I've hunted woodcock in Missouri for 32 years. I have also hunted them in Iowa, Minnesota, Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, Virginia and Louisiana. There are not many woodcock hunters in the middle of the western portions of their flyway, but as quail populations have diminished, those bird hunters who have kept hunting have started seeking woodcock. We have our own local birds in North Missouri, and I've stumbled upon chicks from March to April depending upon weather conditions.
I've noted here in Missouri that a covert that holds birds headed North is not always one that will host birds migrating in the Fall. I have also seen an increase in birds moving from points. I can't say that I have seen an increase in birds flying lower upon being flushed. That seems to be determined by the cover from which they are flushed in my experience.
The screwy weather of the past several years has made flights much less predictable. Twenty years ago flights peaked around October 31st. Lately, I see more birds around November 7th, but again, the weather is the key.
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"Doubtless the good Lord could have made a better game bird than bobwhite, and better country to hunt him in...but equally doubtless, he never did." -- Guy de la Valdene (from A Handful of Feathers )
"'I promise you,' he said, 'on my word of honor, I won't die on the opening of the bird season.'" -- Robert Ruark (from The Old Man and the Boy)
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