CO prairie dog trip

[Mike]

I just wrapped up a prairie dog trip to eastern CO with my shooting buddies. This was our first trek into Colorado, even though we were only about 20 minutes from a place in Kansas that we shot a couple of years ago. The biggest surprise to me about CO was the sheer number of people who had flocked to the area for prairie dogs. We ran into quite a few other groups, both in town and out in the field. We never had any issues with other shooters, but seeing so many people gave me a lot of reservations about returning to such a popular place in the future.

As anyone who's driven across Kansas knows, it is not the most exciting journey and time seems to pass rather slowly. Thankfully, I found the solution...



When we arrived at our destination, we were greeted with rain showers that kept us out of the field that afternoon. Thankfully, the rain didn't last more than an hour and we were able to relax and enjoy a pleasant evening grilling steaks and dining under the stars.

The next two days were spent in a much more exciting seat...





We shot on a massive dog town for both days. The action was steady, even though the town was not densely populated. We enjoyed shooting at a relatively relaxed pace and the prairie dogs weren't educated enough to be wary of our presence. This big guy seemed to get all twisted up...



This one was head of his class...



Shortly after lunch on the second day, we looked up from shooting and saw this moving in...





As a result, we loaded up our gear and high-tailed it off the prairie before the ground turned to muck and trapped us. We were a bit disappointed to miss out on the last few hours of shooting time, but sometimes the weather just doesn't cooperate. We drove back to town and got everything packed away into the RV right before the sky opened up and poured.

Back to passing away time through Kansas on the way home...



Overall, we had a good time and enjoyed our time in the field. Thanks for sharing in the journey with me.

[Bodei]

Nice report, thanks. You guys sure know how to remain comfy!

[Rick in Oregon]

Mike - 'Cept for the weather, looks to be a great trip. Your mode of 'travel style' leaves nothing to be desired, maybe except the often mentioned cabana girls serving drinks and cleaning rifles when needed.

That's a nice rifle/bench setup there, buddy.....I bet you were comfortable, and the dogs appreciated being launched in style (grin). Thanks for sharing the adventure with us. Looks like it was alot of fun.

[bow shot]

They are so cute when their heads pop off!!! Thanks for the great tour!

[Mike]

Rick: The rifle cleaning and fully stocked bar were both self-serve, but somehow we endured. We had to cut and light our own cigars from the humidor as well. Life is rough.

I'm not sure if you're familiar with those benches or rifles, but I highly recommend giving both a spin. <grin>

[Rick in Oregon]

Rough life indeed.... now, that's MY kind of rough!

Rick:I'm not sure if you're familiar with those benches or rifles, but I highly recommend giving both a spin. <grin>

Hummm.....I'll look into it.......

[Clint E]

Mike looks like you had a great trip . I like the way you travel plenty of leg room.

[wirelessguy2005]

Thank You for sharing the photo's. If you don't mind saying what town were you at in Coloarado? I am guessing Holly.

[Mike]

Thank You for sharing the photo's. If you don't mind saying what town were you at in Coloarado? I am guessing Holly.

Bingo! Does the town advertise in all of the varmint forums or something? I really couldn't believe how many people were out there and we had no idea that the area was so well known.

[wirelessguy2005]

Last summer we were out there and only ran into one other small group shooting pdogs. There are a couple outfitters in the area that do alot of advertising and generate alot of attention. They also claim that the fields they have are so full of dogs that you can shoot all day at under 200 yards, i can tell you that statement is untrue. They typically take guys to the same fields day after day, by the middle of the summer the dogs are so skittish that you can't get within 400 yards of them. Were you guys shooting with an outfitter?

[WY-NEvarmints]

You have to love modern technology, but what is up with no video of red mist being sprayed across the prairie to up the anticipation level? Instead it's news! How depressing, I go to get away from that sort of stuff but some people are all about punishment. HEHEHE

Glad you found your corner of flat ground and didn't have to share, that would have lessened the ol fun factor. Thats the bad part about not having sole permission on a piece of property. I guess I never realized what I had before seeing how far some have to travel to do this sort of thing, or how long others have to plan to be able to, and then there are those that may never realize the dream. Man it is GOOD to live out here!

I don't suppose there is a chance that you were in a hurry packing up on the prairie and didn't remember to pack up that bench or that ol boom stick huh? Very nice set up all the way around Mike.

[Mike]

Brad:We did not use an outfitter. I lined up a couple of places to shoot a few weeks before our trip by working the phones a bit.

I can also verify that the prairie dog fields are not densely populated. According to locals, the whole area was impacted by some type of disease (not the plague) that knocked down the dog populations. There's still decent shooting, but it is not the fast and furious action that some apparently claim. We drove around the area quite a bit to see if conditions were similar to what we experienced, and they were. We even made it a point to drive over to Kansas to check out an outfitter's area that was crawling with dogs two years ago, only to see that it was the same as what we were seeing in Colorado.

WY-NE: I think Wyoming is the place to be. My best trip to date was in Wyoming, but unfortunately the plague rolled through the year after we were there and the dog populations haven't recovered enough to justify the drive. I'm happy for the rancher, but I sure do miss that place!

I did remember to pack up the bench and rifle before rolling out. Maybe I'll wander back to Wyoming next year and forget them.

[wirelessguy2005]

That's a bummer that a disease wiped many of them out. You should of seen it last year, there were so many we were running them over on the county roads as we were driving to the field that we hunted in. I think a big part of the reason that you don't see as many dogs now is because of the greedy outfitters in the area, they have overshot many of the properties and almost wiped the dogs completely out in those fields. I will say that it didn't look like there were that many mounds in the field that you were set up in, is that the case or just the way the picture was taken? A few of the fields that we were in last year had a much larger number of mounds.

[Mike]

There were a lot of mounds, so that picture is deceptive. What you describe mirrors what I saw in Kansas two years ago. I killed two prairie dogs while driving the county roads over there (neither on purpose) and one large jackrabbit. Did you use an outfitter on your trip?

[WY-NEvarmints]

I'm picturing the spot now that would work wonderfully with that rifle holding down the bench incase a little wind should blow. The dogs seem to have had pretty good success with the size of litters around here. We have quite a few along the road to work out here and there are a few new dead ones on it pretty much daily. Pretty hard being here at work and looking outside and seeing them and all the other wildlife running around.