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Larry Brown
PostPosted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 5:54 am  Reply with quote
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Terry, you're right--I have hunted all 3: wild birds, those released (mostly by private landowners or outfitters in SD to "supplement" the wild population) that have survived for some time afield, and those put out maybe just hours before on a preserve. In Iowa, where I've lived for all my life except 5 years, we don't have released birds. And we don't have enough preserves that the overflow is going to supplement our wild stock much--and I don't hunt anywhere near any preserves anyhow. So it's the wild ones I hunt nearly all the time, the same wild ones I grew up with. And you hit the nail on the head, Terry. A bird that has to escape predators from the moment it comes out of the egg is bound to have different survival skills than one raised in a pen and only out for a few hours, or maybe even a few days. Those that survive longer than that might be more of a challenge, but I'll bet on the real wild ones.

And Guy, how cold can it get for your "wild" pheasant hunts out there in Mass? The same game laws that tell me you can only shoot 6 birds per season (not counting preserve birds, of course) also tell me your season's over before the end of November. You want cold, you need to hunt Iowa or the Dakotas in Dec or January. But the pellets still kill the birds. Shot my last 5 roosters last season, January birds, with the same load of Brit 6's I've been using in my R barrel on almost all the birds I've shot this season.

One reason those recently released birds can be tougher as far as killing them cleanly goes (but not, typically, knocking them down) is that many of them are packed with fat, from their pre-release, easy living days. Shot has to punch through all that yellow gunk. But because of that fat, they also fly slower than their slimmer, trimmer wild cousins, and aren't much of a challenge for a dog once you put them on the ground. I haven't shot nearly as many preserve birds as I have wild ones, maybe only a couple hundred of the former, but until a couple years back, my dogs and I had never lost one of those. That's a loss rate about 1/8 of what we experience with wild birds.
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Dave Erickson
PostPosted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 6:21 am  Reply with quote
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Right on, Larry!
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16gaugeguy
PostPosted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 8:48 am  Reply with quote
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Location: massachusetts

Larry, about the only way for you to understand is to come East and give it a try. Go after some of our own wild birds. Then you will know for yourself. Until then, all you can do is wonder and assume.

I don't doubt what you say about the birds in your state. I've never hunted there. However, from what you have said, and what I know to be true about our own wild birds, I understand that there is virtually nothing different about them behaviorwise or physiologically either. So until you have hunted our wild birds in the coastal fens, river bottoms, and around the edges of our ceder swamps, you might want to withold judgement and suspend your doubts.

I've worked my way across the Midwest. I've been in Nebraska in July and in January too. We don't have the extremes of heat and cold here, but it often gets well below 20 degrees from early November on, below zero on occasion from December on. It depends on whether we are having a cold or a warm winter. This year, it has been unseasonably warm. We've had some real freezers too.

The RI pheasant season goes right into January and the state has pretty much the same geographic makeup as SE Mass. I've spent a lot of time hunting the same coastal fens and river areas there in winter, that I do fly casting for stripers, bluefish, and tide runners from April to early November. Sometimes, I've done both in the same day. Fishing those spots is how I learned there were wild birds to be hunted there. Hiedi often came with me on these fishing trips. She'd get birdy on the way to the water, and we'd follow it up. The tracks in the sand or mud and the occasional bird flushed was all the proof I needed.

Further, until you've lived under a political system like ours, perhaps you might also want to withold your judgement about how things are supposed to be done vs how things are actually done. But from what I can gather from the little I know about your background, I believe you are well travelled enough to know it and might have forgotten it. I would not presume to tell someone from Nebraska how to do things in Nebraska. Perhaps you might offer the same courtesy.

This thread has come a long way in discussing what shot sizes and velocities work best on pheasant. I think we have covered the differences between wild and stocked birds. I will use what works for me based on the birds and conditions I am faced with. I would advise the same for anyone else, anywhere else. Thanks for the opportunity to discuss the mattrer and the give and take, the sharing of ideas and experiences. 16GG.
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revdocdrew
PostPosted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 8:56 am  Reply with quote
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I'm slightly embarassed to admit that I was not aware there was actually a sustained self-propagating population of wild pheasants in Mass or RI:
http://www.gamebirdhunts.com/hunting-news/detail.asp?iArt=461&iType=42
http://www.epa.gov/fedrgstr/EPA-IMPACT/1996/August/Day-27/pr-16898.html
http://www.mvgazette.com/features/bird_news/?document=20050923_bird_news

Pretty amazing bird: can make a home on the seashore or the frozen prairie of N. Dakota!

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Drew Hause
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LiverTick
PostPosted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 9:07 am  Reply with quote



Joined: 18 Jul 2004
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Location: The Great Lakes State

A clarification:

The original question was never about shot sizes, but about the size of the load -- i.e., whether a 7/8 or 15/16 oz load moving at 1350+ fps might have better terminal performance over a 1 or 1 1/8 oz load at 1295 fps.
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Terry Imai
PostPosted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 10:24 am  Reply with quote
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LiverTick,

When you asked about the proper shot size, you got a ton of different views and most of these opinions are situational. I know guys with good pointing "preserve" dogs using a 410 up to guy hunting wild birds using a 12 gauge 3" 1 5/8 oz. over labs in heavy cover. The guy shooting the 410 can get away with a light load since his average shot will be 20 yards on a slow moving pen raised bird that will go down easily. The guy shooting the 12 3" #4 usually ends up with a 35-40 yard shot since his lab doesn't flush the bird as quickly (and closer) as a good springer would flush their birds. BTW, this guy makes 95% of those shot since he's an expert shot. The hardest part of getting information from most BBs is being able to separate the good info from the other stuff along with factoring your own ability and situation. Luckily we a few experts on this BB who have spent their time only chasing wild birds but I sometimes check a poster's location just to see what their typical local hunting conditions are when considering their opinion. Someone on the board who lives in the deep south may be experts on wild quail but if they hunt their local pheasants, they're hunting over preserve birds. The bone structure of a wild bird is always stronger than a pen bird. When you wring the neck of a wild bird, you really have to give them a good spin to break their neck. You can just "pop" a pen bird's neck to dispatch them. All of those are indication of their skeletal structure without even addressing their survival skills.
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16gaugeguy
PostPosted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 10:40 am  Reply with quote
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Liver and Ticked, you are right. The short answer is, the difference would probably be so small as to go unnoticed. Round projectiles like shot face one near constant factor, air density. Round shot has a low ballistic coefficient and looses velocity quite quickly. Smaller lead spheres loose velocity and energy or hitting power faster than bigger lead spheres if started at the same velocity. So the only way to increase the ballistic performance of a lead sphere is to make it bigger. Therefore, the size issue automatically comes into the matter. Hence the old saying, little power, more lead... . the old timeres from the days of th patched roundball understood this very well. I hope this info helps clear the matter up for you.

Drew, ringnecks are exactly that, an amazing bird. I believe the Ringneck we know originally came from the cold dry plateaus of China. I've heard the expression, "Manchurian Blue Back." I assume this means a strain of bird from Manchuria in Northern China.

We in Mass and throughout Southeastern NE have had a fairly hardy population of wild ringnecks ever since I could remember. The state enlarged the stocking program in the mid 1960's at the behest of Governor Sargeant, an avid bird hunter. For some reason never really studied or understood, much of our wild population died off in the late 1950's. I personally believe it to be from wide spread use of DDT. However, ever since DDT was banned, the wild birds have been coming back quite well.

Even many of our local pheasant hunters don't realize it. The stocking program draws most to the easier to hunt WMAs throughout the state. Most of these guys get to hunt but one day a week, Saturday. Most go maybe two or three times a year and are delighted to even see a bird shot. They Would not want to spend it matching wits with a wild bird. I'm just crazy enough to prefer it whenever I can do it. But I'm also nuts enough to hunt snipe with a .410. Laughing The last guy I took snipe hunting with me suggested I go get some counceling. Rolling Eyes He swore the two birds I knocked down with the little gun were just a matter of pure luck and said it can't be done even with a 12 regularly. Laughing

However, as with most things in MA. the entire matter of replentishing our pheasant population was politicized, was not well studied, and the solution was to stock birds helter skelter throughout the state. We even went through a period where a hybrid form of bird called a "dilute', a mule crossed between a Ringneck and a Golden Pheasant, was stocked. The idea was to stock only male birds that were sterile, so the stocked birds would not mix with the wild ones. However, as is with all things in nature, the plan did not work as well as hoped, because today, we still see traces of these cross bred pheasants among the wild birds. They are a bit bigger, and paler without the darker mahogany and pale blue hues of the ringneck. so some of them were packing more thamn blanks. Laughing

Where in the world these benighted folks who run our state get the idea that a bird known for its ability to cope with the harse climactic conditions in the Dakotas, Nebraska, and Northern China can't make it in our more moderate climate is beyond me. But as my old boss, John Prouty used to say, "We breed them and stock them to keep the Govey happy. Its a living. Besides, the wild ones out there will teach these dummies how to survive." He was not that far off the mark. Laughing John was an old Cape Codder from boyhood. He hunted and fished there all his life. He took a pragmatic view of things, ignored all the foolishness, and went about his business with a good understanding of reality. He also hunted all winter for whatever he felt like, as most native Codders did. He just did not admit it or talk about it.

In spite of all the bumbling, stumbling, and fumbling of our over polictically motivated and misled MF&W pheasant program, with its almost total lack of facts and grasp of reality, somehow, our wild birds keep right on doing what wild pheasants do everywhere within their range, survive and make more pheasants. I certainly appreciate thier efforts. Wink
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Larry Brown
PostPosted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 1:10 pm  Reply with quote
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Guy, since you've never hunted them in the MW--which is where the vast majority of serious pheasant hunters live (or where they come, for extended visits)--you don't know a whole bunch about our birds either. There are places you can live out here where, if you have the time, the inclination, and the skills to do so, you can kill over 100 roosters in a season. In states like KS, NE, IA, and most of ND, they'll all be wild. (SD is somewhat more of a crapshoot, because while they have plenty of wild birds, there are also lots of released birds.) You needn't worry about whether anyone but the hen that hatched them put them there. And given the length of our seasons (and no season limit), it's all perfectly legal. Compared to a season limit of 6 birds--assuming one is inclined to follow the law--a Midwestern hunter can get the equivalent of a decade or more worth of Mass experience on pheasants in just a single season.

Cold . . . we're having an unusually warm Dec at the present too. By this time last year, my hunting close to home was effectively shut down due to very deep snow. But I've already been out this season, two or three times, in single digit weather. Once hunted -50 chill factor, but that's been many years ago, and would not care to do it again.

And I lived for 3 years on the East Coast (VA), where they also had the strange no Sunday hunting thing, maybe still do. But then we all have our difficulties with either our state game agencies or our politicians. We're the only state west of the Mississippi without a dove season. Got it through the legislature a few years back; governor vetoed it, animal rights folks were happy.
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16gaugeguy
PostPosted: Thu Dec 14, 2006 6:27 am  Reply with quote
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Maybe some day, I'll have the time and inclination to do just that Larry. Like I said, I would not presume to tell a Nebraskan how things should be done in Nebraska. However, I'm willing to bet these Eastern wild birds I've hunted and taken have tought me enough of the fundamentals for me to catch on to any local nuances in hunting Midwest birds. Smart tough birds bring out the best in dogs and hunters too.

And remember, what some folks see as serious, others see as an individual's personal form of insanity. At least the guys I know around my neck of the woods think I'm totally nuts for chasing these wild ones long after the stocked bird fields have closed for the season. To each his own passions-- or dose of the crazies...whatever. Laughing

Ps, I lived in Grayson County, VA for a brief number of years on my Uncle's farm. Up in the hills there, folks are more inclined to do what suits them as long as nobody else is being hurt. They just quietly go about their own business. Most of the more avid local deer hunters thought Sundays a fine time to bowhunt. These folks pretty much did as they saw fit regardless of what some politician or other authority figure thought as long as they were not hurting anyone. They also brewed up some of the finest home stilled whiskey for their own use I've ever tasted. This, in spite of what the "revenuers" thought. I tend to keep my own council as they did and follow my own path as long as I'm not hurting anyone. I've never been much of a follower.
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