My first time coming out to South Dakota to shoot prairie dogs, what a great humbling experience! We shall see
What tomorrow brings. Man that’s some long distance shooting!

Try shooting in teams. One who spots, ranges and calls the shot and the shooter. It helps to get instant feedback and easier on the eyes.

Yes! We kinda figured that out towards the end of the day.

How many prairie dogs did you see and hit? Do they ever wise up?

Keith

Take out the scouts or lookouts around the outer perimeter of the town first. If the scouts aren't there to warn the rest then they will come out of their dens and make easier targets. Dead prairie dogs also make good decoys.

They do wise up, where we were they was plenty of dogs pretty much constantly to see from 200-600yards all
Day. It did slow up towards the end of the day, but that was fine as everyone was getting a little
Tired as well. This is where you can really appreciate good glass.

That sounds like fun and I would like to try it sometime. The way I shoot, very few PD's would be harmed. Public land or private?

Theres a National Grasslands south of Pierre that is public land. Popular place to look for rattlesnakes in PD towns.
You can also pay to shoot them on reservations but they send a "guide" with you to sit and watch. I think you pay the guide too.

I have shot them. Just for fun when I was a kid and for bait as I got older. Got a range about 8 miles from my house you can shoot to 1300 yards. I think its just as fun to shoot paper. Cheaper too unless you live by a dog town.

Lots of BLM land West River in SD Ft Pierre national grasslands Buffalo gap grasslands a few reservations that hold dogs they have made a comeback from 15-20 years ago.

I know where their at here on this ranch in West Texas. I use this place to look for coyotes sign. There tame. Could shoot with 22 pistol. But I dont want to buy license

They are easy to shoot with a 22 if your on private property where they dont get shot at every day. I use my 22 hornet to get bait. After the ones close get nervous its easier to reach out there a bit. If you shoot them at their hole you need to run up and grab them out quick. The other residents will pull them back in and eat them. (at least I been told that's why they pull them back in)

Be carefull handling them. They have fleas that can carry plague. It's not something really uncommon either. I drop them into a small trash bag with channel lock pliers. If its good and cold just leave them outside to freeze or drop them in a freezer. Freezing kills the fleas if you give it a couple days. The fleas need to bite you to transmit the disease. I chop them into chunks while froze with an axe. Even pine martins who never seen one before will readily enter a trap for a nice chunk of prairie dog. Fox coyotes badgers cats will all respond to them.

Where about were you if you don't mind me asking. I have inlaws in the Chamberlain area.

We were is ft Pierre. Lots of fun, we went with a guide on private leased ranches

I didn't think about it much before, but at a buck or two a round, even free prairie dog hunting on public land can get expensive, when you shoot those kinds of numbers.

Keith .

Sometimes you can’t put a price on fun bub…. I also turkey believe there are some intangible lessons to be learned from it for other types of hunting

I always tell people if you hunt groundhogs out East then see thousands of p-dogs in one place it has to be priceless.

There was no lack of seeing prairie dogs, just picking the yardage you wanted to shoot. Very fun time

Those are the medic s doing the pulling

Looks like fun- what were you shooting?

Done it three times on the Fort Belknap reservation in north central Montana. Last time was 29 years ago with my son, he was 10 years old. I have used 22 lr, 17 Mach IV, 222, 22-250, 6mm Remington, 6mm AI, and last but not least for the really aggressive ones that charged, a 300 Win Mag. My first reservation license was $17 for a year. The next and last was +/- $50 I think and it included my son. The second tag started the first week of July and I went back the middle of June the following year. Two trips within the same year. This was before the "guide" requirement. Ran into one group of guys at the diner in Zortman from Washington state that were whining about the lack of shooting (15 or 20 shots) for the group. They hunted BLM land that had been pounded for two plus months. They were dumbfounded when we told them we probably got 200+ each on the reservation per day. Their immediate response was there was no way they were going to pay for the reservation tag. They admitted to saving up for two years and using up over a weeks vacation for the trip for a shoot that was a bust for the unwillingness to buy a cheap tag. DUMB!