Pheasants not as plentiful as before in Ohio but still can be found
Anyone who has been around a while knows times and trends change.
Hunters still at it have proved flexible enough to accept what they are given and to take what they can get.
What they can get are deer in numbers and wild turkeys in fewer numbers. Hunters recognize Daniel Boone probably had an easier time locating game than they do.
Ohio, however, held a lot more ring-necked pheasants during the mid-20th century than Boone could imagine, if he could imagine pheasants. An Asian transplant, pheasants arrived late. Boone was familiar with bobwhite quail, ruffed grouse and cottontail bunnies, which along with pheasants will become legal game on Nov. 1.
Rabbits may be bagged statewide through Feb. 28, and male pheasants statewide through Jan. 12. Hunting seasons are brief for quail and grouse, ending Dec. 1 in a limited number of southern counties.
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Hunting hours run sunrise to sunset for each species.
Pheasants in their heyday perched at or near the top of an Ohio hunter’s most-wanted list. Meadows and fence rows encouraged nesting, and crop harvesting time provided plenty of scattered seeds on which to make a living.
Pheasants thrived.
Lines of hunters, sometimes accompanied by dogs, would walk among rows of cornstalks a short distance apart to sweep ahead swarms of running pheasants, often kicking up a flurry of birds near field’s end.
Loss of grassland to trees and a change in agricultural practices have led to a decrease in pheasant abundance, said Joseph Lautenbach, grasslands biologist with the Ohio Division of Wildlife.
Farm “fields are now much larger than they were years ago to accommodate larger and more efficient equipment, as farmers responded to economic signals our country has prioritized,” he wrote in an emailed response.
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Wild pheasants still can be found in locales with large tracts of grass adjacent to croplands, Lautenbach said.
On a regional scale, pheasant concentrations can be found north, west and southwest of Columbus. Deer Creek Wildlife Area, for example, is a public site open to hunting where pheasants have been reproducing naturally.
One important aspect of maintaining pheasant habitat is the wildlife division’s ongoing effort to keep trees from overtaking grasslands, Lautenbach said.
Nonetheless, unless you know with some preciseness where pheasant haunts are, earning a two-bird daily limit of wild-grown ringnecks can’t be taken for granted. A survey conducted in 2021 came up with an estimated population of male pheasants in Ohio at 6,612 birds.
Counts at one time ranged in the hundreds of thousands.
Wild pheasants can be found at Big Island Wildlife Area near Marion and along the Scioto River Corridor from Hardin and Marion counties south to Fayette, Pickaway and Ross counties, Lautenbach said.
Northwestern counties including Defiance, Fulton and Williams also support populations of wild birds because of wide enrollment in a federal program promoting cropland conversion to habitat.
The wildlife division has started releasing pen-raised birds in anticipation of the autumn hunt. Birds were released the past two Saturdays, to be followed by releases for opening day, Nov. 9 and Thanksgiving.
Releases in central Ohio include those at Delaware Wildlife Area north of Columbus, at Kokosing Lake Wildlife Area in Knox County and at Urbana Wildlife Area in Champaign County.
Veterans invited
A free day for veterans at Ohio Division of Wildlife shooting ranges is scheduled Nov. 10. Specialized instruction will be offered 10 a.m.-2 p.m. at two Class A ranges, one of them at the Delaware Wildlife Area, 1110 Ohio Rt. 229, Ashley.
Staff at Delaware will provide equipment, ammunition, ear protection and eye protection.