# Released question?



## #1DEER 1-I (Sep 10, 2007)

So did the division release any hens with this batch of 11,000 they're going to release? All the photos are roosters?


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## cklspencer (Jun 25, 2009)

Yes


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## RandomElk16 (Sep 17, 2013)

Saw 4 times the number of hens as I did roosters. Nice to see birds. Group got our last at 1 and they were still flyin around!


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## Chaser (Sep 28, 2007)

At your backyard WMA, Bax* and I didn't see one single hen this morning. Every single bird was a rooster.


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## johnnycake (Jul 19, 2011)

anybody know if they released some at the Nephi WMA? Hit that hard this afternoon, saw 1 hen, and didn't even see feathers on the ground from a morning slaughter, I thought that was a little odd.


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## COWAN (Oct 7, 2012)

Yep.. I watch DWR release them, about 20, mostly roosters. This morning they got hit hard. Around 100 people didnt help either, especialy those running into the field at 7:15 am in the dark.


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## Mountain Time (Sep 24, 2007)

They DWR employee we talked to said they released all roosters....150 for the opener. 50 more this week. I asked if they were trying to re-build the population and he said no. The birds are just there to be hunted.


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## #1DEER 1-I (Sep 10, 2007)

All I've seen is roosters. The worst part is the wild ones seem to be significantly down, I haven't seen a hen the whole year and only a couple wild roosters.


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## COWAN (Oct 7, 2012)

Like I said before "I personaly watched them release aprox. 20 birds and most were roosters and 2 maybe 3 hens." I asked the personell DWR releasing them and they said they did release around 20 birds and thats what I witnessed as well. Keep in mind this was just on one good sized WMA that could hold 10 times as many. God knows there were atleast 100 people that showed up on the opener. If you look at the number of birds to be released and the number of WMA's and WIA's thebirds are going to be spread thin. But I am personaly happy to see it done. 

Mountain Time, if you were in an area that got 150 birds released at once I would be hunting that area hard, thats a lot more than the 20 birds released in my neck of the woods.


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## Mountain Time (Sep 24, 2007)

The area got hit pretty hard but we were still able to turn up 4 birds in a half day of hunting. This was my first pheasant hunt and I thought it was a lot of fun, so did my son(15) and daughter(8). The other hunters we talked to said they were having a tough time finding the birds so I guess we got pretty lucky.


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## mycoltbug (Jan 21, 2013)

We went out to the WMA we normally hit. I couldn't believe how many hunters were out there compared to the past years. I would say normally on the opener we see less than 20 people this year there was 100-200 people out there. It was nuts. We saw so many guys shooting at birds that were 40+ yards out and just wounding them. Our group of 9 dropped 9 birds total, picked up one bird that had expired from those idiots shooting too far out and found only one bird that a hawk had gotten too. Out of the birds we saw all were planted save one wild one. We probably saw a total of 60-100 birds flying all over this wma during the hunt. It was great fun but sure would have liked to smack a few people around who were taking long shots without a dog to check for wounded birds.


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## COWAN (Oct 7, 2012)

I wonder when they will release more?


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## Bax* (Dec 14, 2008)

Chaser said:


> At your backyard WMA, Bax* and I didn't see one single hen this morning. Every single bird was a rooster.


One of the guys we ran into hunting said that SFW was planning on a limited release of hens and will determine if it is worth the money in the future to release hens or just invest in planting roosters only.

Unless they do some serious research on how to ensure the survival of these birds, I fear that the release of hens may be a waste. But I really hope I am wrong.


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## #1DEER 1-I (Sep 10, 2007)

Bax* said:


> One of the guys we ran into hunting said that SFW was planning on a limited release of hens and will determine if it is worth the money in the future to release hens or just invest in planting roosters only.
> 
> Unless they do some serious research on how to ensure the survival of these birds, I fear that the release of hens may be a waste. But I really hope I am wrong.


Like I've said a million times, fix the problem for wild birds, pen raisers are cover up of bad management and a fake fix.


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## Bax* (Dec 14, 2008)

#1DEER 1-I said:


> Like I've said a million times, fix the problem for wild birds, pen raisers are cover up of bad management and a fake fix.


We were having a conversation on the ride down on how to help with this. And we were wondering if there could be a bounty posed for raccoons, skunks, etc, if people would start working to eliminate some of the animals that prey on the birds and their eggs?

Obviously a $50 bounty like coyotes have isnt realistic, but I wonder if this would get guys out trapping more?

Whaddya think 1-I?


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## #1DEER 1-I (Sep 10, 2007)

Bax* said:


> We were having a conversation on the ride down on how to help with this. And we were wondering if there could be a bounty posed for raccoons, skunks, etc, if people would start working to eliminate some of the animals that prey on the birds and their eggs?
> 
> Obviously a $50 bounty like coyotes have isnt realistic, but I wonder if this would get guys out trapping more?
> 
> Whaddya think 1-I?


It's a good thought. I don't know how do - able a bounty is on them all, but I doubt the division will do any . Maybe this hunt will remind people how fun pheasants are to hunt . Everyone go pick up a $30 live trap or a couple $10 foot traps and lets as sportsmen get it under control. I've got 3 foot traps and a live trap out. If not for pheasants do it for other upland or waterfowl. Anyone who hunts should care about the cause. The DWR should ask sportsmen to try there best to get rid of them.


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## royta (Sep 26, 2007)

How can we make sure we're not killing dogs with all these extra traps out there?

I'd much rather bait those skunks and raccoons and then blast them at night with a shotgun over a spotlight. Too bad the counties don't see the value in allowing the spotlighting of non game animals though.


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## royta (Sep 26, 2007)

Sorry, I missed the live trap part. I have a Havahart trap and need to set it up on my friend's property near me that has sharptail grouse on it. No, I can't hunt the grouse in Morgan County, but that doesn't mean I don't want to do my best to protect the ones that are here.


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## swbuckmaster (Sep 14, 2007)

1-eye
I don't care what people think but I agree with you on the predators. When I was a kid I never saw a ****. I never saw a **** till I was in my mid twenties. Now I see them everytime I drive through lehi after midnight. I see them dead on the side of the roads everywhere. Same thing with skunks. I set a trap for ***** last summer in my neighborhood because the ***** were eating the crap out of my corn. All I caught was skunks! I caught skunks everynight! No shortage of predators. 

One of my best friends used to hunt skunks, foxes, and cats on his dads place. He was able to hunt the crap out of pheasants. He moved away, quite hunting the predators, the land/habbitate hasn't changed and guess what all he sees is foxes, skunks, *****, and cats.


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## Mr Muleskinner (Feb 14, 2012)

swbuckmaster said:


> 1-eye
> I don't care what people think but I agree with you on the predators. When I was a kid I never saw a ****. I never saw a **** till I was in my mid twenties. Now I see them everytime I drive through lehi after midnight. I see them dead on the side of the roads everywhere. Same thing with skunks. I set a trap for ***** last summer in my neighborhood because the ***** were eating the crap out of my corn. All I caught was skunks! I caught skunks everynight! No shortage of predators.
> 
> One of my best friends used to hunt skunks, foxes, and cats on his dads place. He was able to hunt the crap out of pheasants. He moved away, quite hunting the predators, the land/habbitate hasn't changed and guess what all he sees is foxes, skunks, *****, and cats.


I agree with 1-I and you as well on this. That said I still like the fact that birds are being released. Can't stand all of the predators either. Stray cats may top my list. No special reason. Just don't like cats. Never will. I used to trap stray cats in my neighborhood and then they started charging $20 a head to take them. Then I was told that I could be fined for dealing with them myself. I trapped twenty stray cats in my neighborhood with a single trap one month.


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## Bax* (Dec 14, 2008)

Mr Muleskinner said:


> I agree with 1-I and you as well on this. That said I still like the fact that birds are being released. Can't stand all of the predators either. Stray cats may top my list. No special reason. Just don't like cats. Never will. I used to trap stray cats in my neighborhood and then they started charging $20 a head to take them. Then I was told that I could be fined for dealing with them myself. I trapped twenty stray cats in my neighborhood with a single trap one month.


I think cats are a huge problem as well. Especially with hatchlings. They are much more vulnerable and easy prey for cats.

I'd love to see a trapping program go after coyotes, fox, raccoons, skunks, and feral cats in some select areas and study the effects on bird populations. BUT the hard part would be that a guy like me who lives in SLC couldnt contribute much to a program like that because of driving distance to trap, so there would have to be a real incentive to the trapper / hunter to go out and get rid of these little monsters.... now I am just noodling ideas out but I wish there was something more that could be done to improve wild pheasant, quail, hun, etc numbers.


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## #1DEER 1-I (Sep 10, 2007)

royta said:


> How can we make sure we're not killing dogs with all these extra traps out there?
> 
> I'd much rather bait those skunks and raccoons and then blast them at night with a shotgun over a spotlight. Too bad the counties don't see the value in allowing the spotlighting of non game animals though.


They make traps specifically for ***** that won't catch dogs, check IFA. My dogs been caught in one once it didn't break his foot . If you don't want to catch dogs for sure use the **** only foot traps, or live traps.


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## #1DEER 1-I (Sep 10, 2007)

swbuckmaster said:


> 1-eye
> I don't care what people think but I agree with you on the predators. When I was a kid I never saw a ****. I never saw a **** till I was in my mid twenties. Now I see them everytime I drive through lehi after midnight. I see them dead on the side of the roads everywhere. Same thing with skunks. I set a trap for ***** last summer in my neighborhood because the ***** were eating the crap out of my corn. All I caught was skunks! I caught skunks everynight! No shortage of predators.
> 
> One of my best friends used to hunt skunks, foxes, and cats on his dads place. He was able to hunt the crap out of pheasants. He moved away, quite hunting the predators, the land/habbitate hasn't changed and guess what all he sees is foxes, skunks, *****, and cats.


I agree with this post 100%. I trapped 12 skunks in 15 nights at my house a couple years ago. I've never had a skunk in my yard since. If effort is put forward getting a viable pheasant population and helping other game. I've seen less pheasants in the last 10 years then I've seen of each raccoons, foxes and skunks the last 6 months alone.


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## #1DEER 1-I (Sep 10, 2007)

Mr Muleskinner said:


> I agree with 1-I and you as well on this. That said I still like the fact that birds are being released. Can't stand all of the predators either. Stray cats may top my list. No special reason. Just don't like cats. Never will. I used to trap stray cats in my neighborhood and then they started charging $20 a head to take them. Then I was told that I could be fined for dealing with them myself. I trapped twenty stray cats in my neighborhood with a single trap one month.


I could agree with released birds if they were wild ones caught and released from other states.


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## Mr Muleskinner (Feb 14, 2012)

#1DEER 1-I said:


> I agree with this post 100%. I trapped 12 skunks in 15 nights at my house a couple years ago. I've never had a skunk in my yard since. If effort is put forward getting a viable pheasant population and helping other game. I've seen less pheasants in the last 10 years then I've seen of each raccoons, foxes and skunks the last 6 months alone.


No arguing that either


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## TAK (Sep 9, 2007)

Lets not all forget that there once was a time that the state had a bird farm so to say. It was here in Carbon County and they raised many birds for release. I can be sure that the wild birds you talk about came from these pen raised birds!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Over the years I have raised a few birds. I have also worked at a large bird farm. I can tell you it is possible to raise a better bird!!!! That mean less human contact and raising them in COVER!!!! Not the perfect bird but along with curbing some of the bird eaters there can be better numbers. 

Also don't forget everything about Utah is against having more phez. Sprinklers! Destryoing Olive trees....etc.

***** I think are probley the biggest killer followed very close by the flying preds. One you can get a handle on the other... Good luck.

You want to increase numbers release hens. Good hens! Healthy hens raised in cover with little human contact. Release them during breeding season in areas with good cover and wild birds. Releasing them now only lessens the odds. Besides *****, hawks etc there is winter!


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