I’ve died and gone to South Dakota!

Dixie and I celebrated our 16^th wedding anniversary a couple weeks ago. I think I may have mentioned this previously, but she finally agreed (willingly or unwillingly I’m not sure) to go pheasant hunting with me in South Dakota to celebrate the occasion.

While I love my wife unconditionally, I have cursed the fact that I got married the first week of November for the last 15 of our 16 years together (first one I was too distracted to notice). The timing provides an annual conflict of me wanting to be somewhere else during our anniversary Anyway, this year has been an absolute dream come true. Dixie finally caved in to the pressure to celebrate our 16^th anniversary by going on a pheasant hunt with me – the first time in our 16 years of marriage. There was an ulterior motive here as well – since she’s a co-owner of the Uplanders Warehouse business with me, I figure it’s only going to serve us better the more she knows about upland bird hunting, and about the products we sell.

The day finally arrived! We packed up the truck and dogs Wednesday, 11/4 and drove to the small town of Mellette, SD (population 250) – about 20 miles south of Aberdeen on Highway 281 – a 12 hour drive from our home in Montana. We rolled in around midnight, found our lodge, unloaded our gear and went to bed. Shooting doesn’t start till 10am in South Dakota (noon for the first couple weeks of the season), so Thursday morning we slept in, then ate a late breakfast before we met our guide at the Mellette bar & grill (the only food in town). We spent the rest of the day hunting the fringes of fields that had yet to be cut – slough areas and fence lines. Did not kick up much at all – in fact, I didn’t fire a single shot on Day 1 – and I was seriously getting concerned that this much-anticipated South Dakota hunt was going to be a bust.

Montana Extremes. Hunt #4, Denton, MT

Emma posing next to the truck. We couldn't find any birds to enhance the picture on this day.

Exactly 7 days after the 20 degree pheasant opener, I headed back to north-central Montana to explore a new area – but this time is was 80 degrees and not even the slightest breeze – a bit too warm in my opinion. I took my 12 year old daughter along on this hunt (my son caught a cold on the opener and stayed home). She took her hunter safety class back in September (along with my wife and 11 yr. old daughter – all passed!) – so she is now an officially licensed hunter. She was a bit nervous to be on her first hunt – and she is a bit of a worrier. I think she was afraid that she would accidentally shoot her dad and be stranded out in the middle of nowhere So, she decided to carry an unloaded shotgun around all day. She had some shells in her vest, but never loaded any in the gun. I didn’t pressure her on this – I knew she was worried and didn’t want to push her past her comfort level. First and foremost, I wanted to make sure she had a good time and a good first hunting experience. 

Turns out, her unloaded shotgun was just as effective as my loaded gun. We worked through a large Pheasants Forever piece of land north of Denton, MT that surrounds a stretch of Coffee Creek. It looked like great bird country, but we didn’t find much – only kicked up

A very cold Montana Pheasant Opener. Hunt #3 – Malta, MT

Dylan with Cora and a couple nice roosters. If it weren't for the birds, he wouldn't be smiling. It was a cold day.

My third trip out for the season was October 10th – the pheasant opener here in Montana. It was a balmy weekend – high of 20 degrees with a solid 20 mph wind all day long. My son and I made the trip up to the Bowdoin wildlife refuge outside of Malta, MT on the recommendations of a couple guys in our Pheasants Forever chapter here in Bozeman. Only 2 days prior, our high temp was around 85 – talk about extremes. I took my 14 yr old son (Dylan) along and we wore out some tread on our boots looking for birds. Being new to the area, we were going off what others had to say about the place – “stick to the cattails.” Well, that’s easier said than done. We pushed through some tall, thick cover trying to kick up a bird or two. We finally had some success and bagged a single bird. If I had to work that hard for all my birds, I think I’d rather starve to death But we also had a couple long-distance flushes and watched the birds fly into a small grove of Russian olive trees. We pursued and

Cora the Wonder Dog. Hunt #2 – Lower Shields Valley, MT

Cora the Wonder Dog - as in, it's a Wonder she didn't kill herself

On my second outing looking for sharptail and huns, my wife went to a different area in the Shields Valley and had what amounted to a wonderful walk through the fall-colored hills and chalked it up to great exercise - we didn’t kick up a single bird. The highlight of the night was the rib dinner at the Wilsall Cafe afterwards – excellent food and great service.  If you ever find yourself driving through Wilsall on highway 89, it is worth the stop.

There was a brief moment of excitement on the hunt I should mention though. My youngest shorthair (Cora) gave us quite a scare. She had followed what I believe was deer scent up a hill, and took a different path back down the hill – running full speed off a 15 ft. cliff. My heart absolutely sank as I witnessed this whole thing unfolding. It was like a car accident you see coming, but are powerless to prevent. Cora didn’t exactly stick the landing – she bounced and rolled down some loose shale but didn’t skip a beat. As soon as she got her feet back under her, she kept on running as if nothing ever happened. I called her in and gave her a thorough checkup, couldn’t find anything wrong, and turned her loose again to beat the bushes. Weeks later, there are still no ill-effects from the fall.  Tough dog!

We did see several deer and antelope and other game – just no birds. My source who typically bow-hunts for big game in this area tells me he usually kicks up some sharptails and has seen huns in there several times as well. The area looked birdy, but they were nowhere to be found on this particular day. I’m sure I’ll take another walk through here though – it has all the right cover and signs of producing some birds.

Given that this was a shorter trip and less-intense hunt, I didn’t wear a vest at all, but strapped on a Browning Belted Game Bag. This is a wonderful option for warm-weather hunts where you don’t need a ton of bird capacity (my wife was wearing a Columbia Grouse X II Comfort Vest, so I figured I could load her up if needed I also had on a Browning Prairielands shirt (tan w/ blaze) and some jeans with Filson Single-Tin chaps. I love the protection that the Tin chaps provide, but they can get a bit warm and sweaty on warmer days. We didn’t get into too thick of cover, and I thought about pulling them off and throwing them in my wife’s gamebag, but the Single Tin Chaps don’t have the zipper on the leg, so I would have had to take the boots off, etc. Too much work, so I just sweated it out.

A bad day hunting is still better than most. Hunt #1, Shields Valley, MT

Two of my daughters (on the left) and their friend came along to serve as additional bird dogs. Not quite effective as the 4-legged kind, but they had a lot of fun.

As usual, I’ve neglected my blogging for the past month or so. I’ve got a good excuse though – I’ve been too busy hunting!  Given that this is my first bird hunting season in the great state of Montana, I’ve had to do some exploring. I have successfully found birds, but been less successful at bagging them. It’s been a fun process nonetheless.

Sharptails, sage grouse and huns all opened back on September 1. The sage grouse have had a rough last couple years, and numbers are down, so I have not targeted them (not to mention that they supposedly taste a bit gamey – but I can’t confirm that, just a rumor). I had a buddy circle an area on a map (Shields Valley area north of Livingston, MT) and I went out a few weeks ago looking for sharptails (sharpies) and hungarian partridge (huns). I tried to stick to the draws and coulees

The Tanner Family Pheasant Project

Just after hatching, our chicks in Rubbermaid bin

The kids and I have been doing a little pheasant project the last couple months.  We have a small GQF Hovabator incubator and bought some pheasant eggs to hatch.  Memorial day weekend, we hatched 37 chicks.  We’ve since lost 2, so we’re sitting at 35 chicks now that just turned 4 weeks old.  There is some land not far from here where we plan to release them and see if they can’t survive – at least till hunting season  

We typically hatch something each year.  When we lived in Texas – and even Utah, it was quail.  We can fit many more quail eggs in the incubator than pheasant eggs, and it was more fun having more birds around.

But the rules in Montana are different, and according to the Fish & Wildlife department, we can’t release quail here (they wouldn’t survive the winters here anyway).  But there are no problems with releasing pheasants, so our bird of choice this year was a no brainer.  I think we’ll try Chukars next though – as they are legal to release in MT as well, and I’ve never tried hatching them before.  Let me know if you have any good Chukar egg sources.

One problem has come up though.  On a recent walk on the land where we plan to release the birds, we saw a family of foxes.  Mom, dad and several kits.  My thoughts now are that our birds would last maybe a week – and would be quite the delicacy for the fox family.  Usually, a little predator control would solve the problem, but I don’t think my kids would let me back in the house if I exterminated a few cute little foxes.  So, I’m currently looking for a new home.  Fact is, I’m sure there would be predators on any piece of land I could release the birds on.  It’s just that I’ve seen these foxes and know that they’re there.  Maybe I’ll just keep these birds in the backyard and use them for dog training.  At least then I get to eat them instead of our local fox family

Local Characters

Doc Bradford's recent newspaper ad

I’m involved in my local chapter of Pheasants Forever (Gallatin Valley PF), and have met many great people as a result of this association.  In fact, I’ll be chairing our annual banquet/fundraiser next February if anyone is interested in sponsoring.  Anyway, one of the guys that sits on our PF committee is Doc Bradford.  Doc’s a Michigan man who moved to Montana to retire 7 years ago.  He got into shooting clay targets in his 50’s, and has since gone overboard.  He’s a certified shooting instructor and has built a 9-station sporting clays course on his 80 acres of Gallatin River-front property.  We just hosted a “thank you” event for this past year’s PF banquet sponsors at his place, and I must say his place is really incredible – but only if you like shooting and fishing and the beauty of nature   Doc is about to open his range up to the public – Rising Spirits Sporting Clays is the name of his new business.  I’ll have plenty of opportunity to get to know Doc and his range much better as I hope to be involved in the sporting clays league he is about to launch. 

 

I’ll keep you posted on Doc and his venture – as well as my performance in the sporting clays league – in future posts.

 

I also received an email from a customer (Chris Pfadt) who bought some Crackshot Snake Chapz several weeks ago.  I noticed his Three Forks, MT address when we shipped the order (just up the road from where we live in Bozeman 30-40 miles) – and we’re practically neighbors (by Montana standards).  Anyway, Chris sent me an email once he realized we were neighbors as well and invited me to come and check out his operation.  He runs the Grey Cliffs Ranch (www.greycliffsranch.com) – and after looking at the website, I had to wipe the drool off my chin.  They’ve got upland hunting and trout fishing – and even some big game opportunities by the looks of it – all in a spectacular location.  I can’t wait to get out there and check out his ranch.  At the rate I’m going, I’ll never be able to afford hunting there – but it will be fun to go take a tour.  I might need to bring my own snake protection though – apparently Chris is on a search and destroy mission for rattler dens.

Meeting new people and other upland businesses is a fun benefit of meeting people through Uplanders Warehouse.  I’ll continue to post more businesses and interesting people as I encounter them!

Grey Cliffs Ranch

It’s all about the cup holders…

I find it amusing when people comment about how many cupholders a vehicle has when shopping for some new wheels.  This feature doesn’t even come close to the top of my priority list when evaluating a car or truck.  

 

Yet, I hear the exact same comments when people are shopping for a new hunting vest (“I like how it has two water bottle holders…”). I hear other people comment on the size of the game bag being the most important feature.  I’ve also heard that front-loading bird vests are an absolute must.  Then there are those who will only wear the traditional style and won’t give a strap vest a second-look.  So I thought I would throw these questions out to you and get your feedback.  What are the most important features of a good hunting vest in your opinion?  Take the poll below and share your opinions!

“Bird Camp” Canvas Tents

I grew up sleeping in a Springbar brand tent.  I still own a Springbar and absolutely love them – they are nearly indestructible (trust me, I have 4 kids).  I’ve slept many nights in my Springbar, through rain and snow storms, and severe winds – and made it through unscathed in all kinds of sketchy weather. 

 

So I was a little skeptical when Aaron Hill – a good friend of mine – told me he was going to get into the tent business and build a tent that’s better than a Springbar tent.  But sure enough, he’s done it.  Not so coincidentally, his new tents have the same basic frame technology as the Springbar tents.  But he has upgraded and added several features to his tents that I like much better than the Springbar tents.  Aaron called his company Kodiak Canvas Tents and has now been in the tent business for a few years.  You can get his Kodiak Canvas tents in several different retail outlets now as well (Cabelas, Sportsmans Warehouse, etc.) – but obviously I prefer if you buy it from Uplanders Warehouse  

 

He’s been bugging me for a while telling me I need to sell his tents on Uplanders.com.  I kept resisting, thinking that it wasn’t really a product that bird hunters would use.  Well, this past fall, guess who I went hunting with, and guess what we slept in?  We called it “bird camp.”  Turned out to be a great hunt in central Utah chasing chukkars around and up and down mountains.   Given that I actually used his tents on a bird hunt, I could no longer argue that the product wasn’t for bird hunters.

 

So now I offer them to you.  Kodiak Canvas tents truly are wonderful tents.  Being an owner of both a Springbar and a Kodiak Canvas tent, I have to tip my hat to Aaron and his tents – in my unbiased opinion (still being a Springbar lover), he has a better tent.

 

Mind you, these tents are not backpacking tents.  These are serious “bird camp” (or deer camp if you prefer) tents – or what other call “base camping” tents.  The materials used (heavy-duty canvas) are not light by any means.  Which is partly why you feel so safe and secure when sleeping in them – they are the ultimate heavy-duty tent. 

Family Fish & Game Magazine

You may have noticed that there are some new articles in The Roost section of Uplanders Warehouse (www.uplanders.com).  We just did a deal with Family Fish & Game magazine where they are providing us with some new articles for our Roost and we are promoting their magazine.  They also provided us with a special offer for Uplanders Warehouse customers – only $9.95 for 12 issues of their magazine.  Being a family man with a wife and 4 kids, I think it’s a great publication.  There is a little in there for all of us – and I’ve noticed my kids enjoy reading through it (and looking at the pictures as much as I do.  I think you can see by the few articles we’ve posted that the magazine has some quality writers.

 

While I pulled out a few articles that were upland related, the magazine covers all types of hunting and fishing.  And like myself, I’m betting that birds are only one of the many species you hunt.  Give it a look, and give the magazine a try.  I’m betting you get more value out of it than the $9.95 it will cost you for a full year.