WATERTOWN, S.D. -- The first bird came from over my shoulder on my right, high and fast.

The 16-gauge double swung through the rooster's flight and I pulled the trigger sending an ounce-and-an-eighth of number six shot towards him.

I actually heard the shot strike the rooster flush and watched as he tumbled into the high grass at the end of the shelterbelt I was blocking.

Pheasants were in the air everywhere now and other shotguns spoke. Birds were dropping and more and more were taking to the air.

A whitetail doe bounded out of the trees, took one look at me and sped into the corn on my right and Iwatched her bound across a fence and disappear into the cornstocks a couple hundred yards away.

Another rooster flew over and Idropped him and then another and my limit of three was filled.

That was when Chuck Stone, Watertown, and Gary Howey, Hartington, Neb., emerged from the shelterbelt. Their dogs were still working the tall grass against the fence line, but the pheasants were long gone.

Gary's dog, Moe, picked up the first pheasant I dropped in the tall grass. The other two had fallen in the winter wheat field where I was blocking and I had them in hand.

We counted our birds and came up four short of our nine-man limit but decided to end the hunt that afternoon.

Chuck and Gary were high school classmates back in the 1970s at Watertown high school and have kept in touch over the years.-Chuck's brothers Rick and Jack where hunting with us along with some other friends including John Wilson, a wildlife artist who lives in Watertown and who won the federal duck stamp competition 1981, and Dennis Murphy, Watertown.

Our hunt had lasted less than two hours on land the Stone brothers own and manage for pheasant hunting. Every year they plant food plots and trees to enhance CRP lands. Last year Chuck said they planted 12 1/2 acres of trees and a food plot on every quarter section.

The beneficial results of that stewardship was plain in the number of pheasants we saw and the number of whitetail deer.

The countryside west of Watertown is really a mecca for all kinds of wildlife. Countless sloughs and small lakes dot the land and provide excellent winter cover for pheasants and deer. A recent cold front had sent thousands of geese into the area and we observed huge, and I do mean huge, flocks of snow geese working the fields and resting on the lakes. Canada geese were around in big numbers as well.

The next day we headed farther west for a hunt on land owned by Jeff Hanson, Dolan, S.D. We were joined by several other hunting friends of Chuck and Jeff, including John Heber of Redfield who brought his four shorthairs for the hunt.

We walked a cornfield first and I blocked again. Chuck had said we would really see birds this day and he was right. Hundreds flew out of that field with flights of 20 or 30 taking wing at once.

The pheasants were wild as they usually are this late in the season and very few of them made mistakes. They rose high and flew hard with many of the roosters choosing to fly back over the advancing line rather than chance the blockers.

At the end of the field we counted the birds and fell six short of the limit. We decided to walk a nearby slough where we had constantly observed birds flying in and out.

Again, Ichose to block and missed rooster after rooster. It just wasn't my day. Perhaps there was too much to revel in. Thirty and 40 birds in the air at one time, no less than nine whitetails bounded out of that slough, the dog work was magnificent.

Concentration? Mine was gone. This was pheasant hunting as we dream pheasant hunting should be. This time, however, it was real.

Larry Myhre is outdoor editor of the Journal. Reach him at (712) 276-5965 or email at lfentfish@msn.com