Freelancing South Dakota Pheasants

I have said it before, and I will say it again. When there is snow on the ground and the sloughs are frozen, that is my favorite time of the year to hunt pheasants. This season we have had snow and freezing temps across the Midwest. So last weekend my father and I took advantage of the weather that has be absent the last couple hunting seasons to chase pheasants.
In an article, legendary outdoor writer Tony Dean said that South Dakota is the best place for hunters to pursue pheasants. With South Dakota having lots of pheasants and plenty of opportunities for hunters, I believe that Tony is right. My father and I both had a second five-day period available on our licenses so we chose to go back to Sodak.
Freelancing pheasants in South Dakota is like freelancing ducks in North Dakota. Basically there are birds all over the state and to be successful you have to be mobile. Knowing different areas is crucial, so we decided to hunt pheasants in an area we have never hunted for them in.
Our goal was to target cattails for the majority of our hunts. When the water beneath them is frozen, cattails provide excellent cover for late-season pheasants. Plus, it is cover that, for the most part, has just recently become accessible. I was hoping that hunters had overlooked these spots so far this season.
The two of us ended up hunting mostly Waterfowl Production Areas with the three labs we brought along. Waterfowl Production Areas or WPAs are public lands open to hunting that are purchased through Federal duck stamp dollars. These lands always have some form of water on them and are natural places to find cattails. Pheasant hunters have to remember that steel-shot is legally required on Waterfowl Production Areas.
My father and I ended up hunting Federal land, but the state of South Dakota has public land available to hunters as well. Most of the land I saw that was purchased by the state had food plots on it. South Dakota also has state funded Walk-In areas. These land plots are only accessible by foot, like the majority of public land. The state basically leases the land for the Walk-In areas from farmers, and opens the land up for public hunting. Pretty cool.
I feel that most hunters when freelancing just open up a public hunting map and say, ‘look at all the public land around here.’ Usually pointing out a few areas of concentration and suggest to others that they go there. These are places that I try to avoid. I don’t have any problems with putting on a few extra miles to avoid other hunters.
Blocking strategies for jumpy birds and dogs for finding birds that are holding are a must when hunting pheasants later in the season. We had the dogs, but we could have used some blockers. Still we were able to find a handful of roosters that were willing to hold in the snow and cold.
On our recent trip my father and I discovered that our new spot is a good one. It is always a pleasure to hunt with a good friend in a new area. Next season we are planning on going back and bringing a few more shooters. Now that we have hunted a few different areas, we know how to cover them the right way.
On the drive home from South Dakota I was pleasantly surprised by the number of pheasants my father and I spotted. We probably saw twenty-five birds feeding in cornfields while we were driving along I-90. The funny thing is that we didn’t spot a single one from the Interstate in South Dakota. I almost couldn’t believe that all the birds I saw were on the Minnesota side of our drive.

Dave's Band

I met Dave Easton in the fall of 2000 at the Phi Delta Theta fraternity house on the University of North Dakota campus in Grand Forks. Dave had a burning passion to pursue game in the outdoors and a Jeep. I had three-dozen mallard floaters and knowledge of waterfowl passed down from my father and relatives. Together we were poised to make a great team.
Dave grew up in Colorado were there was few opportunities for him to hunt ducks. His own father was more of an upland hunter who brought Dave to western Nebraska and local game farms to harvest pheasants. To this day I have yet to encounter an individual who was more excited to experience new ways to hunt and fish.
I was just a freshman and Dave was a sophomore. Before the duck season began on the prairie we had agreed that we would hunt together as much as possible together. Dave had hunted ducks the season before with a couple older guys in the Frat, who at the time rented a house off-campus. These older Phi’s were kind enough to allow the two of us to store our firearms and the decoys at there home.
It was a time in my life that I will always remember. I was 19 years old, living on my own for the first time, making new friends, just forty-five minutes East of some of the best duck hunting in the Central flyway. If I could re-live one duck season, it would be my first fall in North Dakota.
On weekdays Dave and I would leave the UND campus in the early afternoon, after our classes were completed. Once the guns were picked up, yours truly would be riding shotgun in the Jeep, while we coasted west down highway 2 towards the prairie-potholes.
Whether or not you that have traveled down highway 2 to from Grand Forks, I will give you my re-cap. You pass the Grand Forks airport, then the Grand Forks Air Force Base, Turtle River state park, and the ‘big fan’ bridge just before Petersburg. Once you cross the bridge have left the Red River valley and are now in the prairie-potholes.
Those afternoons Dave and I would just drive around and jump shoot ducks. Gas was cheap, and I had never seen any place like it. It seemed as though every slough contained birds. Coming from Minnesota where my childhood hunts were mostly filled with ‘empty skies,’ I thought that I was in paradise.
Dave, the Colorado kid, none the wiser, was thoroughly enjoying hunting plentiful game with a new friend. Every turn on those dusty gravel roads contained new experiences for the both of us. Species of ducks, first doubles, triples, leg bands and the bag limits that had eluded me through my early years of waterfowl hunting were found.
On the weekends Dave and I would occasionally wake up before daybreak and set out decoys on several small potholes that we had become fond of. We rarely shot our limits over these sets, but we enjoyed seeing the sunrises that many of our fellow college students missed.
Back on campus Dave and I would clean plump mallards, gadwalls, teal and the occasional diver in the girl’s bathroom of the Frat house. This is also where we cleaned the perch and northern we pulled through the ice in the wintertime. In the kitchen we would mix duck breasts with any spices we could find and share them with our Frat brothers.
Our good friend Phil Bettenburg occasionally joined us on our duck hunts and the three of us go on a fishing trip every summer to this day. In the latter years of college Dave and I discovered field hunting for ducks and geese, and many new hunting partners. Some experienced, some not. By the time we both graduated and parted ways we had learned a ton about waterfowl hunting through experience and others.
Towards the end we did not hunt as much together as I would have liked. Goals and opinions changed, and educations needed to be completed in the classroom, not just the outdoors. Everything is good, but I would not trade those memories of the carefree early years for anything.
On one crisp October afternoon Dave shot a nice drake mallard just west of Petersburg, North Dakota. I, being a good friend and the one with waders on, retrieved the bird for him. To my surprise it was banded! At that time I had only seen two other banded birds harvested.
That mallard was banded in North Dakota at the J. Clark Wildlife Refuge. It was 12 years old when it met its fate at the hand of Dave’s steel 2s. Traveling up and down the flyway on that old North Dakota bird, the Avise bird band is a great memento and a true jewel. Dave’s band now hangs on my lanyard, and I think about those days every time I glance down at it. Dave gave it to me because he says that he never cared as much about the band as I did. He was more into mental aspects of the hunt, memories and experiences.