Prairie Chickens - Needle in a Haystack?

[Mark Kircher]

Dean

Great hunt! Happy for You and your crew. Brought back memories of my only prairie chicken hunt maybe 25 years ago. We hunted with Bob Tinker out of Pierre and chased them with dogs on horseback.

Big fun and we were on target all 3 days. The 3rd day we hunted the ranch where much of the film Dances with wolves was made. I almost had a 3 day 9 bird limit but doubled on a covey for my last 2 birds and the second was a sharpie. Great memory! Hunting with the Tatanka! You live in a very special area.

Glad it all went your way.

I found some pictures (pre-digital) so these are pics of those pics.

The gun was a 20 bore single trigger Zoli with 28" tubes if I remember correctly.
Stolen from me soon after. ��

[George "Scott" Davis]

Absolute "Bucket List" item for me. Thanks for sharing!!

[Dean Weber]

Originally Posted by MARK KIRCHER

Dean

Great hunt! Happy for You and your crew. Brought back memories of my only prairie chicken hunt maybe 25 years ago. We hunted with Bob Tinker out of Pierre and chased them with dogs on horseback.

Big fun and we were on target all 3 days. The 3rd day we hunted the ranch where much of the film Dances with wolves was made. I almost had a 3 day 9 bird limit but doubled on a covey for my last 2 birds and the second was a sharpie. Great memory! Hunting with the Tatanka! You live in a very special area.

Glad it all went your way.

I found some pictures (pre-digital) so these are pics of those pics.

The gun was a 20 bore single trigger Zoli with 28" tubes if I remember correctly.
Stolen from me soon after. ��

Hey Mark!
I did not have your success when I hunted with Tinker. Good for you, cool hunt. The gentleman who helped in our hunt scouts with binocs to know which land the chickens are using. This helps locate those coveys without wandering around for just any grouse. I have hunted this area previously and it was just what you run into and meant many sharpies.

I just want to say I did not shoot any sharpies on this hunt…..one person in our party shot both on the 2 day hunt…..just sayin’ without sayin’ who!

[Scott Smith]

Sharpies! The Rodney Dangerfield of game birds. They just don't get no respect!

[Harold Pickens]

Great way to start the season. Take a shorter barreled gun with open chokes with you when you chase those Minnesota ruffies.

[Bill Murphy]

Mark, did you shoot from horseback or shoot from the ground?

[Mark Kircher]

Shooting was from the ground only Bill- guns unloaded and in scarab while riding.
Dogs go on point. Dismount. Load and approach 2 men at a time.
Tinker was quite a character. Gave us a big pre hunt speech about how hard the hunt would be....and how challenging the shots were etc...And made big point of telling no chance at all at getting a limit of birds (when we tell guides we are from New York they immediately think we live in Manhattan)
Anyway I got to snickering and he called me out on that. I told him I had a deal for him- "Bob you put the birds up and We will knock the birds down" - Bob was not a believer.
Well - we had our limits the first two days by noon. He would not hunt with us on day 3 - sent us with another guide. And we got all our birds with Him too at the Tatanka ranch.
I giggle everytime I relive this hunt!!

[Double Lab]

Mark,

Don't you just love it when you can stick it to 'em like that? Reminds me of one of my first trips to SD with an outfitter who just doesn't like someone to correct him.

He liked to supply ammo to the shooters for extra cost and he believed that they needed 12ga, 1 1/4, 6's. So when I uncased my 20ga Parker and stuffed it with 7/8oz of 7 1/2's he told me that if I wounded too many birds he would have to ask me to leave the field. Yeah, right. Fast forward to the next year and more of the guys were toting 20ga guns. He almost had a stroke when I showed up that year with a 28ga. Dumped him after that year and found a great family to hunt with and this will be our 15th or 16th year I believe. Still hunting with the 20's and 28's.

[Mark Kircher]

Daryl
It was exceedingly satisfying on this occasion! Mr. Tinker was not a timid man and was proud of his opinions!
He too was not impressed with our gun selection as we all showed up with 20 bore guns.
As a good friend of ours says "an ounce of shot is an ounce of shot - no matter what gun it comes out of" while that can be disputed there is a bunch of truth to it. 20's and 28's get alot of work done!!!

[Double Lab]

"an ounce of shot is an ounce of shot - no matter what gun it comes out of" while that can be disputed there is a bunch of truth to it. 20's and 28's get alot of work done!!!

Not meaning to hijack this thread any further but I learned a long time ago it's not how much shot you put in the air but where you put it. 3/4 of an ounce delivered to the head is better than an 1 1/4oz delivered to a hit-too-far-back body shot.