Ring-necked pheasant rooster in snow under shrubs

Pheasant Winter Cover Starter (22 Plants) | Spring 2027

Name: Pheasant Winter Cover Starter (22 Plants) | Spring 2027
Brand: Montana Fruit Trees
Price: 539.99 USD
Availability: InStock

$539.99 $639.93 16% Off

Reliable shipping

Flexible returns

Ripening

Will it finish before your first hard freeze?

Check it on the Ripening Map (opens in a new tab)

The shrub and small-tree rows of a pheasant winter shelterbelt: plants that catch snow and hold fruit into winter. Every species here is on South Dakota's Woody Habitat list for wildlife shelterbelts.

What you get	22 plants: Buffaloberry (5), Sea Buckthorn (5), Golden Currant (3), Mountain Ash (3), Hawthorn (3), Dolgo Crabapple (2) and 1 Rescue Applecrab (Dolgo full size, 4-6 ft., pruned to 5 ft.). Bare root, shipped or picked up in Missoula in spring 2027, roots wrapped in moist sawdust. Guaranteed to bud out.
Hardy to	Zone 3 (winters to about -40°F). Check your spot with our cold hardiness calculator.
Winter food	North Dakota Game & Fish recommends native suckering shrubs that bear fruit for late fall and early winter food. Sea buckthorn berries hang on from September through winter, and mountain ash berries stay on the tree all winter.
Pollination	Buffaloberry and sea buckthorn come as male and female plants, and five of each gives good odds of both. Rescue pollenizes the Dolgos.

This Is a Starter, Not the Whole Belt

Pheasants need wide winter cover. South Dakota GFP says 9 or more rows are needed, because narrow belts fill in with snow. University of Minnesota Extension lays it out as two shrub rows on the windward side to catch drifting snow, then four or more conifer rows, then one or two shrub rows on the leeward side, with shrubs 3 to 6 ft. apart in the row. Use this bundle for the shrub rows and add conifers as you go. Put any food plot on the windward side, close to the cover.

Cost-Share

South Dakota's Woody Habitat Program reimburses 75% of wildlife shelterbelt costs (90% if it's enrolled in public access). In Montana, FWP's Upland Game Bird Enhancement Program and NRCS EQIP (practices 380 and 612) fund shelterbelts. Most programs need a plan approved before you buy. Minnesota's RIM easements take natives only, and sea buckthorn and Dolgo aren't native.

Heads up: sea buckthorn suckers hard and will spread. Plant it where that's what you want.

Protect Them

Deer, elk and moose browse young plants hard, and bucks rub trunks in fall. Cage each tree until it's out of reach: a welded-wire cage about 5 ft. tall and 3 ft. across works for deer. Where elk come through, MSU recommends an 8 ft. fence with a top rail. Trunk tubes alone won't stop rubs. Water with drip the first couple of summers.

Is Planting This Baiting?

Growing plants is habitat work. Rules on fruit or nuts you pick, move or pile up vary by state, so check your state's hunting regs before you hunt over it.

For the full how-to (why these plants work, spacing, protection and timing), read our pheasant winter cover guide.

See our other wildlife bundles on the wildlife orchard bundles page.

Photos: pheasant by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (public domain), via Wikimedia Commons.