Pheasants are there Eric Morken emorken@echopress.com
B
irds like the pheasant that have such a short lifespan to begin with are so dependent on annual hatches to produce big numbers each fall. Marginal or poor habitat and wet springs can lead to tough seasons chasing roosters. Quality habitat can help sustain numbers every year, and a dry spring during the June nesting season can help populations jump considerably in one year. That seems to be what pheasants got across much of their range in Minnesota in 2020. The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources on Sept. 8 released the results of its annual roadside survey that showed the number of pheasants counted up 42% over 2019 and 37% above the 10year average. The pheasant increase hit an astounding 146% over 2019 in the state’s prime pheasant habitat in southwestern Minnesota. “It really comes as no surprise to me given the weather that we had this spring,” Douglas County Pheasants Forever chapter president Dean
Krebs of Alexandria said. “When we get good weather in June, the pheasants are designed to really increase or explode their population when they have favorable nesting conditions. We had really favorable nesting conditions this year, and this is the result of that.” This year’s statewide pheasant index was 53.5 birds per 100 miles of roads driven. All regions of the pheasant range reported an increase in pheasant counts, with the southwest reporting the greatest increase. There, observers counted 90.5 birds per 100 miles. The areas of Douglas, Pope, Todd and Stearns Counties run the gamut on the 2020 pheasant hunting prospects map from poor (10-24 birds/ square mile) to good (greater than 49 birds/square mile). That prospects map is intended to be a general indicator of the upcoming fall hunting season based on count numbers. But areas considered poor overall can have areas of great habitat within them that will carry plenty of birds, and vice versa. “There’s places where we were jumping 20, 30, 40 birds in down years,” Krebs said. “If
“We saw and heard a lot of birds this year while turkey hunting. That’s a little bit anecdotal because it’s just one spot, but even driving to and from in the areas where we go, we saw a lot more pheasants in the spring than we had in many years. We kept saying, ‘If we get a good hatch, this is going to be a good year.’ I think we pulled off a phenomenal hatch.” Dean Krebs
Douglas County Pheasants Forever chapter president
PAGE 6 | Lakes Area Outdoors
to chase this fall
Black lab, Gus, sits on the tailgate after flushing and retrieving a couple of Minnesota roosters late last November. The 2019 season produced some great hunts across the state in areas of good habitat, and this year’s roadside count from the DNR’s annual survey showed pheasant numbers increasing by 42% statewide from the 2019 survey, setting up what could be a good fall for hunters. (Eric Morken / Echo Press) you have good habitat, you’re going to see that. It’s that marginal habitat where you really get that hit in down years.” To put this year’s count into an historical perspective, the 53 birds per 100 miles counted is still just a fraction of the more than 300 birds per 100 miles counted in the 1950s and well below recent highs of over 100 birds per 100 miles in the early 2000s. Still, it’s good news for pheasant hunters in the state after the bird’s numbers dropped over the past decade due to
the loss of grassland habitat taken out of the federal Conservation Reserve Program on private lands. “It was nice to see. It’s a prediction based on roadside counts, but it’s crazy how accurate they are a lot of times,” Krebs said. “When you have good news like this, that’s also represented in the license sales. We’re going to see an uptick in pheasant hunters by quite a bit I would guess this year because people are
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