For the most part, most of the fires around eastern Oregon have been contained or are out. It could have been a lot worse, but a lot of the chukar habitat is still there. I was imagining the worst and thought a couple of the fires would blow up and burn most of the land accessable from the Brownlee reservoir road, but luck was on our side and there is abundant public land to hunt. Steep land mainly, so we’ll still have to earn our birds. It looks like most of the Malheur county land west of Vale and norh to I84 is gone. I’m sure there will be some pockets left unburnt, but I haven’t been over there to give any kind of hope.
So far Idaho has been lucky as far as fire go. Except for one popular area north of Emmett. Paddock Valley is burning up right now and the fire has reached 20,000 acres as of the fire report this morning with no containment yet. So if your plans include that area it looks like you might rethink them. With that being said, there is still tons of public land and access yes land to hunt.
I still haven’t been out for any kind of personal inventory of chukars and huns, but I’ve got lots of great reports on the bird numbers. It’s still looking like a banner year, and if we don’t get a bunch of new fires it’s looking a lot more positive than it did a couple of weeks ago.
Let’s hope for the weather to cool and some rain to help knock down the fox tails and cheat stickers. Good luck out there and stay cool.
paddock is now 60,000 acres no containment
Jump creek is 20,000 with 80% containment
I wouldn’t jump for joy yet
we’ve 2 more months of fire season , a bad one at that
pray for a miracle . We’ve lost a ton of land and many hunters are displaced from their normal areas
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Thanks for the update.
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paddock is 118,000 no containment
there’s another fire out of Jordan valley that’s 11,000 acres
by 3 forks
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That explains all the smoke here in Horseshoe Bend. Lot’s of good hospitable country over in the Paddock area and the fuel was exceptional this year there. Real bummer. Thanks for the update and I’ll be looking at the other fire you mentioned.
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I took a drive yesterday out to Brownlee. I saw 8 coveys of chukar and two coveys of huns. Lots of litt
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nodnocph. I assume the end of your report was lot’s of little ones. Good report and thanks.
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looks like I need to find new country to hunt…..I just checked the 118,000 acre map.
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it’s all gone , we’ve lost about a million acres in Oregon and Idaho
that’s big time cause snd effect
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Greg. 154,000 now and where you usually camp is about the center of it all. It’s really bad over there.
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