My hunting partner Curt and I hunted birds yesterday with my vizsla Gus. What a phenomenal day.
We arrived at our first public woodcock hunting honey hole around 7:30 AM when frost was just starting to melt off of the fallen leaves in the sapling thickets. Within about 10 minutes, Gus pointed his first woodcock. The bird flew before we could get close to it, but 5 minutes later, Gus pointed him again. I flushed the bird, got off one shot, and dropped the bird to the ground.
As we moved through the saplings, Gus was finding birds in some really thick cover. Curt missed his first few birds, which must have been contagious because I started missing. With Gus pointing a high number of birds, we managed to redeem ourselves. Within two hours, we had 5 woodcocks, although Gus point at least a dozen.
Curt has been itching to hunt snipe for years, so we changed our plans and went after snipe. Gus has never hunted snipe before, but we were finding them on the edges of damp fields. At a prime snipe spot, we jumped a pair right off the bat. I wasn’t paying attention when they flew, so I missed them completely. Curt got a few shots off, but didn’t hit any. We drove to another spot, stepped out of the truck, walked 5 yards, and busted another snipe up! No one shot because of the location near the road. As we walked the field, we jumped 6 more snipes, and Curt knocked one down. Beautiful!
Coincidentally, while woodcock and snipe hunting on New Jersey public ground, we came across some pheasants. Gus pointed one, but the bird ran straight out to the marsh and we lost him. Thirty minutes later, he pointed another one. The big rooster flushed, and I dropped him with one shot. While we were taking the photos of the woodcocks and pheasant, another pheasant began walking from the hedgerow right into the field we were in! Gus and I went up to get a shot, but the rooster flew the opposite way from us, presenting us with no shot.
Although it is the heart of the rut, our bird hunt was going so well we decided to forego deer hunting and put in a full day on birds. Gus, Curt, and I were all exhausted, but it was well worth it.