WRITTEN BY: GEORGE DUKE | RANCH SALES | LICENSED IN MT, WY
Upland game bird hunting in South-Central Montana is no longer a secret. The Clarks Fork of the Yellowstone River valley all the way down into Wyoming and the surrounding Pryor Mountains foothills to the east, on the Crow Indian reservation, offer spectacular hunting opportunities for sharp-tailed grouse, Hungarian partridge, and ring-necked pheasant.
When I was growing up in northwest Wyoming around Cody, you could almost always get access to bird hunting on most ranches just by stopping in and asking permission from the landowners. But those days have long since disappeared. Today, most game-rich ranches in northern Wyoming and south-central Montana are private hunting only. Landowners either hunt themselves and are keen to keep the hunting good for their family and friends, or they lease hunting rights out as another valuable source of income for the operation as a whole. However, the public hunting opportunity is still terrific in Montana through the Block Management program, wherein landowners allow walk-in-only hunting to the general public in return for compensation for each hunter-day by the state Game & Fish Department.
I gradually developed my passion for wing shooting and upland bird hunting from my father, Pony Duke, who loved hunting pheasant, huns, and grouse. Like a lot of old elk hunting guides of his generation, as he became older, he cared less and less for all the time and work associated with big game trips and became more and more of a bird hunter. Having Labrador retrievers you love who live for the hunt, being able to experience a great hike in a beautiful country, and bringing home excellent food for the table all in one fine day, then doing it all over again makes life worth living!
