Enjoyed 3 days of hunting wild bobwhites in southwest GA. We were hunting cut-over longleaf/wiregrass land bordering cropland. The conditions ranged from frigid to pleasant... Windy and dry all 3 days. The dog work was less than stellar. We had 8 dogs total... My 2 Brits, 2 GSPs, 1 pointer, 1 setter, 1 musterlander.
Day one produced 3 nice coveys and a harvest of 8 birds.
Day two produced 2 coveys (1/2 day hunt) and 0 bird harvested.
Day three gave us 4 coveys and 4 birds in the bag.
The guns used varied.... I used my Plantation Grade 410 from Dickinson Arms as well my Beretta Silver Pigeon II 20ga. My hunting partners used a lightweight 12-bore by Thomas Turner, a 16-bore Fox Sterlingworth, a 16-bore LC Smith (not sure which model), and a 16-bore Arrieta Orvis Uplander sidelock.
Getting 'em started young!
Some of you Southern bird hunters should recognize this plant. This is partridge pea... one the best plants for quail (food in the winter and brood rearing cover in summer). We used to have a plot of it here and when they logged off the longleaf pines, the plot exploded into the biggest patch of partridge pea I ever seen. A covey of bobwhites is always nearby.
My brittany, Copper with some remnant longleaf pines in the background.
My Beretta 20ga with the harvest from the first hunt.
Copper and Rusty with the bag.
I was wondering why the longleafs were cut. Thanks for the explanation as they didn't look that big and obviously weren't in a program. The absolute best woodcock hunting on private land that I hunt was surrounded by 1000 acres of woods. Just six months ago, the owner clear cut it for chip wood to export to Europe out of our port. As a result, it affected the 500 acres we hunt to the extent that the woodcock didn't show up this year.