Thanksgiving hunt: First of the weekend

I love the tradition of a Thanksgiving hunt.

But since college (what? going close to 30 years now) I have rarely had to the chance to do it any more.

So I was lucky that Steve Palmisano, yeah of Henry’s, invited me along on the one he and Scott Szatowski have been doing since back when they were single.

This year’s ended up quite large with steve’s two boys, Vince and Phil, Scott and his son Scottie Jr., Steve’s brother Tom and his son Joe, me and Tom Matug.

I was particularly pleased that the group of nine included three college kids and a high school freshman.

While his dog Fredo raced in to investigate, Matug brought back a bird for Phil.

The dogs were Steve’s Rusty and Fredo, yes, named for the character in The Godfather.

The site was the controlled pheasant hunting at Des Plaines CA.

I wish I could report that we piled up the birds after we split into two groups. I can’t. As it was, we ended up with 10 pheasants. The fault wasn’t the pheasants or the dogs. It was our shooting.

It’s $25 now for residents to hunt.the controlled pheasant hunts. A quirk or issue with the new reservation system allows hunters to make reservations without putting money up front. So there’s no-shows and even more than usual numbers of standby slots available.

Controlled pheasant hunts aren’t ideal, but in the modern urban/suburban world of the Chicago outdoors they may be the only way for the average hunter to put in time with his friends and dogs to hunt the birds.