Jon's Southern Outdoors
Quail Hunting Page

On 2-18-06 I joined some great guys up in north GA at a plantation hunt. The hunt was organized on Woody's GON Forum and after my three hour drive north I got there just in time for the rain and boy did it come down. We all, being die hard hunters, were tromping around on the field with the guide and dog only to watch the soaking wet quail get caught by the dog because they could not fly. Even though we didn't get to shoot very often we still had a fun, although be it a wet, time. The photo below is from that hunt and is a composite of three different pictures; the guys, the dog, and the birds. This is the dog that was on the hunt, but I took him from another picture and added him to this one. The quail I had from another picture that I took back on opening day of deer season when they crossed a food plot.



On 2/19/06 Gary from the Muckalee hunt club emailed me and some other members to set up a quail hunt for Saturday 2/25/06. He has a young German Shorthair pointer and wanted to work her on some birds. Danny, another member of the club, located some pen raised birds there close to the camp and was able to buy fifty birds. Unfortunately, when we all met on 2/25/06, it was 100% rain all day. It poured all day and all we could do was sit at the camp and watch it rain. My dog was in his kennel and it was inside my trailer at the camp in front of the heater. We watched television, hunting shows, most of the day. The good news about this is that they were calling for a clear sunny day on Sunday the 26th.

Sunday 2/26/06 was clear although a little windy. The rain had stopped about 4:00 AM and by 6:00 AM I was being woke up by Will. For those that don't know, Will goes to sleep about 6:00 PM and gets up about 4:00 AM every day. I guess he waited as long as he could before coming to get me up. I'm not complaining at all. He had breakfast cooking and for those that know me, food is always a good peace offering. I took a quick shower, dressed and headed over for my biscuits and eggs. Will had his dog, also a German Shorthair, and she was ready to get on some birds. After we ate, we called Danny to see what we were going to do only we found that he was already putting the birds out at 7:00 AM. By 8:00 we were at his house waiting on him to come back from where he had put the birds out at. It was just a short distance from his house on some property he has leased. When we got there, the dogs were let out.

In all we had a good hunt. We put out fifty birds and ended up with thirty. The only problem I had was loosing sight of my dog Prowler a couple of times. Even though I have a bell on his collar, he is so liver ticked that he blends in and I can't see him. I am sure he was on point somewhere the last time he disappeared. I looked and looked, but couldn't find him among the waist high pine trees and he wasn't coming to the call. I finally got in my truck and drove back around to the last place I saw him and he stepped out on the road. It seems every time this happens, when I get in my truck and drive to where I loose him at, he steps out. I told him to load up and he hopped in the back of the truck. After that we all headed back to the trucks where we counted birds. We headed back to Danny's, took a few pictures and then went to cleaning birds. Overall it was a good day and Prowler did well considering he had not been in any birds in two years.

This is a picture from the 2/26/06 hunt. It is of Prowler on point on the right side and Gary, the hunt organizer with his dog Weezy on the left. Here he is in the process of giving her some backing training. Weezy did real well on the hunt and actually was in better control than Prowler. She didn't disappear. Her range was closer and appropriate for a foot hunter which helped. Prowler likes to range out a little further than I like and it is a little hard keeping up with him on foot.





Here is another picture of Prowler pointing a bird. The bird was on the edge of a field in that thick transition zone between field and woods. I knew the flush would send the bird directly into the woods, but we had a couple of good guns at the ready. We actually got three or four birds out of this group.

This is prowler after the hunt on 2/26/06. He is a tired puppy.

This is Blackie, Gary, and Will with the dogs Weezy (Gary's dog), Prowler, and Katie (Will's dog).

Here is a close up of what we were able to shoot on 2/26/06.

March 4, 2006 a friend of mine and I went to a place called Big Red Oak Plantation in Gay, GA where we had a great hunt. We got up there in time for lunch, shot a five stand of clays, started the hunt at 1:00 PM and finished at 4:00 PM. They even cleaned our birds for a dollar each. The place is wonderful for hunting birds. The property is managed for quail and the thinned pines, food strips, and mowed lanes all work to the bird's advantage. Prowler was dead tired after this hunt, but he seemed to really have fun.

This is one of the first points of the hunt.

This is Prowler pointing another bird that we had missed the first time he pointed it. On the first point he chased after the bird when we flushed it, we shot at it and missed, then the bird went down in some brush. Prowler missed seeing it go down and had to work the area to pick it back up. When he stepped out on this cut he caught the scent and locked down on it. I walked the bird up and then was able to shoot it this time. Prowler doesn't like it when we miss. He does his job and expects me to do mine.

Here prowler has pointed some birds and my friend, Reid, is moving in to flush the birds.
















This is the result of the hunt on 3/4/06. Prowler pointed and retrieved over twenty birds. We bought 20 birds from the plantation, but Prowler found a lot more. We ended up with twenty two and still there were several that we shot at, missed, and never went back for. We had a great time on this hunt.


On Saturday March 11, 2006 and Sunday March 12, 2006 we decided to do a little dog training and paired a relative new dog with a seasoned dog. The new dog was Katie, Will's dog and the seasoned dog was Prowler. Katie is about two, but until our late February hunt this year mentioned above, she had never been on an upland bird hunt.

With this hunt we worked with her on pointing and honoring point. There were several times that she did get good solid points and there were several other times that when she saw prowler on point she would freeze and point too even though she was not in the scent zone. This of course let us know that she is honoring Prowler's point and not actually pointing the birds herself.

Several times I watched her go on point as soon as she saw Prowler pointing birds. Even though sometimes she may have been down wind of the birds, she didn't act like she had their scent yet, but when she saw Prowler pointing she would freeze.

We started the Saturday morning early. Actually at first light and here is a picture of prowler pointing in the early morning dim light. Because it was to get into the 80's we wanted to work the dogs in the cooler morning air. By the time we finished it was hot and the dogs were tired.

This is a picture of Katie honoring Prowler's point. She appears to be down wind of the birds, but as I watched her coming in she didn't freeze until she saw Prowler on point. She is actually a little up wind of the single that Prowler pointed because the wind is coming from Prowler and back towards the camera. By this time it was already getting hot, the dogs were tired and catching a bird's scent was a little difficult given the late morning conditions, but the dogs were able to get the job done.

This picture below is what we ended up with on Sunday the 12th. This was also the last hunt of the season as it is now getting too hot to hunt the dogs and Turkey season is coming up quickly.