November 14th turned out to be a great day for hunting for me. I started out leaving my house in Orem just before 5:00. I drove out to meet a couple guys in Duchesne. My dogs were bouncing off the walls, ready for the BIRDS. Well we started hunting about 8:00, at 26 degrees and slight snow. We put up quite a few hen pheasants before finding the roosters, but we did manage a few. Finished out the morning bird hunt with a limit of quail.
Now that the birds were in the bag, I headed to my tree stand for the evening. In the stand a little later than I had hoped (3:51). Saw my first deer at 3:53. They ended up being a group of 5 does, which came in straight under me. After a couple staring contests with the two biggest in the group, they decided something wasn't right, so they fed off to the north. About 20 minutes later I saw a buck chasing a doe in a field about 200 yards away. It was a very good sized deer, but I didn't get a good look at the rack. Then, another doe came in and fed about 15 yards away. The doe started to get nervous, then looked back behind me, and bolted. Next thing I know I hear leaves rustling straight behind me. As I wrap my head around the tree as far as I can, I see a doe..... then a buck in hot pursuit. I drew back, pointed at the next opening the buck should come to if he stays on the does path. Lucky for me, he even decided to pause in that opening. I let the arrow fly...and watch him run off into the field I saw the deer in to the south of me just earlier. After about 30 minutes, I get out of the stand to see if I can find blood. No such luck, as the arrow stuck in him, and did not pass thru. So, I follow the general path he took into the field, and hadn't found a spot of blood. Just as I start thinking this is no good, I see a bit of movement in the field. It is the bucks head slowly dropping, then he would pick it up again, and so on. Well, I left him alone for another half hour, then went to see if he had expired. And...... he had.
All in all, a great day fo me. A nice bird hunt, followed by filling my deer tag on the extended archery with a nice little Uintah Basin two point. He measured a hair over a 19 inch spread. Not a monster, but much better then an empty tag. And also not bad for being in the stand for less than an hour to the point of the kill.
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Looks like a great day in the field!! congratts[
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i don't think it gets much better than that!!!!! nice!!!!
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Great Day - Great Report
Just a quick question on the darker color rooster - I hunt birds in South Dakota & Oregon but have never seen that dark a colored rooster before. I was wondering if that is something common
in Utah? or just a dark colored odd ball bird that might be worth mounting?
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You know, I am not positive why they are colored like that. I have shot a few like that, but mostly while training my dogs on a pheasant farm. I have been told they call them "black mutants". I am guessing that this bird got away from the hunting preserve, as I was hunting not even a mile from it. Someone feel free to answer the question correctly if I am wrong, but that is my understanding. As to how they end up black, I have no clue. Pretty cool looking birds though. Makes for a good looking bag with one of each type.
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When I was stationed in England I killed a few of them and have killed one or two thru the years down by Utah Lake. I was told the name of them but damned if I can remember what it was. They were usually a bit larger than the regular ringneck and seemed to have more fat on them. Pretty birds.
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I believe the word your looking for is MELANISTIC. The Pleasant Valley Hunting Preserve always has a bunch of them. If anybody wants to hunt them they can go to PHVP and request them to be put out for you. I shot a few last year while I was working over there. I think they are the same as a ring neck just a genetic thing that happens in hatcheries. I was told that a regular ring neck lays the eggs. Maybe kinda like how they also have a couple albino pheasants every year in the broods. We are talking 1-5 birds out of 35,000 chicks. The melanistic birds are a lot more common. I bet the bird bowhunter3 killed was shot while he was hunting somewhere near a pheasant club or possibly @ a pheasant club.
Nice buck BTW and bag-o-birds BH3
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You are probably dead on with that, while I was stationed in England I became good friends with a Game Keeper who raised Pheasant on a 5000 acre estate and I remember that color phase of a pheasant and that sounds like the name. You have never hunted pheasant until you have seen how the English do it. I use to work as a beater on weekends and push the birds to the hunters who were positioned ahead of us at shooting positons with their double barrels. My friend would allow all of us beaters one day of hunting toward the end of the season on the estate usually a day called Boxing Day. I captured some of these hunts on my old 8MM silent camera. This all took place from 1973-1976.
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I have seen some TV shows about the Euro pheasant hunts. It was interesting how they dont use dogs. In this show they were pushing the birds off a big ridge and the guys were pass shooting the birds. It looked like a riot. I still like the methods practiced here but it would be nice to just have bird after bird flying right over your head. Kinda like waterfowl or doves..... [
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I just googled melanistic and found out it is the opposite of an albino having a dominating black pigment rather than white. Kinda interesting. Their are also melanistic deer roaming around somewhere. Just like the albino deer that get shot every once in a while.
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We actually did use dogs for flushing and retrieving birds. At the end of the day everyone was given a brace of birds and the rest were sold to markets, the money made was put back into the estate fund to raise more birds. They also had several different types of partridge. The Gray Partridge looked like our Huns and the French Partridge looked like our Chukers. They thought I was wierd to clean my birds on Sat. and then have one for dinner on Sunday. In England they hang the whole bird uncleaned in a shed for a week to 10 days to age before cleaning. I never did try one to eat so I can't tell you how they tasted but they claimed that was how your best pheasant under glass was prepared in the best restaurants. They kind of looked at me like I was some type of cannibal for not aging my birds.[crazy]
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Did they hang it by the legs or head? Usually after around thanksgiving, I like to start aging my ducks and geese. Never hung them, just a nice cold cement garage floor. I can't say for sure if it improves the taste or not, but it does make them alot more tender.
I don't really ever like to wait more than a day to clean my pheasants. Most of the shots I get at pheasants make them more prone to get shot in the guts. And they just seem more apt all around to getting tainted meat from the guts than waterfowl do.
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They strung them up by the heads, I think I have them recorded on one of my old films. I went goose hunting in Scotland the last year I was there with a couple of my English friends and they did the same thing with our ducks and geese. I know when I walked into the sheds you could smell them.
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FOD, You are right about the Pleasant Valley thing, as I stated before, we were hunting some property very close to there. I do believe this bird got away from there, as I have only shot them on pheasant farms before. I have just heard them called black mutants,but I also think you are right about them being melanistic. I have seen some pictures of melanistic deer. Pretty crazy looking if you ask me. Anyways, thanks for adding your info to this post.
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MMMmmmm, sounds good - lol. Were they taking temperature into account? I don't ever do it unless the temp is below 40° for the better portion of the day - and they never have really got stinky. It's funny though, I got my cousin (who is kinda new to hunting) started doing it. When our grandma and my aunt found out about it they FLIPPED OUT! Especially when they found out he learned it from me. LOL. I guess I should know better since I been hunting since I was a sprout. [:p]
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So I guess what you are saying is that you hang your birds guts in for a week or so to age? Think I'll just clean mine as soon as I can, alot of times in the field leaving a wing on and put them in a cooler.
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Yup, just ducks and geese; 3-7 days. I know it sounds crazy.
I don't think you can go wrong with what ur saying though.
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