I continue to count my blessings with each outing........Record Quail numbers, The late Dove season kicks in on Saturday this week, and we finally have some Ducks on the place following the year's first cold snaps......

Trying my best to consume it all , probably won't see this combination of birds , habitat and climate again in my life....

Bird numbers have me playing with more guns than normal for me.....Chance to use different ones on lots of shooting opportunities lets one form pretty conclusive opinions on personal preferences.....

With all that , I find not much has changed relative to guns and loads, but I tend to find myself with relatively lighter guns for Quail than in past seasons...Shooting percentages are holding up surprisingly well thru these changes....

I'll get some pics hopefully, but shooting alone mainly ,I put more emphasis on dog work/training than photography...

Are you hunting Sandhill Crane in your parts? We were on property near Big Spring for a number of years, and often the Crane hunting was quite good. I too am often hunting alone, but have gotten in the habit of taking the camera/phone into the field, as I much prefer photos afield as opposed the typical tailgate shot back at camp. Mike

So glad to.read of your continued success with birds this year. I can tell that you realize what a blessing it is to have those numbers twice straight. I really enjoy your posts and pics, and look forward to seeing more great scenes on the ranch. Hopefully I can get out to hunt somewhere in Texas one season and experience it for myself, even if it isn't a banner year when I make it.

SRH

Mel5141:
My wife and I are recently retired - at least partially for me. We are looking at places a little warmer than Wisconsin for the winter months and really do not care for Florida. Can you give me some suggestions in West Texas for nicer places to stay for 4-8 weeks at a time. It would really be nice to hunt and shoot clays in temperatures about 15oF with less than 2 feet of snow. I just passed on a late season grouse hunt here because we are suppose to have wind chills at -20oF. That's tough on the fingers, toes and dog.

From yesterday:



Dogs on the ground for six and one half hours. Twelve coveys. Lots of single points. Just me and the dogs.

I'm with you Mel. Very grateful for the birds these seasons.

° symbols can be done on computers or iPhones if you are under the age of 12.:)

On a iPhone tap then hold 0. Then slide finger up and towards the left to display a ° symbol.

On computers it varies by operating system. Hold down Alt and type 248 then release Alt key. To place F immediately after ° symbol just use shift F like you are capitalizing normally. Macs are different which is no great surprise. Use to be shift option 8. Now you can do it with emoji symbol function. But as a man I try not to get in touch with my emoji side of my self.

These are from my shooting student Cy. I have also mentored him on bird dog training, quail hunting, and field trialing. Cy has been an apt student as you can see.





Cy took these birds on his West Texas birdlease this season. I will send him a link to this thread.

Nice work with the Fox Mike......
Looks like those poor pups with no, or abbreviated, tails got you in the right place at the right time.......
I have talked to a lot of Bird hunters State wide and I understand we have the BEST of it here on the Southern Rolling Plains......A fairly well known Quail Biologist/Researcher in my neighborhood reports Record numbers of Covey contacts on a lease near Big Spring, 60+ in one day for his party a couple of weeks ago.

Yesterday was indeed a great afternoon. I had checked the weather and decided to try to get the Girls out for a run.
Year end business kept me in town much later than I had hoped. But I was determined to get them out, so in spite of my late start (I opened the door to the dog rig at 4:08 pm)and was in birds immediately. 4 dogs down at once is organized chaos with these bird numbers, but I wanted all to get some action.

One covey find ran into another and never slacked up. Shooting and dead bird pick up was punctuated with additional points for a solid hour plus....Keeping the dog rig caught up with the action was my biggest challenge.....Counting coveys was impossible as one ran into multiple others.
I twice had two dogs in sight pointed on separate coveys simultaneously 100-200 yards apart.....

I pocketed the 15th bird of a limit at 5:16 pm.... 68 minutes...... Too fast to totally digest it all.....

Nature will return us to normal all too quickly......But I'm going to relish it while I can....

I'm glad the birds are thick down there Paul! Sounds like my idea of heaven. Thanks for the reports and please keep 'em coming.



Best,

Mike

Tom--The problem with hunting in TX is that most private ground is leased. Often by deer hunters; sometimes by deer hunters who don't bird hunt, so the bird hunting can be "subleased" from them or you can still lease from the owner directly. Often done by a group of bird hunters. If you find one of those deer leases where they don't hunt birds, that works out pretty well for winter quail hunting. Deer season closes at the end of the year (or used to), which still leaves several weeks to hunt quail--that likely haven't been hunted up to that point. But if you're looking for places to hunt quail on public land, OK/NM/AZ are all better bets. Although especially in NM and AZ, the quail numbers likely won't be what you'd find in TX in a year like this one. I hunted the OK Panhandle last year, and quail numbers were very good. I think more public land opportunities there than TX.

lads, those are Sand hill Cranes , right?..how do they taste?
A little gritty,lol?
He looks a bit like "Moth Man"
franc

Sand Hill Crane = flying tenderloin...Geo

What a great mixed bag Mike! I have no idea what crane tastes like, but it looks like something fun to figure out.

I was not kidding. Filet the two sides of the breast out and then treat it just like a pair of steaks...Geo

Thanks for the report. It sounds like a year for the ages.

I took the Dogs out again this afternoon, Great day, perfect weather and great scenting conditions.....

In birds from the start, and finished up again in just a bit over an hour.....I shot only one bird per rise ( no attempts to double) in an effort to stretch the outing ....

Had fine dog work from all the gals, and some DANDY cripple recovery by the youngster.

We have not lost a bird in several outings, and not because I have been stoning them in mid air every time, but rather tenacious dead bird work by all of them......

I shot them pretty classy for an old guy, taking the 15 bird limit with 18 shots....I have been surprised at how well the shooting has gone considering how much I am paying attention to the dog work.
A lot of factors come into play when you have a good outing (shooting wise) on wild birds. Yesterday conditions were just as good and I took the 15 with 23 shots and was Very satisfied...... Today, the stars aligned right and it pushed the average up....

Today was my second best shooting in 22 Quail outings this season..... I can only hope it holds out for the late season as well, I would consider that a Perfect Christmas present....

I wouldn't be surprised to hear of a 15 for 15, with the Fabbri, anytime now.

SRH

Stan , strangely enough this work is NOT with the Fabbri ......

I have been shooting a great deal with a 28 bore Piotti SxS ( it weighs a little less than the Fabbri ), and my records show I average a good deal better with it.....Although neither approaches the averages of my long time staple, a 20 ga. Browning OU.

I had 73 Quail outings last year and scored only one 15 x 15 , Oh yeah, my country boy side came out, I did it with a 16 ga. plain barrel Model 1100.......Them Remington repeaters are Damn sho Bird guns brother......

Those birds eat just as good killed with a 1100 as with a Hartmann & Weiss.

That's awesome gun work, whatever the gun.

SRH

Great season and shooting. 15 out 18 wouldn't be embarrassing on "boot and shoot" bobs much less wild ones. Gil

Stan, I recall in reading up on the late Coffeeville MS. Quail hunting legend John P. Bailey and seeing that he started with Model 12's graduated to doubles, and moved to a Remington auto 12 in mid life.
It appears to be a Model 58 with barrel bobbed and a standard Poly-Choke installed.....

His detailed records compiled over 50+ years of Quail shooting note quote "highest percentage gun, Auto Remington 12"

Pictures show him with the gun in the mid 50's shortly after the model's introduction....

Known to some of us as "rib eye in the sky." Smart, tough, and mean. A cripple can turn your dog into the same with that stiletto beak. I don't let Cocoa near them, though she has tried to haul some in. In our area, the only deeks that worked were full body taxidermy mounts. Most interesting aspect to me is their call, which can be heard from incredible distances. Frozen in your blind, you think they are right on top of you and you crane your neck (sorry ) to get a look for the shot and they're still a thousand yards off.

You need a crane endorsement on your license (no extra charge), lead is allowed and they are not considered waterfowl but are definitely migratory: I believe the ones we hunt come to Texas all the way from Siberia. My friend Milton claims he's seen several banded that said "I wasn't born in Texas, but I got here as soon as I could."

My son several years ago with his first:

I've never shot Cranes in the US, but they migrate through the area of Saskatchewan where I hunt ducks and geese every Fall. The big white ones (Whoopers) migrate through at the same time and are protected. Whole areas are posted for crane closure when the whites are around...Geo

Plenty of Sandhills around south Ga; I heard a flock in my parking lot yesterday afternoon. Looked up and saw about 25. No season down here.