Very cool photos. The arrows in flight has to be my favorite

 

Great pics!

Is that a bolt action shotgun in pic #9?

I wouldn't mind having the back license display return.

 

Great pics. I wished I wouldn't have missed those days. Those bolt action shotguns sure we're pretty popular back in the day. I got an old sears and roebuck 16ga bolt action.

 

Pretty sure that one photo was the release of the first Sichuan pheasants in the late'80. Jim Blanchard was Governor then and is in the photo. The DNR spent a lot of time, effort and money in an attempt to establish these birds. Didn't work. A lot of the Biologists at the time were quite hopeful, but never said it was a sure thing.
As I recall, the hope was placed on their different nesting habits than what the Ring-Neck has.
Ring-Necks were introduced to Michigan in 1918 according to the article that I just read.

L & O

 

Great photos. Your dad was a great photographer.

 

Thanks for sharing. Great photo's

 

These are awesome! Thanks for sharing!

 

Brings back some good memories, sure do miss those days.

 

Great pics! Sure miss pheasant hunting in Michigan!

 

Thanks for the pictures. I forgot how I miss the pheasant hunting days of old. Lots of good old memories from back then.

It took the DNR a long time to admit the real reason for the failure of the Sichuan pheasant fiasco. All you heard was a lack of habitat especially nesting. LOL What a joke/lie. Ottawa county was covered with fallow fields of grass. What better nesting habitat could you want? Lots of fence rows to go along with the fields.

I will never forget the Hollander farmer from the old country telling us to shoot every crow we could. He watched them all spring drive the setting hens off the nests to eat the eggs. We did our part during pheasant season but today that would get you a ticket because of the stupid Crow season due to agreement with Mexico to protect a Mexican crow that never comes to Michigan.

If you have not figured out what the reason for the demise of the Sichuan failure the DNR finally admitted too.

PREDATION!! Not just crows but all the rest of the various predators.

 

.........
I will never forget the Hollander farmer from the old country telling us to shoot every crow we could. He watched them all spring drive the setting hens off the nests to eat the eggs. We did our part during pheasant season but today that would get you a ticket because of the stupid Crow season due to agreement with Mexico to protect a Mexican crow that never comes to Michigan.

If you have not figured out what the reason for the demise of the Sichuan failure the DNR finally admitted too.

PREDATION!! Not just crows but all the rest of the various predators.

I have never seen or heard anyone speak of crows being part of the problem before. Maybe some others can share evidence of this. In the 2 SLP counties that I own property in, I believe the hay mower has destroyed more nest than anything else.

L & O

 

Thanks for posting. It brought back a lot of memories. I missed the "hay days" by about 4-5 yrs. I saw all the old photos and heard all the stories of my dad and uncle. Oct. 20th still brings a tear to my eyes. I haven't hunted birds in 20 yrs. I have bad knees and lack of birds I just don't hunt them. I still have dads old model 12. It saw so much brush and cover the blueing is completely wore off. It looks nickel plated and that's the way it will stay. We found a few pockets of birds but not many in the late 60's early 70's. Then when I started going to CMU I found a few spots. Looking back I wish we would have hunted Iowa in the 70's for a 3 day weekend. I deer hunt there now and the old farmer say there was a ton of birds then. Funny how you just don't think of those things and that Iowa was 700 miles away. When you could have been there in 8-9 hrs.Thanks again I wish I could find the old photos I would post them my mom has them somewhere.

 

All I can go by is what the old gentleman had to say about the crow raiding the nests. Of course when season came along the nesting was long over. I was witness to all the crows sitting in the dead elm snags in the fence rows. Yes back when the sichwan debacle was going on there were still plenty of fence rows and fallow fields. No way could the screw up be blamed on lack of habitat.

Of course I am gullible! According to L.O. any how.

 

These pics are great! Thanks for sharing

 

Hey Governor, HEADS UP!!!!

 

Great photos. Thanks for posting those. I never got to see those day, but my father-in-law talks about them pretty regularly.

 

The thing that does bring back memories for me also is the brown hunting jacket and brown hunting pants. And the big license holder on your back. I started out wearing the Jones style brown hat. Duck hunted with the same outfit for a long time also.

 

It is neat to see those photos and I also remember all the stories from my dad and oldest brother about how they would go to ubley every year for the opener and all the birds they would see and get. In the mid seventies my buddy and my dog and I would get dropped off by metro airport and we would usually get a couple a season. And let's not forget put and take I have some fond memories of that as a teen. Last week I was in hillsdale goose hunting and seen a rooster in a cut cornfield I was so excited I pulled over and was trying to get some photos sad . When I was young all the old timers said it was because of the dtd !! But I have seen crows and skunks and ***** plus cats wipe out out duck nests a lot over the years..

 

I"ve been down with a cold the last few days and I remembered another opening day pheasant story dad told me. It was either 1957 or 58. They hunted on relative farms in Sandusky. My uncle had come down with the Asianatic flue a week before the opener. They tried to make him stay home but he wouldn't listen. My dad him and two friends took off up Vandyke. My dad said they looked like bank robbers and got a lot of strange looks because they were all wearing bandanas around their face and mouths on the ride up. My uncle made it to the end of the field the first pass and shot a bird. He was so weak they left him there and the plan was to work the other side of the field and go back and get him with the tractor. My dad said as fait would have it they shot 8 birds that pass. They had their limit and one for the farmer. My uncle looked so bad they left and took him home. My dad used to rass him and say he would have shot 10 or more that day if he didn't leave.

 

Thanks for sharing, that's a really cool story; I'm way too young to have seen any last vestiges of the good pheasant hunting years in Michigan but I certainly enjoy hearing old stories like that!

 

Thanks for sharing, that's a really cool story; I'm way too young to have seen any last vestiges of the good pheasant hunting years in Michigan but I certainly enjoy hearing old stories like that!

You have no idea how much me and my uncles boys loved hearing those stories of pheasant hunting and deer hunting and trout fishing over and over. I really think I could recite most. But we loved to hear them as much as the first time.

 

Anymore stories??????????

 

I hate to see this thread go . One more time anymore stories???????

 

My first pheasant hunt was in Zilwaukee, MI on Consumer's Power Company land in 1962. My Grandfather had a green and yellow Lincoln. The dog rode in the trunk. My Grandparents watched us kids, and my Grandfather always took us hunting and fishing. It's nearly my earliest memory, and that is kinda nice.
My Grandmother held my hand and we walked the ditch for my Grandpa. The weeds were taller than me.
I had to poop, and we had nothing to wipe with. My Grandma gave me an old yellow flannel work glove out of the glove box to wipe with. I still remember dropping a deuce at 18mos old in the middle of the road behind the old Lincoln.
Yellow work gloves still creep me out, but every time I hunt pheasants I am returned to those days, and I am a toddler on my Grandma's arm again.
So as you see, you can start a kid young, and it'll take.

 

I didn't think we would hear a " BOWEL MOVEMENT" story LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

I could have told the one about that damn hound killing all the farmers chickens way out by Burt in'63.
But that wasn't a happy story.

Take a kid hunting, protect their ears, and pass it along.

 

We had a dog that had a bout with a farmers chickens and won but we lost some money paying the farmer back. We did have a pheasant chicken combo dinner as I recall.