Colorado pheasant season 2026-27: dates, units and bag limits

Pheasant is open in Colorado from November 14, 2026 to January 31, 2027, in the areas listed below. This page has the 2026-27 dates, the daily bag and possession limits, the licences you need and the rules that apply, read from the Colorado Parks and Wildlife brochure.

2026-27 season dates and limits

Shooting hours: Half an hour before sunrise to sunset.

Units we can plan for pheasant

The legal area is as the brochure words it in the table above. These are the units inside it that our maps cover: a unit missing from a list may still be open, so check the brochure.

Pheasant season, east of I-25: east of I-25

45 units: 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 95, 96, 97, 98, 100, 101, 102, 103, 106, 107, 109, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 119, 120, 121, 122, 124, 125, 126, 127, 130, 132, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147.

Cocks only.

Pheasant season, west of I-25: west of I-25

111 units: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 86, 131, 161, 171, 181, 191, 201, 211, 214, 231, 301, 361, 371, 411, 421, 431, 441, 444, 471, 481, 500, 501, 521, 551, 561, 581, 681, 682, 691, 711, 741, 751, 771, 791, 861.

Cocks only.

Licences and stamps

• Colorado small game licence
• Colorado Habitat Stamp
• Harvest Information Program (HIP) number for this season

Rules for pheasant

• Cocks only. A hen is never legal with a gun.
• Shotgun (10 gauge or smaller, no slugs, three shells at most), bow or crossbow only. No rifles or handguns.
• Keep a fully feathered wing or the head on each bird until you are home, or a foot with a visible spur.

Do not mistake these for pheasant

• Hen pheasant (protected or closed: never shoot): Plain mottled brown and buff, no white collar, no red face, shorter tail. If you did not see colour, a white ring or hear a cackle, do not shoot.
• Lesser prairie-chicken (protected or closed: never shoot): A round, barred, chicken-sized bird with a short rounded dark tail, in south-east Colorado grass and sand sage. No season.
• Greater prairie-chicken and plains sharp-tailed grouse (different season or permit): Short tails, not a long pointed one. Prairie-chickens are open only in listed north-east units; plains sharp-tails have no season.

How to hunt pheasant

• Walk cover toward its end and expect the flush there. Block the end if you have partners, and agree where everyone is before you start.
• Never shoot at a low bird with walkers or blockers ahead. Blockers wear orange.
• Work into the wind with a dog. Late in the season, hunt the thickest cattails and the last hour of light.

What a map cannot tell you

• Crop fields and most pheasant country are private. the planner offers only public ground it can show is open, mainly State Wildlife Areas and State Trust Land.
• Walk-In Access parcels, where most public pheasant hunting happens, are not in the planner yet.
• The land cover map cannot tell tall CRP grass from grazed pasture.
• Units beside I-25 are not offered until the line is mapped.

Source

2026 Colorado Small Game & Waterfowl brochure (corrections 21 Aug 2026), pages 5, 7 and 11; CPW regulations chapter W-3 (07/16/2026): https://cpw.widen.net/s/bklvf2bjmw/colorado-small-game--waterfowl-brochure. Read October 2, 2026. Rules change every year, and corrections are issued during the season: read the current brochure before you hunt.