New way to hunt birds....

Big Chief

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFjFptZ1wGI&feature=player_embedded

Teach

Several years ago when pen-raised quail were just becoming the norm, an outdoor writer commented "These birds fly like they've only got a learner's permit!" I've noticed that the birds we would buy for dog training would only fly as far as the length of whatever flight pen they were raised in, no matter how much space was available to them!
Jerry

NN

We hunted rabbits on one of those places that they take
Dudes out and treat them to quail hunting. We could not shoot
birds; but, the quail would fly a few yards
and sit back down. At that range they would have been mince
meat

Teach

Most of the "hunting preserves" we've been around sell their customers as many birds as they want, and an employee gets on a Gator or a 4-wheeler and plants the birds for the dog to find. Any that don't get flushed and shot remain in the field, but I'm pretty sure they have some sort of recall pen to lure the birds back to their food source. A pen-raised quail or Chukkar partridge has an almost zero chance of surviving on its own- - - -no predator avoidance skills or foraging ability. The trick to making a bird stay put where it's planted is to "dizzy" it as it's placed- - - -shake the bird in a circular motion just before it's put on the ground, and it will hunker down for quite a while before recovering its senses.
Jerry

Big Chief

There are Mourning Doves that i call "Bottom feeders" who eat spilled seeds off the ground under my bird feeder in FLA. I can walk out the back door and almost right up to them before the dummies fly off! A blind cat could probably catch one.

KENFU1911

Buddy of mime went on a hunt like that....shot one bird.... then just "wound" the others necks up.....said it was was not worth shooting 'em...Ken

bisley

Big Chief wrote: »

There are Mourning Doves that i call "Bottom feeders" who eat spilled seeds off the ground under my bird feeder in FLA. I can walk out the back door and almost right up to them before the dummies fly off! A blind cat could probably catch one.

My wife sees all the 'tame' doves around here, and is mystified that I will drive 500 miles to hunt them on the prairie. In the late spring, when the 'burr clover' is seeding out, I could probably get my limit with a BB gun, off my front porch.

KSU Firefighter

Teach wrote: »

Most of the "hunting preserves" we've been around sell their customers as many birds as they want, and an employee gets on a Gator or a 4-wheeler and plants the birds for the dog to find. Any that don't get flushed and shot remain in the field, but I'm pretty sure they have some sort of recall pen to lure the birds back to their food source. A pen-raised quail or Chukkar partridge has an almost zero chance of surviving on its own- - - -no predator avoidance skills or foraging ability. The trick to making a bird stay put where it's planted is to "dizzy" it as it's placed- - - -shake the bird in a circular motion just before it's put on the ground, and it will hunker down for quite a while before recovering its senses.
Jerry

Went to a place that did those hunts as a fundraiser for a guy who I went to high school with who had cancer back in the early 90's. We were supposed to "hunt" our birds that were placed for us and then walk back to the main house to clean our birds. Being good Kansas rednecks we spotted where the birds that we missed flew to that happened to be sort of on the way back to house. We were the only group that managed to get all the birds that were placed for us. Pheasants and Ptarmigan as I recall. Definitely not the same as hunting wild birds, left a bad taste in my mouth. Never have participated in one since.

Teach

When we bought out farm in south central Tennessee about 30 years ago, we had a couple of resident coveys of quail which I hunted occasionally, never taking more than one or two birds at a time. Gradually, they disappeared, and I haven't seen a wild quail in this area in the past 10 years or so. Lots of theories have been floated as to why the quail are gone, from coyotes to feral cats, to fire ants. I even talked to one oldtimer who claimed he had SEEN wild turkeys eating quail chicks like popcorn! I had to stifle a laugh over that one, but he was dead serious!

Bottom line, if a quail flies in our area, it's been pen-raised and planted for a field trial or dog training. Wild ones just don't live here anymore!
Jerry