Hunting Classes with the Seasons

Our courses take place in a hunting landscape, with the opportunity to shoot pheasants seven months of the year, and ducks and geese in season.  In the summer, we offer non-hunting wingshooting classes, where we use clay targets to practice specific hunting drills, and cover all the main hunting topics, such as safety and strategy, so you can set up a practice regime at home to prep you for hunting season.  

Choose the best time for you (subject to availability)

Safe & Savvy classes can be taken from early September to early November and from 1  to 31 March.

September is the start of our Preserve season.  Doves and snipe may visit if us we are lucky.  Early September can be very hot (in the 90s) or mild (in the 70s).  We release birds on 1 September and give them a few days to settle in before applying any hunting pressure.  The older they get, the more they behave like wild birds.  So if you're after a hunting experience where the birds are relatively unwary, September is the ideal time.

October gives way to waterfowl hunting, and wood ducks, teal and mallards can be plentiful, and can be added to the hunt.  The weather is usually mild, though we usually have a couple of days of snow during the month.  2016 was the wettest October on record, however, yet made for excellent hunting.  By mid-October, the released birds are hard to tell from the wild birds.

November is a classic month to experience a full range of birds in Montana.  It can be surprisingly mild until close to Thanksgiving  - perfect hunting weather!

December through February can be bitterly cold and target practice outdoors would be miserable.  However, if you like the cold, we can do a lot of gun-mounting drills indoors, going outside "just" for the hunting.  Our goose season ends late January, and in some years, it has been extremely mild, with all the ice gone from the river by the end of season, making for very pleasant hunting.  But it could go either way.  Custom rates available on request.

In  March, the weather is brisk, with many sunny days, and snowfalls are rare.  Sunsets can be magnificent!  It's a great time to brush off the winter cobwebs and get some vigorous outdoors activity, with more daylight hours to enjoy yet still have a blazing log fire at night.

From April to August, it's nesting and chick rearing  time, so  geese, ducks and pheasants are preoccupied.  This is when we hold our more relaxed summer program, with plenty of optional extras, such as fishing, kayaking and even frog-gigging! But we can still teach a lot of hunting skills and shoot clay targets on request.  This is a great time for people to explore whether hunting is for them, and to get skilled up in time for when hunting season begins.