most part they get shot on the spot.But theres no way to control them if their harvesting pups left and right.

[Stilly bay]

It is actually a pretty good testament to mother nature that we even have what we do have. I was talking to my wife and kids on our trip home from the east side on Monday about all the predators. Seems anymore every light pole or power pole, tree, bush, even street sign has a hawk/owl/eagle on it. I remember as a kid we owner a Toyota landcruiser with a sunroof  , and man it was cool to see a large hawk or eagle through it as we drove east or west. Now all I see is prey animals that are taking out all the gamebirds I would love to hunt. I can only remember a coupe times seeing coyote killed on the road in the hundreds of trips we took as kids now it seems ever trip has a couple on the road and if you are looking a half dozen along the road as you drive. We have lost chicken to eagles right out of our pens this year and several of them. I have lived in the same general area for almost 40 years and we have NEVER covered our chicken pen form aerial predators until this year. I am delighted to see the return of the bald eagle and many of the birds of prey but too many of anything is not a good thing. I think the state should issue a few hawk tags, and coyote harvest should be mandatory with every small game license just to help out the cause.

  bingo
in the hay day what ever hawks that survived pesticides were shot in the name of game management. no so much today.
I have read stories from the 20's and 30's about actual hawk shoots where thousands were killed in a few days, and these took place all across the U.S.

plus back in the day every country kid was running a trap line keeping all the varmints in check, today you would be a social outcast in if people found out you were a trapper.

ad that to pesticides and modern farm practices that don't leave any suitable cover and not a drop of extra grain... its not easy  to be a wild ditch chicken these days.