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After two decades of promoting pheasant habitat conservation, the Mitchell chapter of Pheasant Country Ltd. is joining Pheasants Forever, a like-minded national organization that has more than 600 chapters in North America.

“We feel that after 24 years of success as Pheasant Country Ltd., we want our organization to move up another step on the ladder and grow bigger and better,” said chapter president Dave Allen, of Mitchell.

Allen said that uniting with Pheasants Forever — and its numerous chapters and members — gives local outdoorsman a better voice on federal and state conservation policy issues, while still maintaining local habitat and youth program efforts.

Pheasants Forever has 650 chapters in the United States and Canada and more than 115,000 members. In South Dakota, there are 34 chapters.

Pheasant Country Ltd. held a unique distinction throughout its history, growing from a grassroots effort into a formidable advocate for South Dakota pheasant hunting, and especially pushing for the development of pheasant habitat.

For years, the Mitchell group has hosted its annual banquet on the eve of the state’s pheasant-hunting opener, regularly drawing more than 600 attendees, making it the largest outdoors-related event in the region. The money generated from the event stayed locally and was used to fund local hunting-related causes, with most of the money directed into food plot and conservation programs throughout the Mitchell area.

Each spring, the group provides free seed to enrolled landowners; the seed is then planted and generally left alone, providing acres of food plots. Typically, the group donates approximately 3,000 bags of seed each year.

In the 1990s, the organization began helping fund shelter belts in the region. Today, upwards of 1,000 acres of shelter-belt trees that were aided by Pheasant Country money dot the lands around Mitchell.

The group showed steady growth from its unlikely beginning as simple coffee-table discussion in the 1980s.

“When they started 24 years ago, they didn’t know it would be this big,” Allen told The Daily Republic Wednesday. “And now we have a chance to be bigger.”

Although $30 per ticket at the banquet will now go to the national Pheasants Forever organization, Allen said all of the money raised inside the Corn Palace at the banquet will stay locally. Fundraisers that night include various auctions, raffles and giveaways.

With the price of a ticket, each banquet attendee becomes a member of Pheasants Forever and also receives five issues of the organization’s magazine.

The other payoff, Allen said, is “we get a more support from national (Pheasants Forever).” That support includes more opportunities for promoting youth and habitat programs, as well as access to Pheasants Forever’s biological staff. Allen said the latter is “a big deal” to members and area landowners.

Allen said the Mitchell banquet now becomes Pheasants Forever’s second-largest banquet fundraiser.

The chapter’s local support of habitat and other programs will continue, Allen said.

In a press release, Pheasants Forever President Howard Vincent said Pheasant Country Ltd. has “a tradition of doing great habitat work, and we know the chapter can build on that foundation as part of Pheasants Forever.”

He said South Dakota is the nation’s pheasant capital, “but like the rest of the pheasant range, the state faces serious challenges in terms of expiring Conservation Reserve Program acres and other losses of habitat. Having a Pheasants Forever chapter in a pheasant stronghold such as Mitchell adds numbers to our cause and strength to our voice.”