Gun Dog Forum

Hi All
Quick question:
My husband and I purchased 10 pheasant chicks from a local farm this past spring and raised them for the purpose of getting in some bird time, particularly with our younger dog, before the upcoming season.
this will be his first season pheasant hunting - we've introduced him to quail on our property, and he's also been exposed to wild pheasant already from the runs we take him on at the gamelands. But for the sake of extra training, we were looking to plant our pheasants and then send him out to find them.

My question is this - we don't exactly want to just plant them, have him point and flush them, and then be out of pheasants. We could always buy more, but we were hoping to get a use or two out of them.
We could certainly box them up and set them out in the field, but I feel like, to some extent, that doesn't give the dog the "tracking" experience of catching the scent of a running bird.

Is there any suggestion, other than a pheasant harness, of what we can do to keep them, while allowing him to train on them?
This might be stupid question, and it might be better to just dizzy them, set them out there, and let him point/flush them.
But just figured I'd see if anyone has experience KEEPING the birds for more than one training session!
Thanks
-Brooke

Well, I see you have no replies so I'll say : I know of no way to use pheasants a second time unless they survive in the field / area you are using. Even in dog trials the hawks have almost all before day 5.The dog needs to see the bird either shot or fly away. I can't imagine how a harness would be useful.

Sharon wrote:Well, I see you have no replies so I'll say : I know of no way to use pheasants a second time unless they survive in the field / area you are using. Even in dog trials the hawks have almost all before day 5.The dog needs to see the bird either shot or fly away. I can't imagine how a harness would be useful.

Agreed! Quail and to some extent chukars do offer a secondary opportunity for another contact. Pheasants very rarely will cooperate in that way. Actual pigeons,quail and chukars are the birds of choice when training. exposure to pheasants should come after the dog has proven reliable on the smaller birds. That thinking comes from over 30 yrs and 1000's of birds over 100's of dogs.

gundogguy wrote:

Sharon wrote:Well, I see you have no replies so I'll say : I know of no way to use pheasants a second time unless they survive in the field / area you are using. Even in dog trials the hawks have almost all before day 5.The dog needs to see the bird either shot or fly away. I can't imagine how a harness would be useful.

Agreed! Quail and to some extent chukars do offer a secondary opportunity for another contact. Pheasants very rarely will cooperate in that way. Actual pigeons,quail and chukars are the birds of choice when training. exposure to pheasants should come after the dog has proven reliable on the smaller birds. That thinking comes from over 30 yrs and 1000's of birds over 100's of dogs.

Thank you!
We've exposed him to quail already-he does fine with those. And we have plans to purchase chukar for one or two pre-season practice hunts where we can stock the birds on property and send him out after.
I figured there probably wasn't a way to re-use the pheasants, but I figured I'd ask around and see!
Thanks for the feedback!

Has anyone tried to card a pheasant? and did it work!

Well, ahem... you could use them frozen with a launcher.

In my area pheasant chicks are cheap. There is some money involved in raising them because game bird feed is quite spendy. I think you just have to buy more chicks and regard it as a lot cheaper than paying to hunt someone else's planted field

You can put out feeders and waterers and maybe your birds will stick around the area for a few days. Much pressure from the dog and they will leave the area, and whether they stay or not, they won't live long because the predators will get them.

I've manged to get wild quail to move in close to my house by providing ideal habitat and a good food source. However, the quail around the house are counted as pets and we don't hunt them. I think they would move away quickly if the dogs harassed them. It might be possible to provide ideal pheasant habitat and then wait and hope some wild ones will move in. (your planted pheasants are very unlikely to live.)

Meller wrote:Has anyone tried to card a pheasant? and did it work!

No . That would have to be a heavy card. Weight of the card/hose is important when carding, as that will determine how far the bird will fly. ( Learned this the hard way.)

I used to card birds until one day the bird took off with the card hanging , landing on an island in the middle of the pond. It was hanging from the tree as the bird watchers went on the other side of the pond. True story. Did I swim out there and get it ? ..........................

Meller wrote:Has anyone tried to card a pheasant? and did it work!

I saw it done one time. Group of us were training in smallish 40 acres field surrounded by large oak and maple trees. The bird flushed after being pointed by a GSP. The handler insisted on also doing his own the gunning, he missed the bird. Somehow the bird gain altitude. as the bird tried clear a very tall Oak tree the card snagged on a limb...not a very pretty sight. a pheasant dangling from a tree some 80 ft
The owner was bound and determined to have that bird. well after about 6 rounds he did just that and there the bird hung. I never trained with that group again.

Mercy. I at least the hawks got my hanging bird.

Hmm, did the OP perhaps grow fond of the chicks she raised?

NEhomer wrote:Hmm, did the OP perhaps grow fond of the chicks she raised?

Hi there!
We think they're BEAUTIFUL! But we'd still be OK with letting them go!
We were just hoping there might be some shred of hope that we could use them a few times, just because we don't have a bird farm right nearby, and so once they flush, there's no guarantee we'll see them again, and we'll need to go get more!
That said, since we've built a flight pen, I suppose we can always just go buy a bunch now and keep them in the pen until we're ready to use them!
-Brooke

Good luck Brooke, I can appreciate the sentiment....to me they've always looked their best in a 350 degree oven!

If your birds have been in a flight pen together for a while, they will tend to recall and probably tend to stick around.

ezzy333 wrote:If your birds have been in a flight pen together for a while, they will tend to recall and probably tend to stick around.

I wasn't sure if they would have that tendency or not! If so, that's a good thing! Might get a use or two out of them just because of that!
thank you!

Brad Higgins has a video where he raises them in a topless pen. He blows a whistle at feeding time, and they learn to come to the food. As they mature and fly out, they still fly back in to the whistle and food. He opens a gate for the walk-ins. It's a brilliant process.