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*Last edited by chopper on Sat Nov 18, 2006 10:14 pm; edited 3 times in total*

All -

I've been home a week now and the euphoria has yet to be lost. Pup worked at about 18 yds, quartered wonderfully, didn't chase hens or coasting roosters, and retrieved well. It's the first time all components have come together and to say I'm happy is the understatement of the year. Just wanted to share some of my joy...

Stats
Days 1-4: 11 hunters - 115 total birds (not quite a limit)
Days 5-7: Dad and I - 18 birds (nice to let the dogs work)
Weather: Ranged from 40 degrees w/30 mph wind to 70 with near calm wind.

Here's one of the second day birds taken with the citori 16. My first rooster taken with the citori was a high passing shot, much like a dove, while blocking. The bird was dead in the air and pup made a nice retrieve adding to the sweetness.

Weather was great on day 2, but a bit warm at 55. Here's a shot of a pasture we hunted that was surounded by a harvested sunflower field. The pasture had a nice slough in the middle of it that provided multiple opportunities to harvest a rooster.

I was blocking for the group as we pushed through a 50 yd wide, mile + in length, slough to end the day. With pup at heal we had two nice 200 yd + retrieves from birds that fell in the short grass pasture (I like to stand 250-300 yds away from the shooters for safety). Neither birds were dead in the air and had ducked into clumps of grass making pup work for the retrieves. Here's a picture of the sunset as we closed day three.

We actually lost the two longest tail feathers of this bird. He had 7/16" spurs. You can tell the weather was just about perfect on this day, day 7, at around 40 deg. Wind was stiff at 25-30mph, but the few birds that hung around after the massive 80+ yd away flushes came home. A day of limits!

A typical SD pasture we hunted. We collected birds from this field two of the seven days we hunted. I love the landscape in SD!

Snow added 2.5 hours to the drive home, but we made it safely without incident. So much for taking "the short cut"

Regards
Chopper

Great report and great pics-thanks! Very Happy

I'll get some pics up soon from Plankinton last week (when my much more computer savey wife returns from her payback trip to Orlando Rolling Eyes

)

Nice post Chopper - - pictures and all Very Happy

It looks like a great hunt!

Didn't state it earlier, but all birds were wild. All hunting was done on WMAs, Walk-ins, or on land of farmers we ran into.