Mount Ayr Record-News, Mount Ayr, Ringgold County, Iowa
Thursday, October 20, 2011

Iowa pheasant hunters harvested more than one million birds annually 33 times since 1962. Since 2000, that's happened only twice. In the upcoming season, the projected harvest of 150,000 to 200,000 is expected to set another record low.

With its title of Pheasant Capital of North America gone for more than a decade, Iowa seems destined to be an after thought in pheasant hunting circles. How has the once grand tradition of hundreds of thousands of hunters heading to the Iowa countryside each autumn become nearly non-existent?

This is the first in a series looking at pheasants past, present and future in Iowa.

Wild pheasants were brought over from China by Owen Denny in 1882 to establish a population in Oregon's Willamette Valley. That initial stocking and other imports from China are the sources for current day ringnecks across the U.S.

Iowa's wild population came through an accidental release of the Oregon birds' descendants. An early 1900's wind storm turned loose 2,000 wild pheasants from William Benton's Cedar Falls game farm to Iowa's patchwork of small grain, hay and corn fields and pastures. They thrived, eventually prompting crop damage complaints.

By 1913, the Iowa Conservation Commission, the forerunner of the Department of Natural Resources, was stocking hatchery raised pheasants anticipating creation a hunting season. Results, though, were mixed.

In 1924-25, the Commission began to trap and relocate wild birds and eggs to southern Iowa.

Iowa's first pheasant season was October 20-22, 1925 in Kossuth, Humboldt, Winnebago, Hancock, Wright, Cerro Gordo, Franklin, Mitchell, Floyd, Butler, Grundy, Black Hawk and Bremer counties. The season opened one-half hour before sunrise and ended at noon with a bag limit of three cocks.

"It appears that the first counties opened to pheasant hunting were also those where complaints of pheasants caused crop damage were common," said Todd Bogenschultz, upland wildlife biologist for the Iowa DNR.

In 1932, state game farms closed, but reopened in 1938 after several poor weather years.

Better weather in the 1940's helped bird populations recover. By 1945, most of northern Iowa was open to hunting. Through the 1940's and 1950's, it became apparent that pen-raised pheasants were not contributing to wild bird numbers. Yet, by 1965, pheasant hunters spread across Iowa, save for a few southeastern counties.

Northwest, north-central and central Iowa held the most pheasants through the 1950's. However, since the 1960's, changes in agriculture led to a decline in pheasant numbers. By the early 1970's, southern Iowa had become the premier pheasant range.

The last state game farm was closed in 1973 and entire state was opened to hunting in 1976.

Pheasant populations in the northern and central regions rebounded with establishment of the federal Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) between 1985 and 1996. Counts rose in the southern counties, initially, but have declined steadily since 1992.

Even in its heyday, with hunters consistently harvesting more than 1 million roosters annually, clouds hung over Iowa's pheasant population.

Since 1962, populations and brood size have declined. Changes in farming practices greatly reduced grassy field corners and fence rows. Advances in seed genetics nearly eliminate weeds and allow crops to be planted closer together. But weather is the major factor influencing pheasant numbers. Cold, snowy winters reduce marginal habitat and concentrate pheasants and predators. By spring, much nesting habitat is reduced to road ditches, terraces and grassed water ways, where spring rains flood nests and drown chicks.

"The bottom line is weather trumps all when it comes to hen survival and nesting success," said Bogenschutz. "Tell me the amount of snowfall, the amount of rain and the temperature in the spring, and I can tell you if pheasant counts will be up or down that summer. The weather models are that accurate. We are now in a weather pattern of five consecutive winters with heavy snow and springs with lots of rain. That has not happened in 50 years."

Iowa hosted 30,000 to 50,000 nonresident pheasant hunters in years past. They stayed for days in small town hotels, ate in the cafés down the street and bought supplies from local stores; a multi-million dollar shot in the arm for small town Main Street.

"It was pretty common to see hunters from Michigan, Georgia, Texas and every state around us," said Rich JORDET, law enforcement supervisor for the DNR in northwest Iowa. "I remember checking hunters from 14 different states on opening day."

Nonresident license sales also provided a boost in Iowa's Fish and Wildlife Trust Fund. With the drop in bird numbers, the drop in hunters has fallen off dramatically as well.

An estimated 3,300 acres is being accepted into the popular Conservation Reserve Program State Acres for Wildlife Enhancement (SAFE) (CP38) Gaining Ground for Wildlife project designed to restore native grasslands, wetlands and develop food plots where they will be most beneficial.

. . . The rental rate payment schedule is based on maximum soil rental rate established for the three predominant soils. Contracts run 10 to 15 years.

The standard FSA 50 percent cost share, 40 percent practice incentive payment to establish the practice, and a signing incentive payment of $100 per enrolled acre are authorized for eligible contracts.

Iowa's SAFE is targeted around our public wildlife areas to benefit grassland birds, both song-birds and upland game birds. Land that is eligible was cropped or considered cropped four out of the six years from 2002 to 2007. Eligible cropland includes row crops, small grains and forage crops. Targeted portions of all Iowa counties, except Allamakee and Clayton, are eligible to participate.

Mount Ayr Record-News, Mount Ayr, Ringgold County, Iowa
Thursday, October 27, 2011

An extra inch or two of spring rain. A few more inches of winter snow. Each by itself raises short term concern for Iowa pheasants.

Strung together over multiple years, though, they spell major trouble for Iowa’s pheasant population, as well as the state's tradition of pheasant hunting and the economic boost it provides rural Iowa.

Heading into the 2011 season, biologists are forecasting a record low harvest of ringnecks — again.

Not that many years ago, it was normal for hunters to take a million birds a year; often well above that.

This year, the projected harvest is 150,000 to 200,000.

Why the plunge? The primary factor is one we cannot change . . . the weather.

Coming out of the 2010-2011 winter, Iowa marked five years in a row of average state-wide snowfall over 30 inches. That causes heavy mortality among over wintering pheasants.

In a half century of standardized data collection, Iowa pheasant numbers never have increased in a year following a winter with 31 inches of snow. Add an April-May hatching period with over eight inches of rain — the fourth time in five years — and survival of chicks from those remaining hen pheasants dropped drastically, too.

Iowa sees an average of seven inches of rain during that nesting period.

In the last 50 years, only once has there been a significant increase in pheasant numbers, when eight inches or more fell.

"A lot of folks will remember back to bad winters we’ve had in Iowa before," agrees Mark McINROY, wildlife research technician for the Department of Natural Resources. "However, they forget that we have never had five consecutive years of bad winter/spring combinations. There hasn"t been a chance for our pheasants to recover."

Throw in loss of good habitat — especially winter cover — and pheasant survival faces a triple whammy.

From 1990 to 2005, Iowa lost 2,500 square miles of Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), hay and small grain lands. That equals an eight-mile strip across Iowa from Davenport to Omaha.

Another 485 square miles of CRP has gone back to row crops since 2007. That leads to heavy game bird losses over the winter. Yet where there is quality habitat, there are pheasants.

Bill Kron owns 200 acres near West Branch in Cedar county. On his CRP acres, he has grasses and wildflowers. He works periodic burning into his management routine. Alfalfa, clover and small food plots of corn and sorghum enhance cover and food sources.

"Our counts are down, but I can still go down a mile long stretch of gravel and count 10 pheasants — more or less - on any given day,"says Kron.

He lives within minutes of the two Cedar county routes surveyed each August by DNR wildlife biologists. Each 30 mile route is along heavily cropped fields, with little year-round cover.

One route yielded zero pheasants this summer. The other tallied birds in the single digits.

The birds need a break.

"We’ve seen birds recover on their own, when Mother Nature has taken a break,” recalls McInroy. “We had a severe winter in 2001, then a wet spring. However, pheasant numbers doubled after good weather patterns in 2002 and 2003. The best thing Iowans can do is to maintain or improve habitat. We have habitat now that could support an 800-thousand pheasant harvest, if we could get a couple years of favorable weather."

Still, only about one percent of pheasant habitat is on public land. The DNR's private lands program and non-government conservation groups, like Pheasants Forever, are working with private landowners to get more high quality habitat on the ground.

Another feature is Iowa's walking access program, through which property owners are reimbursed for conservation practices and allowing hunters on specified acres.

This year, 1,500 acres are offered. Over three years, that program may grow to 10,000 acres.

Transcriptions by Sharon R. Becker, March of 2012