The Nebraska Sandhills remain an anomaly, an accessible chunk of America that’s just as it was 140 years ago. It’s unbroken by the plow and undefiled by cities and trophy homes. Native grasslands sprawl for miles, providing the same habitat in which prairie chickens and sharptailed grouse have forever thrived.
Invited by Lance Kuck of Laughing Waters Ranch Outfitters, my team and I drove to the Sandhills last September to partake in some of best native upland-bird hunting in the lower 48, capturing as much video as we could along the way. We didn’t get an in-your-face slow-motion flush like we’d wanted, but only because you can’t orchestrate these grouse as you can pen-raised birds. This is a wild hunt for wild birds in wild country, the likes of which you may have never seen. But it’s there. In Nebraska.
Ron Spomer is a senior editor at Sporting Classics. Check out his new smartphone app, “Everything Whitetail.”