Terry Knebel brought out his shorthair, Sadie and his buddy Roger Well brought his lab, Camo out for a quail hunt. First we did a little pigeon and quail work with Camo trying to get her a little bird crazy. Then I put some quail coveys around the Clubhouse Field. Sadie did a great job finding and pointing the birds and Camo helped finding the singles and retrieving.
Phil Hocher came out with his grandson, Ben, and young Boykin Spaniel, Jake to get him in front of some more quail. We let the first quail fly in hopes for Jake to chase the bird, getting him a little more excited about birds. If you watch closely you can see this quail fly all the way to treeline and then get plucked out of the air by a Coopers hawk. Things got better after that Phil and Jake got all of the remaining birds and picked up a bonus pheasant.
Brad Diecker set up a hunt with his buddies, Soap Chan and Chad Welch. Brad brought along his pointer, Lincoln, to help Jeff Powell and his pups find the pheasant and chukar I stashed around the Clubhouse Field. Lincoln joined the group for the first round of birds, but took a nap for the rest of the hunt. They still did fine leaving only a single chukar and pheasant left in the field.
The Cumberland Chapter of the Quail and Upland Game Alliance held their annual youth pheasant hunt at Sandy Run Hunt Co. on January 28th. Almost forty kids participated in the hunt, shooting at nearly 700 clay targets and more than 80 pheasant. Except for a fairly strong wind the weather was picture perfect. This year the QUGA chapter bought all the birds for the hunt, getting the price per hunter down to just $10. The hunters ate all the chili I made and a pile of hotdogs. Most of the hunters were able to knock down at least one bird and if not they all went home with a door prize, full stomach and few less shells.
Bill Warix and Alan Feezel came out with their two shorthairs, Whip and Harley to hunt some pheasant. I set out a few birds in the Clubhouse Field and then a bunch down in the East Bottom Field. The wind got the birds up and moving, but Bill and Alan had a bunch of opportunities and picked up some bonus quail.
Kevin Diekroeger came out with his pair of dog, Ina and Penny for a quail hunt. I set out a few extra birds and picked up my gun to help with the harvest. Some decent dog work and some good and bad shooting, I shot a limb in half trying to nail a bird flying through the trees.
Terry Knebel set up a quail hunt for his buddy Jack Levy and shorthair, Sadie. I set some quail coveys around the Clubhouse Field, trying to get them out of the strong west wind. Jack claimed a lack of recent upland bird hunting, but he didn’t miss more than a couple of shots.
Dale Timmermann came out to hunt some upland game birds with his son-in-law Greg Triphahn. Travis Devall brought out his pair of setters, Zip and Patches to find the birds spread out around the Clubhouse Field. They picked a nice afternoon and some great rises and good shots.
Dean and Travis Devall brought out their new pointers, Cy and Sadie, along with the old lab, Peaches a chukar hunt. Dean’s daughter, Karey Courson, her two boys, Blaze and Blake, and husband, David came along to help with the harvest. Lots of birds in the air and a lot of orange on the ground, so nice chukar action in this video.
John Cavaletto picked a nice day to bring up his English Pointer, Burl for some quail hunting. I tried a new method of releasing single birds into the Clubhouse Field and it worked well. Burl was able to find all the birds randomly flown around the field plus some extras.