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| Rhys and me. |
It was a pleasure to be able to introduce a new hunter to the sport. Rhys, my prospective son-in-law, a native of Wales, has been very interested in shooting sports and hunting in general. He is an archer and competes in Archery for the University of Florida. A natural extension of that is a progression to shotguns, pistols and rifles. One day, he asked if I would show him how to shoot a shotgun. Things progressed and I found him a good buy on a Browning Citori Upland Special 20 ga. He was thrilled, and started shooting trap and skeet down at college.
Last month, I was drawn by
lottery to hunt at DiLane plantation in eastern Georgia. This is an 8000+ ac. Quail Plantation managed
by the state of Georgia for quail habitat.
It seemed like a perfect time to introduce Rhys the fine art of quail
hunting in Georgia.
We arrived at the check-in
station around 7 a.m. and picked up our permission form and eased out to where
we decided to put out. It took a little
time to get the dogs and gear and guns ready to go, but after a few minutes we
gathered to discuss the plan. We talked about
shooting safety, especially over the dogs and around other people, how to move
over the ground, approaching pointing dogs, gun safety and a lot of small stuff
that makes hunting a lot more fun. This wasn’t the first time we’d talked about
this stuff, but it was a perfect time to refresh the information.
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| Ace Pointed |
It was about 40 degrees under
clear skies and promised to warm up to about 70 degrees in the afternoon. We put the dogs out a started around some
perfect habitat. The dogs worked great
and before long we settled in to a routine. We heard some shooting a few hundred yards
away, across a small tree stand and marked that covey off our list as we moved
in to a pecan grove. After about an hour
of working around some brushy fields, we again heard more shooting in a
different area, but still about 300 yards way- another covey off the list! We eased in to a pecan grove and worked through
that in to some tall pines. Suddenly, I
heard the familiar wurr of wings and an exclamation from Rhys! Simultaneously,
I looked through the pines a saw Ace on point ahead of me. Rhys was to my right and Ace was pointed
ahead of me. I worked the area in front
of Ace with no success, turned him loose, and went over to Rhys to find out
what happened. It seems Rhys stepped
right in to the covey! Birds went up all
around him! They flushed directly to and
over our third man on the hunt, Glen. Rhys
wisely chose not to shoot. He did mark
the birds down and we eased on over to that area only to discover the birds had
flown on to adjoining private land!
Those little buzz bombs knew exactly what they were doing- no doubt. With
that little bit of excitement behind us, we moved on to a different area.
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| Looking for the covey |
The day warmed up and we swapped
out dogs to keep them fresh as we moved around the area. Unfortunately, ALL the area looked good with
good food, cover and water- great habitat for the quail. We heard more shooting around the area and we
worked the edges of fields and through the tall pine stands, etc. The dogs did a wonderful job! It was a good time for them, too. Unfortunately, we never did get a shot at the
wild birds, but the benefits of this hunt were not in the killed birds. Rhys got a chance to see how the overall hunt
works, habitat, working closely with dogs and other hunters. We had a great lunch in the field, cooked by
Glen. And, we had hours of talking about
hunting in general and bird hunting in particular.
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| Chow time in the field! |
I always maintain I’ve never had
a bad day in the field, and this one was no exception. We had good dog work, we saw some birds and
Rhys had a covey rise right under his feet(!), we ate in the field and talked
hunting all day long. It doesn’t get any
better than that!
I thanked the GA DNR for the
opportunity to hunt, via the feedback form, and I’d like to thank www.uplanders.com
for sponsoring Rhys on this hunt. The
future of our sport hinges on bringing new “blood” in. Take some time and take a young person
hunting!
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| Long Day in the field |
