LINCOLN – Nebraska youth got to experience an upland hunt as adult mentors took them afield for the state’s special youth pheasant hunt Oct. 22-23.
The special hunt took place on 14 wildlife management areas (WMA), where the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission released 5,445 adult roosters Oct. 21.
In total, 387 adult mentors accompanied 465 youth hunters on the hunt this year, compared to 295 mentors and 350 youth in 2015. Youth and their mentors harvested 44 wild roosters and 692 released roosters. The harvest success rate was 0.86 roosters per hunter.
Pheasants were released at the following WMAs: Pressey (Custer County); Sherman Reservoir (Sherman County); Oak Valley (Madison County); Branched Oak (Lancaster County); Twin Oaks (Johnson County); Hickory Ridge (Johnson County); Wilkinson (Platte County); Peru Bottoms (Nemaha County), Yankee Hill (Lancaster County), Cornhusker (Hall County), Arrowhead (Gage County), George Syas (Platte County), Randall W. Schilling (Cass County), and William Gilmour/Tobacco Island, (Cass County). Arrowhead, George Syas, Randall W. Schilling and William Gilmour WMAs were new additions to the list of hunting sites this year.
The highest success rates were at Peru Bottoms (1.35 roosters per hunter), Cornhusker (1.14) and Arrowhead (1.06).
The special hunt, which takes place annually during the statewide youth pheasant, quail and partridge season, was for youth ages 15 and younger. Youth could take two rooster pheasants per day while adult mentors were allowed to harvest one per day. Only one adult mentor per youth was allowed to hunt.
This was the sixth year of the pheasant releases during the special youth season, which is intended to increase youth participation in upland game hunting.
The statewide pheasant, quail and partridge season is Oct. 29 – Jan
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