A12
SPORTS
East Oregonian
Tuesday, January 18, 2022
Birds:
CCC:
Continued from Page A11
Continued from Page A11
into a shallow draw. Cattle
were grazing on the distant
ridgeline among the bunch-
grasses.
The weedy cover held
nothing, but at the conver-
gence of cattle, bunchgrass,
and setter, Yuba came to a
jerking halt. I closed in on
Yuba, smiling with the antic-
ipation of a covey rise. Yuba
relaxed as I approached and
peeled off in pursuit over
200 yards across a saddle
in the ridge. This was no
Hun covey. Her fi nal point
came with confi dence and I
circled widely to pin the bird
between us, but the bird was
not about to quit. I caught
a glimpse of the rooster
low-crawling through the
sparse bunches and couldn’t
help but laugh as the bunch-
grass faded into starthistle,
exposing the rooster, and
pressuring him to take wing.
Yuba stood steady to fl ush
with an exasperated look.
A year later I dropped
two setters in that covert,
and their teamwork put a
wily rooster in the bag. The
main lesson was that good
pheasant coverts need not be
brushy, wet, or draw-bottom
habitats. I’ve since found a
number of unsuspected back-
pocket pheasant sites in what
I would call prime Hun cover.
Grazed lands add an
element of randomness as
you can never predict the
condition of the parcels.
Many times, I have parked
at the foot of a steep slope,
gnawed to the soil, and
thought, no way am I plod-
ding up and over that greasy
grassless mud mound. But
I never let myself get away
with a lazy mindset. You
never know what hidden gem
may lie on the other side of
the hill.
My older pup, Finn, ran
a parcel like this one New
Year’s Day. It was a muddy
slope with a perennial creek
along the road, denuded of
vegetation. I nearly drove on
to the next parcel, but Finn
and I hoofed it up and over,
down to each confer-
ence when it comes to its
postseason policies. The
Cascade Collegiate Confer-
ence has little wiggle
room for canceling games
or moving the schedule
around in order to meet
those deadlines, hence the
forfeit rule.
“At this point, we
have not said anything
about putting a pause on
anything,” he said. “We’re
beholden to some deadlines
to complete our season
and have our representa-
tives make it to the NAIA
national tournaments, so
you kind of have to work
backwards from those
deadlines.”
Member schools
control attendance
policy
Brad Trumbo/Contributed Photo
Llewellin setter Finn with a hard-won late-season rooster from the sparse partridge covers.
crossed a few fences, and
found a single 20-acre strip of
beautiful Hun cover between
two wheat fi elds.
This day, the cover
was empty, but recent scat
suggested a covey may have
been present with better
timing. Two whitetail sheds
provided consolation, laying
on the wide-open hilltop
among a struggling rabbit-
brush community.
Draw bottoms thick with
woods rose and blackberry
nearly always hold quail.
Bunchgrass islands among
sagebrush can hold a surpris-
ing number of pheasant.
Riverside bluff s on the Snake
and Owyhee are known for
chukar. Not every new cover
is a good fi nd, but when the
stars align, you can stum-
ble upon a covert so fi ne
you don’t dare expose it, not
even to your mother as she
gabs over the phone from her
Del Ray Beach retirement
condo – like the wild pheas-
ant stronghold I found last
month, again while seeking
Huns.
Go into every late season
hunt expecting to hike longer
and harder, experience the
unknown (maybe only to
you), and come away with
valuable information. Cata-
log your new covers and
don’t be too quick to judge.
New sites often warrant a
second look before writing
them off . Not all covers will
be worth even the fi rst look,
but crossing off terrain that’s
not worth your time can be
just as valuable as fi nding a
new gem.
Aerial imagery is an
amazing tool for mapping
out covers across the season,
but it takes ground work to
validate the imagery. Each
parcel is like a new mine
claim. Will you strike it rich
or bust? The unknown is part
of the fun. And one thing
about gambling is certain: if
you don’t play, you can’t win.
It takes homework, boots on
the ground, and endurance
to score wild birds in the late
season public covers.
———
Brad Trumbo is a fi sh and
wildlife biologist and outdoor
writer in Waitsburg, Wash-
ington. For tips and tales of
outdoor pursuits and conser-
vation, visit www.bradtrumbo.
com.
The Cascade Collegiate
Conference has no confer-
ence-wide policy for a
potential limit on fan atten-
dance, relying on member
schools to make the best
decision based on their
location and the current
status of COVID-19 in each
community.
“That is a school-to-
school policy, so it’s all
kind of depending on
what’s happening at that
particular location in terms
of caseload and what the
school feels comfortable
with,” Cashell said.
Cashell also noted there
is not a minimal thresh-
old if multiple teams were
dealing with COVID-19
shortages at the same time.
“Ultimately, we don’t
know week in and week out
what the virus is going to
do,” Cashell said. “Trying
to reschedule things is
problematic then, because
you have no idea if we’d
even get to that point.”
The three wins received
by the Eastern women’s
team will count toward
head coach Anji Weiss-
enfl uh’s career record as
she pursues 500 career
wins. The Mountaineers
propelled to 9-1 in the
Cascade Collegiate Confer-
ence standings after recent
forfeiture victories.
“Basically the rules in
the NAIA state that forfeits
do count towards overall
stats,” Cashell said. “They
do count towards your
win-loss record as a team
and as a coach.”
It remains to be seen if
COVID-19 cancellations
will continue to plague
the winter sports season.
Fortunately for the Moun-
taineers, all five of the
school’s involved cancel-
lations have resulted in
wins for Eastern. With that
being said, the script could
quickly fl ip as the pandemic
is hardly predictable. At the
midway point in the winter
sports seasons, the Cascade
Collegiate Conference is
set on pushing through and
fi nishing off winter sports
despite the cancellations.
ON THE SLATE
Schedule subject to change
TUESDAY, JAN. 18
Prep girls basketball
Pilot Rock at Enterprise, 5 p.m.
Echo at Condon, 6 p.m.
Weston-McEwen at Heppner, 6 p.m.
Irrigon at Riverside, 6 p.m.
Elgin at Nixyaawii, 6:30 p.m.
Prep boys basketball
Huntington at Long Creek/Ukiah,
4:30 p.m.
Elgin at Nixyaawii, 5 p.m.
Pilot Rock at Enterprise, 6:30 p.m.
Weston-McEwen at Heppner, 7:30 p.m.
Irrigon at Riverside, 7:30 p.m.
WEDNESDAY, JAN. 19
Prep girls basketball
La Grande at Pendleton, 5:30 p.m.
Nixyaawii at Imbler, 6 p.m.
Prep boys basketball
La Grande at Pendleton, 7 p.m.
Nixyaawii at Imbler, 7:30 p.m.
College women’s basketball
BMCC at Treasure Valley, 4:30 p.m.
College men’s basketball
BMCC at Treasure Valley, 6:30 p.m.
THURSDAY, JAN. 20
Prep girls bowling
Hermiston vs Southridge, 3 p.m.
Prep boys wrestling
Hermiston at Hanford High School,
6 p.m.
College women’s wrestling
EOU vs. Southwestern Oregon CC,
Salem, TBA
EOU at Corban, 5 p.m.
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