Where the Hen’s and Our Fall Pheasant Crop is Right Now
While most of us are thinking about anything but pheasants in June, the hens are doing the most important work of the year. Everything that you see explode into the air come October was tucked in the cover of grass over these few weeks. Here is what’s happening.
The laying is mostly behind her. May is the peak month for egg laying, and June is the peak of the hatch. A hen lays roughly one egg a day until her clutch is complete — usually 8 to 12 eggs — and only once that last egg is down does she settle in to incubate. That’s a detail worth knowing, she doesn’t start sitting until the clutch is finished, so the whole batch hatches together.
Now she sits. Incubation runs about 23 to 24 days, and the hen does all of it alone — the rooster’s job ended back in spring. For three-plus weeks she’s locked to that nest, leaving only briefly to feed, in a shallow scrape tucked into idle grassland, CRP, winter wheat, a cattail swale, or a hayfield. It’s the most exposed she’ll be all year. Predators, weather, and haying activities are all working against her. Despite all the obstacles, the sheer diligence of the toughest 2 pounds of birds always seems to produce plenty of opportunities for us here in South Dakota.
Peak hatch lands around mid-June. In South Dakota, peak hatch is generally pegged around June 10th. When the eggs go, the whole brood hatches inside about 24 hours and leaves the nest almost immediately — pheasant chicks are up and following the hen within hours, not days.
One worth clearing up. People talk about a “first hatch” and “second hatch.” That’s not really how it works. There’s only one hatch per hen. She’ll attempt to nest again only if her first nest fails entirely — and June is prime re-nest season for the hens who got mowed out or cleaned out by a predator the first time around. A hen whose nest is destroyed will commonly start the whole process over. That persistence is a big part of why our bird population remains relatively stable. With the peaks and valleys mixed in, depending on annual conditions. It also explains why we experience some barely colored Roosters the first couple of weeks of season.
Once the chicks are on the ground, it’s all about bugs. Those first few weeks the chicks live on high-protein insects, not seeds — and they’re flightless and vulnerable to haying and predators for the first two to four weeks. Good brood cover is grass with an open understory at ground level and plenty of insect life — which is exactly why weedy, diverse cover beats a clean monoculture every time. Another myth to dispel is that even in dry conditions, if there are enough bugs to eat, it will provide them with the moisture they need. Watch the next bug splat on your windshield and the point is clearly displayed.
What it costs her. All of this runs the hen down hard. By August she’s in the poorest condition of the year — she can weigh up to 30% less than she did before she started laying. That’s the price of the next generation. The good news is that our birds literally live in a never-ending environment of buffet lines and they can now concentrate on replenishing the reserves.
We have received gentle and timely rains to date and June is rolling along with warm temps and ample moisture. Meaning steady bug production and the bonus of emerging weed and grass seeds. That is the perfect foundation for another strong fall rooster harvest. The birds you’ll be hunting are being made right now.
Largely unseen hidden in the grass most people drive right past without giving it a thought…