Pheasant season opens in the Lower Peninsula as the DNR releases nearly 7,300 birds, including at Monroe County’s Erie and Pointe Mouillee game areas

TEMPERANCE, Mich. — Pheasant hunters in the Lower Peninsula got their opening day Tuesday, Oct. 20, and the state is stocking birds for them, including at two state game areas in Monroe County.

The Michigan Department of Natural Resources says it will release nearly 7,300 rooster pheasants this fall and winter at 13 state game areas across the southern Lower Peninsula. Releases run Oct. 20 to Nov. 14 and again Dec. 1 to Jan. 1, matching the hunting seasons, the DNR said in a Monday bulletin.

Close to home. Two of the 13 sites are in Monroe County: the Erie State Game Area and the Pointe Mouillee State Game Area, which straddles Monroe and Wayne counties. The DNR posts maps of the parking lots at each release site on its pheasant release page. The other sites are Cornish, Crane Pond, Crow Island, Dansville, Gagetown, Lapeer, Leidy Lake, Rose Lake, St. Johns Marsh, Stanton and Townline 16. Gagetown replaces the nearby Cass City State Game Area this year.

Who pays for it. The program, now in its seventh year, is funded by the $25 pheasant license, according to the DNR. The Michigan Association of Gamebird Breeders and Hunting Preserves supplies the birds.

Wild pheasant numbers fell sharply after the mid-1900s, mostly because grassland habitat was lost to large-scale farming and suburban development, the DNR says. “For many hunters, the program gives them a chance to relive the good old days of pheasant hunting, which at one point was more popular than deer hunting,” said Adam Bump, the DNR’s upland birds specialist. “It also gives younger people the chance to go hunting on public lands and exposes the next generation to pheasant hunting.”

The rules. Along with a base license, hunters need the $25 pheasant license to hunt pheasants on public land in the Lower Peninsula or on Hunting Access Program land. Hunters 17 and younger, lifetime license holders, and people hunting on private land or at a game bird preserve don’t need it. Only roosters may be taken. The daily bag limit is two and the possession limit is four, according to the state’s small game regulations.

The calendar. The fall season runs Oct. 20 to Nov. 14 across the Lower Peninsula. A December management season, Dec. 1 to Jan. 1, is open only in the southern Lower Peninsula. In the Upper Peninsula, pheasant season is open Oct. 10 to 31 in all of Menominee County and parts of Delta, Dickinson, Iron and Marquette counties.

Sources:
Michigan Department of Natural Resources, “Nearly 7,300 pheasants to be released in southern Michigan this year,” bulletin, Oct. 19, 2026, https://content.govdelivery.com/accounts/MIDNR/bulletins/42fa361
Michigan Department of Natural Resources, “Pheasant release info” (license rules and release-site parking maps), https://www.michigan.gov/dnr/things-to-do/hunting/small-game/pheasant-release-info
Michigan Department of Natural Resources, “2026 Small Game Hunting Regulations Summary” (season dates and bag limits), https://www.michigan.gov/dnr/managing-resources/laws/regulations/small-game
Photo: Tom Koerner / U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS Mountain-Prairie), “Ring-necked pheasant at LaCreek National Wildlife Refuge (51153223622).jpg,” April 29, 2021, Wikimedia Commons, public domain, cropped and color-adjusted, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ring-necked_pheasant_at_LaCreek_National_Wildlife_Refuge_(51153223622).jpg

Bedford Township

Tags: Bedford Township · Monroe County · Hunting · Pheasant · DNR · State Game Areas