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Throughout the pheasant hunting season, roosters can provide a bit of predictability for hunters seeking consistent upland action. Knowing the habitat and the daily movements these birds make can help with finding and intercepting these wily birds, and make connecting with them a more regular occurrence. Identifying the habitat types that roosters use on a given day, and how they move between them is an important piece to the upland hunting puzzle. Typically, roosters will run on a normal schedule, not unlike hunters the other five days of the week. They move with the approach of dawn, seeking food and grit out of whatever overnight habitat they were hunkered down in. That's why it's not unusual to see roosters out in open fields of just harvested corn or soybeans, scratching around for the leftovers and filling up for the day. They'll utilize light cover along side these fields for protection and will return to it if the day is a mild one.
In those grasses, consisting of brome, bluestem, wildflower plantings or other lighter cover, pheasants can easily move and even cool off if the autumn afternoon heats up some. You may never have to explore heavier cover like cattails and brush if conditions stay temperate and pheasants are relating to grassy areas. Simply follow the breeze and let your dog do the work, paying close attention to any pinch points, pockets of grass that extend into fields and end there, or the break between grass and agriculture on the windward side. Odds are roosters will be there on those milder days.
If things get cold, windy, drizzly, or temperatures drop below freezing, pheasants may utilize heavy cover and stay put for quite a while -- limiting movement or feeding, especially later in the season, only coming out when things get warmest in the day and facilitate foraging. That means your adventures start in the deep stuff: cattail sloughs, stands of cane, willow thickets along swamps, or those well-planted shelterbelts containing plum, dogwood, or other thick bushes. These spaces provide areas where pheasants can hole up from wind, rain, ice and snow. While they may be a challenge to walk, they do provide a reliable scent trail for your dog to follow, as those pheasants often hole up against the elements for quite awhile in the hidey-holes created by low branches, growing grass, and reeds.
In the afternoon and evening, particularly that last hour of sunlight, often dubbed the "golden hour" roosters will be back on the move out of cover and back to areas of grit and food. Watch for them to move from that thicker cover or their loafing cover and back to the field or those gravel roads near agricultural spaces. If you can find a piece of public access land, state or federal acres, or any other space you can hunt that incorporates all of these things, you've found a mark-worthy place on your hunting map. Once you know how pheasants move between them, you'll know where to be for the best action.
By identifying areas of habitat now, understanding how and when pheasants utilize them most often, and how they move from deep cover, to light cover, to feeding areas, you can be a step ahead of any wily rooster. Keep those facts in mind to find more success for these great upland birds now at the start of the season and when conditions shift, driving them to different space. Odds are your journal entries will be a bit longer, your game vest a bit heavier, and your connection with fast upland action a whole lot more frequent.
-- Simonson is the lead writer and editor of Dakota Edge Outdoors.