Member
Joined: 23 Nov 2005
Posts: 435
Location: Illinois (in the burbs of St. Louis)
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Gentlemen:
Sorry for the delay, but posting the final hunt day report from my Russell Kansas Trip. Enjoy - I did 
Day 4 – Monday December 17th
I ate dinner Sunday night at the Fossil Station across the street from the Day Inn – still 10 inches plus of snow on the ground, but roads clearing nicely. After dinner I returned to my hotel room and got out Ms. Elsie (1946 LC Smith, 16 gauge featherweight, 28 inch barrels, Orlen chokes 0.07 and 0.010, Craig Libhart stock repair with period finish and leather pad) and the paper hull reloads in anticipation of Konner picking me up at 8:30 am on Monday morning. I will mention here that these paper hull loads are primed Cheddite paper hulls from Grafs (I bought 5000), 7/8 ounce 6s or 4s, Cheddite SG16 wads, small 28 gauge fiber wad in SG16, and 15.5 grains green dot (use at your own risk). I had everything ready at 8:30 am when Konner showed up with Addie and Tommie in the crates in the back of his truck. Konner helped me load up and then said that we would hunt out west then north of Russell on his family’s property and we pulled out. Skies overcast and temps in the mid-20s as we pulled out of the Days Inn parking lot. After a 20 minute ride we pulled up to the side of the road with a plum thicket about 25 yards off the road at the south corner of a wheat field (all snow covered of course). I got out, loaded up Ms. Elsie and hiked over the snow bank at the roadside ditch and out to the edge of the plum thicket (seeing pheasant tracks in the snow into and out of the thicket as I hiked up to the edge of it). Konner loaded up (he shoots an Ithaca semi-auto in 20 gauge – pretty engraving on this gun) and let Tommie and Addie out and they quickly bounded into the plum thicket. I saw Addie snap around then up comes a rooster right in front of me (10 feet in) and up comes Ms. Elsie and bang – clean miss. I saw the shot go right over the back of the rooster with a pattern of about 10 inches in diameter (good thing I did not hit the bird – nothing would be left). I let the rooster get out about 25 yards and shot with the second barrel (7/8 ounce 4s) and dropped the bird instantly. Addie bounded out of the thicket and retrieved to hand to Konner. Konner and I spoke quietly and he took the right side of the thicket and I the left – Tommie and Addie in the middle (the thicket was about 10 yards wide and 25 long, oblong in shape). As I turned the corner I heard Konner call “rooster” and looked up to see one streaking over my head about 15 yards up and heading for the creek bottom about ½ mile away. I shouldered Ms. Elsie swung through the bird and dropped him at the shot (6s in the right barrel). Two birds down – hunting 5 minutes. This bird cascaded out into the wheat field and “flumped” into the snow – only the tips of his tail showing above the snow. Addie bounded out and retrieved to hand. While doing so, Tommie flushed 2 more roosters and they flew out too far from us and into some trees along a ditch at the end of the field. Konner and I noted this and hiked on down there. I again took the left side along a ditch beside a field road leading to some oil pumps about a half mile away. Tommie quickly charged hard into some downed branches at the base of a tree and a rooster flushed on my side right in front of me and again I tried to shoot at about 15 feet and missed right over the top and then dropped the rooster with the 4s at about 20 yards right in the field road. Addie retrieved again (she doesn’t like Tommie to get her birds) and while she was taking the rooster to Konner another rooster flushed about 15 yards in front of me and I wisely waited and dropped the bird with the 6s at about 25 yards again in the snow-covered field road. Four roosters (the Kansas limit) and I had fired 6 shots in less than 30 minutes. A GREAT hunt! We hiked down the ditch to the end and flushed about 8 more roosters – almost all on my side or too far out so no shots for Konner. As we reached the end of the wooded ditch we met, discussed our options, noted some heavy deer trails coming out of the creek bottom into a milo field across the main road, and then hiked the field road about ½ mile back to the County Road and the truck. Konner and I loaded up the dogs and decided that we would move out north of Russell to another property where there was food plot and we thought we might find roosters for Konner and a covey of quail. Little did we know that another exciting adventure was to begin shortly.
Konner and I drove up the road to the north – noting many roosters and rabbits in the bushes and thickets along the road, crossed I-70 and soon turned down an unpaved, semi-plowed county road towards our destination. In about 10 minutes we topped a rise and I looked at some trees on my side of the road by a small spreader dam and Konner looked at some trees on some walk-in property on the left and we both exclaimed “chickens”. Konner stopped the truck and we noted quickly about 20 prairie chickens in small trees on both sides of the road – we were right in the middle of the covey. We quietly got out and Konner picked up his gun and loaded it and stepped into the weeds on the walk-in side of the road and I was grabbing shells while we discussed quietly our thoughts to try to get some of the 20 or so prairie chickens surrounding us – all of them about 45 yards away, tantalizingly looking at us. While we discussed a circling effort (no dogs) one of the chickens became unnerved and committed suicide – deciding flush out of the tree to fly right past Konner at about 20 yards passing over the road trying to cross the road to the rest of the covey (why did the chicken cross the road). Konner dropped the bird with one shot and all the birds flushed out of the trees all over. No more shots were offered and we watched many birds flap, flap, flap and glide to the horizon. Too Cool! Having never shot a prairie chicken, I was quite envious of the hen that Konner picked up. We admired the bird for about 20 minutes and discussed what we would do differently next time. After much congratulations, we loaded up and drove about 10 more minutes up to an oil derrick on the property we were to hunt – getting out to hunt the food plot and plum thickets.
Once we got out of the truck at this third spot, we looked down the hill toward the food plot and saw several roosters run into a large plum thicket. We headed down there with the dogs (about 150 yards through 10 inches of snow) and when we got within about 75 yards a startled flock of starlings flew into the thicket and then out and MANY roosters and hens busted loose. Konner and I figured we saw at least 50 pheasants flush out – all too far to shoot. We slogged in the rest of the way, but all were gone – flying over the hill. We checked out 2 more plum thickets at this site, but there were coyote tracks around both and then Konner saw the coyote at about 150 yards slip into a draw. He gave us the slip too. After this we drove back into Russell and ate lunch at Subway.
In the afternoon we switched gears and chased some geese, but they eluded us.
I packed up in the evening and drove back home on Tuesday – stopping at Cabelas and eating lunch at Famous Daves in Kansas City.
A great trip. I cannot wait to go back on the 4th of January (this Friday) for my second trip. |
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good shooting.....
Dr. 16 Gauge |
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