Busy day, just not on birds

The pheasant opener is this Saturday so folks whose dogs are here for training are trickling in to begin the hunt.  In the last two days, 4 dog training clients with 6 additional ’sidekicks’ arrived to briefly pursue sharptails and huns prior to the pheasant opener.  They hunt on their own as I do not guide folks up here. 

I’m here to work on training dogs and would not take advantage of the land owners (block management) by guiding on their place.  I do have clients who are more friends than clients and will hunt my personal dogs with them just as anyone else would do with a friend.

After sorting through my clients hunting maps, I determined that two parties needed to visit the region 7 office in Miles City (Town of Lonesome Dove fame if you’ve seen the movie or read the book).  Twice this year clients have had to go to the region 7 office because the region … mailed out upland bird habitat enhancement maps instead of block management maps.  Both times folks had to go to the region 7 office to get the correct books.  I guess I need to call the regional office there and explain what is happening.  Anyway, they received their block management maps and stopped by the BLM office next door to pick up Dept of Interior maps to accompany the aforementioned map…something I strongly recommend.

Bird numbers are high this year and a great number of folks are coming up which means increased pressure on the birds.  The sharpies are getting wise and flushing out of gun range and the huns fly like they’ve been on the Marion Jones / Barry Bonds ‘BALCO’ plan for the last 5 years.

Many folks forget that Eastern Montana is one of the friendliest places on earth and often farmers will let you hunt if you’ll just ask permission EACH YEAR and respect their land. 

I’ll share some of the beefs farmers and ranchers have up here.  I’ll use the pronoun ‘you’ but am not directing it at anyone but the violaters. 

• You get permission this year in person and don’t get permission next year yet you’ll hunt anyway, like you have lifetime permission.  Listen, farming and ranching varies from year to year.  Maybe they don’t want you in pasture ‘A’ anymore or maybe they’ve leased their rights over the summer or maybe you were a slob and broke his fences and left spent shells and sandwich wrappers everywhere.
• You kill birds you don’t clean.  That really chips folks beef!  If that’s you, don’t come!  They don’t like you.
• Leave your bird cleaning debris all over the place with the idea that “It’s biodegradeable, it won’t hurt anything”.  If that’s you, don’t do it!
• Kill a bunch of birds, clean them but you really don’t want them so you ‘belly up to the local bar’ and try giving them away to the locals.  That really chips their beef.  That’s waste.  You shot something you didn’t need or want, even if you did clean it!  Sad part about it is you really thought you were doing the ‘locals’ a favor.
• You break a fence, leave a gate open, drive in a muddy area that common sense would tell you not to drive in it.  Worse, you don’t fix what you broke or worse, you rut up the farmers dirt roads that he uses to get crops / livestock in and out of the field.  Now you get stuck.  You have the audacity to retrieve the farmer with his tractor to get you out.  You slip him a 20 and think you’ve paid him fairly.  Try adding some zeros to the 20 because now he’s has to get a dozer or maintainer or box blade or whatever to fix the road you just screwed up.  To complicate matters, as if they aren’t complicated enough,  you didn’t pay attention to your map and went through a gate onto someone elses property and rutted up their road.  Now farmer ‘A’ is the friends with Farmer ‘B’ but you just through a monkey wrench into their lifetime relationship AFTER you’ve gone.  Gee thanks.
• You breast out your birds and toss the legs.  That’s a violation in many states including here in Montana.  I’ve got some terrific recipes for leg meat, don’t throw away good meat as that is ‘wanton waste’.
• You get testy with a participating block management owner and act as if you have a right to be on their land.  WRONG.  It’s their land and they do NOT give up their rights as a land owner to have you on their land. 

That’s a few of the many problems that are encountered up here.  Hope that this article simply reinforces that you are a good hunter.  If any of these resemble you or someone you hunt with, you aren’t popular with farmers and ranchers I assure you.

Ok, ok, I’m off my soap box.  Please, when someone tells you the bird populations are good don’t take that as a sign that you are going to be able to come up here for a shoot like they do in South America.  It’s still hunting and you can have bad days.  Just a few days ago we didn’t find but a few birds as the weather pattern changed suddenly.  The hunt and enjoyment of your bird dog afield is what it is all about.  The kill is anti-climatic.

 Y’all have fun this year and please, give that Brittany a treat for me. 

Dave

P.S.

Don’t forget that telling your dog ”attaboy” is really appreciated.  He works hard for you desiring your constant approval.  He has no idea whether you’re liked or disliked by your fellow humans