First Woodcock

Brother in law shot a doe last weekend with his bow at my place in Houston county. While tracking her I flushed a nice full grown woodcock. This was on October 28th. The earliest I have seen a woodcock at my place previously was around Thanksgiving. Really surprised me - especially considering the weather was extremely warm with no fronts up north to push them down.

When does season open?

Dec 18. I've never hunted woodcock and would really like to.

I would Love to hunt them.
Any outfitter/place close To houston..

Seen them, flushed them. Never hunted them.

If the quail population drops back I might.

Sorry, Bill. Been at the farm deer hunting without service. Yes, Dec. 18th - Jan. 31st.

As a matter of fact, had 3 fly right over the house at dusk, while cooking on the grill. Ol' Weimeraner got excited.

Did not see the first till week of Thanksgiving last year.

Started by accident 3 years ago. Heckuva good time hunting them. Haven't perfected it yet, but getting a little better every year.

Poor Jenny thinks we are going every time I load the stuff to go deer hunting.

Beautiful girl. Can't wait for this year. Last year we got a decent idea of where to find them. Now, we just have to hit them!

Nice pup

Thank you! She's my baby - I admit I can get a little obnoxious posting pics of her this time of year.

I wouldn't blame her if she bit ya for getting her all riled up for nothing.

That is a good looking shorthair! How old is she?

I've never even seen a woodcock, in Texas or anywhere else for that matter. Sounds like the guys that hunt them a lot have quite a love affair with them. And don't apologize for pictures, we all suffer from the same ailments!

Now that I know where Houston Co. is, guess I'll take my pup next time I get down to my dad's place in Tyler. Would love to at least see one.

Thanks! She is almost 6 - almost time to get started!

Here's a morning's work for Jenny:

Couple more favorites. Amazing how they go from goofy pups to all business hunting machines when they hit the woods.

My unusual this far west Young county TX population of Woodcock has already showed up on our lease there. Hoping to be there on the 18th for the opener.

Mine is just learning about the all business thing, but he came a long ways over the weekend. It all got real to him after a few birds hit the dirt Saturday morning.


This was warm up run on some New Mexico quail.


Our morning take came in a slightly larger package!

Lol it's all good! Looks like a great hunt. Jenny "pointed" wood thrushes, cardinals, squirrels, and just about anything else her first year. Thankfully, none of them held like a woodcock - so as I managed to scratch a few pointed woodcock down she quickly figured out what we were after. Then the "all business" gene kicked in.

Very nice.i like the white. My dark dog would disappear in that muddy timber. Nice pics.

95% of the woodcock population on the N. American continent roost within a 100 mile circle of Baton Rouge ------------ 3 of us hunting in dense wooded/wet area with 2 dogs, walked up on a deer hunter in a tree stand ------ I expected him to be aggravated that we were there,,,, ( he was hunting with a shotgun, no shot was more than 50 yards)----- he was glad to see us because we were making the deer move around --- lol

I want to hunt over there some in the future. Heard all about it!

Nog I think we all agree you can get obnoxious with your post but it has nothing to do with your beautiful pup! Lmfao! I hope you and yours have a damn fine Christmas sir!

Well, please don't blame Jenny for my THF shenanigans. Y'all do the same Booner!

I enjoy his post.

One more week.

I would hate to be the guy taking that picture.

I was quail hunting in southern Stephens County this past weekend and the dogs went on point in a marshy drain area behind a tank berm. When we stepped in, we flushed two woodcock. No shots bc it surprised the he77 out of us. We laughed about it for 30 minutes. Hunted for two more hours and came back through the same area on the way to the truck. Pointed again and flushed another. First woodcocks I had ever seen in West Texas. We will continue to try that area after the season for them opens. I really want to get one mounted.

That's cool! I have had several buddies tell me they have encountered them in central/west TX this year. I take that as a good sign that populations are healthy and the winter migration area is growing.

Warm weather kinda messed us up but Jenny and I finally got our first couple of hunts in. She did just fine, but I had to warm up my shooting eye a little. Multiple points and finally got our 3 birds both days after I shot a few holes in the sky.

Each hunt has its stories - one of my favorites from these is Jenny dropping a bird she was retrieving about 10 yards short of me, moving over about 10 feet, and locking on another point. Sure enough, another bird was right there. Wish she had held the first bird (sure would love to have a pic of her pointed with a bird in her mouth), but I guess that's not her style.

Anyway, good times!

Great story. It still can happen.

Good times!

Great job Nog! You always seem to find them. In the picture it doesn't appear that Jenny is in too dense of a thicket. What were they holding in?

that is one good looking dog

They were in the thick stuff, yaupon mostly. It was just out of the frame.

Thanks colt45 she has been a real joy to me.

We have some woodcocks in the small tree lines that border our pastor. Nothing too thick but they still stay in there. Havn't seen much of them in a good while though... use to spook em up all the time. Maybe they will come around again.

Family illness, warm weather and other stuff have conspired to keep Jenny and me out of the woods until yesterday. She did fine, but only took a couple of birds because they were mostly in very thick stuff and didn't present a shot.

Got this one in the open though - Jenny was running pretty good and skidded to this point:

Well done Jenny.

I love those sliding points.

A little side note:
Somehow the USFWS got wind I hunt woodcock, and last year provided me a log book to log details about each hunt and send it back to them at the end of the season. This year they went a step further and asked me to send a wing from each bird taken, as they are studying migration patterns, age disbursement, bird health, etc. across the country.

Florida parishes 40 miles east of Baton Rouge we quail hunted and would get a mixed bag(wood cocks/quail). Didn't know what we had back then and for sure didn't realize we seeing the end of upland hunting as we knew it. Enjoy the moments.

Beautiful pup NP

Nice post. I used to shoot them on Avon Air Force base in Sebring FL.. along with lots of quail and snipe. That place was amazing!!
I was young and didn't appreciate it. I could never make them taste good so I quit shooting them.

I saw a few while hog hunting here in Wimberley. They were passing through I'm pretty sure. Not enough birds to hunt. I'd love to put my dog n them and try to cook one now. I bet I could make them taste great.

How do you like to prepare them?

I'm no cook. Most of the time I simply breast them, put a jalapeño inside, and wrap it all with bacon just like I do doves.

Every once in a while I try some recipe or another off the internet. Usually edible but nothing to write home about.

Jenny had one of those magical days Friday. Plus, the birds were mostly in the open and flying straight away. So we got a quick limit. (With some admittedly shot up birds.) Yesterday was windy but she still did good - fun to watch her try and work out exactly where them boogers are. Sometimes she get it exact, sometimes the best she can do is say, "In here Dad..." She pointed several but thick cover and some iffy shooting limited me to two birds.
Here's Friday's:

Saw one on my place yesterday. A beautiful bird.

Have you been able to put a pattern together what makes them out in the open compared to being in the heavy cover.

Not really. After 5 years I do notice for sure that they move closer to the fencerows/near the field in the hour before dark. I can hunt near the fields at 2 PM, find no birds and come back at 5 PM and find some. I'm still not sure how they do so without me seeing one or two flying in through the woods every now and again. But they are mostly still in thick cover even near the fields. I roughly estimate 4-5 in thick stuff for every 1 in relatively open areas.

I think I have noticed that on real foggy days we will find more of them in more open areas. That kind of makes sense because hawks and other birds of prey would have more difficulty finding them so they may feel more secure overall.

I'm still new at this. I should probably keep a more detailed log than just birds pointed/# of shots/# of birds taken as I do now. That would help.