Weather made shooting tough, but happy hunters found plenty of birds during the opening weekend of the Kansas pheasant season.

Opening-day results almost mirrored the predictions of the Wildlife and Parks upland bird forecast.

Plenty of birds were seen, but the most taken were in the central, northern, and west-central portions of the state. Activity was generally heavy on the opening Saturday, but all regions reported low hunter numbers Sunday.

In Region 1 (northwest, Wildlife and Parks staffers reported an average number of hunters, but more birds than in previous years and fair to very good bag limits. As in every other region, high winds made shooting difficult, and warm temperatures slowed dogs and made finding good shots difficult.

In Region 2 (northeast), little activity was reported. A relatively low number of hunters achieved moderate success although they were seeing birds, mostly flushing wild.

Husker, a Brittany hunting dog, retrieves a downed roster to owner Keith Patterson, who was hunting near Nickerson on the opening day of pheasant season.

Hunting success was much better in Region 3 (southwest). One group of 19 hunters reported taking 64 pheasants. Although this was exceptional, many small groups were reporting success.

Region 4 (south central) hunters enjoyed success, particularly the western and northern counties of the region. Although birds were flushing wild, many groups reported averages of two birds per hunter, higher than most years.

Region 5 (southeast) saw the lowest hunting pressure, largely because this area of the state is not pheasant country. Some hunters reported seeing good numbers of quail, however.

Region 5 was the only one with a road check station, providing a true measure of the success rate for areas where hunters had been more concentrated in the west, but were now traveling to their homes in the east.

“We checked a lot of happy hunters,” KDWP staffer Mike Little said. “We inspected 783 pheasants and 84 quail. That’s a pheasant-success rate of 2.32 birds per hunter.”

With cooler weather to come, and perhaps snow in December and January, Kansas hunters can expect good bird hunting throughout the winter.

The upland bird season will run through Jan. 31.