TRIUMPH OF THE BIRD PEOPLE

If you ask Robert Hix, regional representative of Pheasants Forever in Colorado and Wyoming, pheasant hunting during the harvest season is “deeply rooted” in his veins and represents “Americana at its best.”

He remembers walking the fields of Northwest Iowa at age five, toy gun in hand, as he pretended to hunt the birds in the late 1960s. Five years later, he gained a Hunter Safety Card and single-shot shotgun, allowing him to turn what was once pretend into a real-life endeavor. “It wasn’t until” his mid-twenties, Hix said, that he began hunting in Eastern Colorado. There, he noticed a curious sight. The foliage appeared strangely plentiful in the area… almost as if it had been set up just for him.

“Before I was hired for Pheasants Forever,” Hix said, laughing, “I would be out in Phillips County and Yuma County, and just wonder, ‘Who planted all these trees out here?’”

National award winners

The Phillips County Chapter of Pheasants Forever, who designed many of Hix’s hunting spots, has earned national recognition for the second time since 2001 by winning the organization’s Habitat Award. The Pheasants Forever page detailing its 2023 National Chapter Awards states this chapter, located in Holyoke, “has always been a leader in nesting habitat, pollinator acres and public access.”

Seven hundred sixty local chapters of Pheasants Forever and its quail conservation division, Quail Forever, exist across the United States and Canada. “Hundreds and hundreds” of them, Hix believes, deserve recognition for their work and it always proves difficult for him to see only one picked for each of five categories.

“But… all the chapters in Eastern Colorado should celebrate Phillips County’s award as a joint award, too,” he said. “Our chapters in Eastern Colorado and even our chapters in the big city – along the Front Range, where we have chapters in the metropolitan areas – are raising significant funds, with great educational outreach.”

Dedicated volunteers

Holyoke’s chapter, the web page states, has planted more than one million trees and shrubs across Phillips and Sedgwick counties – stretching hundreds of miles in all – and established protected areas “with fantastic nesting and winter cover, most of which are still thriving today.” The chapter’s 700 pivot corners, the page states, “permanently protect more than 2,000 acres — all of which are open to public access.”

Structuring these acres, Chapter President Bruce Rosenbach said, is his “specialty.” In the 20 years following the group’s founding in 1990, he continued, his chapter placed “thousands and thousands” of wind breaks, plum thickets, shrubs and tall switchgrass (used by pheasants for nesting).

They went a step further for habitat upon pairing with Corners for Conservation, a partnership between Pheasants Forever, and Colorado Parks and Wildlife that began in 2016 to address a growing loss of the birds’ habitat statewide.

“We [were missing] the bug element: the butterflies, the bees,” Rosenbach said. “So, we started including flowers in our Corners for Conservation mix.

“When our hens nest, the chicks need to have bugs; they can’t eat grain until the fall of the year.”

The National Chapter Awards page states Phillips County now maintains the most Corners for Conservation acres in the state, an assessment with which Rosenbach agrees.

Importance of banquets

Since his chapter began, Rosenbach said, it has followed the Pheasants Forever philosophy of doing “the work” and then spending the money earned to help the group as its members see fit. His chapter, he said, has managed to succeed in a large part thanks to the efforts of its annual banquet organizers.

These events tend to occur at the opening of pheasant season, Banquet Chairman Gary Hershfeldt said, usually during the second week of November. At the banquets, he continued, hundreds of community members arrive and people are happy to donate however they can, whether it be through giving items for the live or silent auctions, or just giving money in general.

Group challenges

Every member, Hix stressed, allows Pheasants Forever to continue as an organization – even if some of them only participate through the banquet and membership dues. That said, Rosenbach added, the older members are having more trouble meeting the physical demands of volunteer work and Pheasants Forever needs the younger generation “to step up pretty soon.”

“We don’t do as many trees because we need younger people in the organization,” he said. “We’re getting too old to do the physical labor…most of our members have either retired or they’re really close to retiring.”

Drought has proved another issue in recent years. Dry conditions have placed a dent in pheasant populations, according to Hershfeldt, who noted many of the birds’ hatcheries likely have not survived 2022.

“Driving around, you don’t see the birds you used to,” he said. “Hopefully, with a good, wet spring and a good summer, we’ll get some hatcheries that will survive.”

‘Resilient animals’

Regarding the drought, Hix expressed optimism for the future. As a lifetime hunter and employee of Pheasants Forever for 15 years, he said, he knows the birds “will come back”

“They are resilient animals, they are incredible upland birds,” he said. “We have plenty of them out there to rebuild our population; we just need good habitat, which is why this chapter won that award, because of what they deliver every year for putting habitat on the ground.”

Bringing in women

As for new members, Hix said, he wants to start a “Women on the Wing” chapter in Colorado. While his mother did not participate in hunting, he noted, she did support her family in its hunting and fishing excursions, and camped with them on trips

Women, he continued, are a growing demographic in hunting: Even Pheasants Forever’s new CEO, Marilyn Vetter, happens to be a woman.

“We need to get our moms involved and we need to get ladies involved,” he said, “and they want to be involved.”

Camaraderie when searching for pheasants, Hix said, has proved to be “unlike most hunting sports.” Though fewer birds have been spotted with the drought, he continued, he has seen more hunters each year – many of them younger.

The focus is not on harvesting birds, he said; rather, like the people who sat around fires “10,000 years” in the past, modern hunters have learned to appreciate those with them on the journey.

To see the chapter award winners, visit www.pheasantsforever.org/chapterawards.