i just started hunting this year and i live in eastern PA. Pheasant season just opened and i wanna try and hunt everything i can during the seasons’. What is the best places to find pheasant i don’t think i have ever seen one. Like wooded areas? fields? etc.. any advice you can give me.

pheasant have a daily schedule just like us. they start asleep in their roosts. these are easy to identify as a small patch of flattened out grass about 10 inches in diameter. usually the roost will have droppings in it too. from the tall grass where they roost, they move to feed at about daylight. pheasant prefer agricultural fields like corn, milo, soybeans, sunflowers. if there arent any agricultural fields then they will feed on native seedy grasses. after feeding for a while they look for gravel to help digest their food. after that they move back to cover, either the same place they roosted, or brush and tree lines, just because brush and tree lines provide cover too. they hide out the day there and might go to feed again before FLYING back to the roosting area. the reason i emphasize flying is because pheasant never walk to their roosting area although they walk prretty much everywhere else they go. they fly into the roost to prevent leaving a scent trail on the ground for predators to find.

as far as hunting them goes i like to catch them just after daylight when they are moving from the roost to feed fields. i usually hunt the edge of the grass next to feed. or if a grass field is across the road from a feed field, then i walk down the road side of the grass field. after that i move to feed fields like corn or milo stubble, something with a little cover and food. after that i might move to tree lines or thickets and work those, looking for a mid-day straggler. the only thing that prevents a pheasant from his daily rounds is the weather. during a big snow storm pheasant move to the thickest, tallest shelter they can find to survive the storm, they might stay there for 2 days until the weather breaks. so this is a great time to find them. the warmer the weather is, the more likely they are to run instead of fly. the best time to hunt pheasants by yourself is when there is ice or a few inches snow in the ground. they dont like to run and will sit still, giving you a better chance to get close. even extremely cold weather will keep a pheasant from running because they dont want to give up their warm spot.

LASTLY: use a dog. even if its the family boxer. if you have access to a dog that will stay close and come when its called then take him with you. (assuming he is big enough and sturdy enough to navigate the brush.) even if your dog doesnt flush or point birds they are still useful. dogs cover lots of ground and have four feet. all those footsteps moving around causes pheasant to sit still instead of run. he doesnt want to leave a scent trail for all those footsteps to follow.