Hunting – The Crooked Arrow Blog

Montana roosters

Judging from the departing flocks of pheasants, Finn is somewhere up ahead. Old trees line a meandering ditch, with enough undergrowth to harbour a few dozen birds, apparently. I’m not sure where Bill is, I doubt he’s seeing this bird bonanza. Poor Jack, Bill’s GSP, is trying to work the birds, but Finn has lost his marbles. He busts roosters and hens faster than I can count, and despite a very deliberate forward pace all I can do is watch them sail across the open to a variety of cattail-filled water courses that cut up the stubble fields. Welcome to Montana.

Shortly after returning from Idaho, I received an email from Bill in Missoula, asking if I’d be interested to meet him in Malta, to hunt pheasants for a few days. With some friends he leases the hunting rights on a large Hutterite operation, and only a few of them actually are serious about birds. I consulted the dog, he said “yes”, I consulted my wife, she just smiled and said “go for it”, consulted the boss, he said “sure”, so after a weekend of missing many partridges, destroying what was left of my shooting confidence, we loaded up and drove the four hundred or so miles to a small U-shaped motel in the center of Malta. “Welcome Hunters”. Thank you, happy to be back.

After witnessing Finn’s performance Bill smartens up quickly and suggests we split up for the next act. I’m treated to a repeat performance, with many birds flushing in all directions, without a chance of a shot. Finn is having a fantastic time!

We grab a bite to eat, and hit up some smaller cover on the outskirts of the compound, where it doesn’t take long for Finn to put up a nice rooster, that I manage to bring down with a trepidatious swing of the gun. A few hens followed by a single rooster bust from the cattail-filled ditch a little further down, and only the females escape with their lives. The rooster falls just across the ditch, an easy retrieve for Finn, if not for the icy slush that lies between us and the bird. Finn’s a strong swimmer, and he loves the water, so when he refuses to cross a few times, I take his cues. We’re in for a bit of walk.

Bill and Jack head further up the ditch, while Finn and I double back once we have been able to cross. I don’t doubt his nose, and when we get to where I marked the fallen bird, he pops in and out of the reeds and brings it to hand. Two birds for the day, same for Bill, we head back for a bit of a rest, and an early dinner.

Fewer birds the next day, but what a great place to just walk around, poke through some cover, enjoy the fresh, but not overly cold weather, watch the dogs run, share some stories. We search through an area with high cover, near a hay stock yard, and one rooster manages to fly faster than my pellets. Or I missed.

Last night’s rain has made the trails a little slick, and we decide not to range too far onto the farm, and just hunt where we are. As I push through some cattails, I find two stationary dogs, one up against the reeds, the other quite intently looking in his direction. Is Finn honouring Jack’s point? Twenty seconds later Jack finally stops pissing, and walks off. I release Finn, who takes two steps and locks up again.

All it takes is a few tentative steps in his direction for the rooster to explode from minimal cover, headed for the reeds, his raucous cackle adding to the excitement. Somehow I force the gun close enough to the line of flight, and the winged rooster dives for the cattails. Both Finn and Jack take up the task, but the rooster jumps high and evades capture. The melee disappears, and seconds later Finn emerges on the other side. Shame on me, I doubt him, and think about calling him back to have him search where I “know” the bird to be. He proves me wrong, a short pas-de-deux ensues, dog and bird briefly airborne, but two legs and one wing prove no match for four legs and a mouth.

We change restaurants, this one becomes the scene of a fairly dedicated crowd of pool players. The dining room, like that of nearby establishments is filled with what likely are visiting hunters. The motel parking lot is slowly collecting trucks, loaded with empty coolers hoping to be filled. One party is packing up, disappointed by the lack of big bucks, trying their chances elsewhere. “South Eastern Montana”. Hopefully they get lucky there.

We need to hit the road early afternoon on Friday, to make sure they don’t close the border crossing before we are back on Canadian soil, so we stage a few shorter walks. A rooster makes me look like a fool, as I try to drop a snack, close the gun, throw it up, and find the bird. I find both triggers, the second one fires as a result of my finger slipping off the first one. The bird was not really concerned about any of that.

A little later Bill and I both double at a rising rooster. After some discussion we agree that I shot its tail off. With the wind blowing across the cattails, Finn and I follow the ditch. The bird sailed a long way, but we didn’t see it veer off course. More praise on Finn’s head will make it grow out of proportion, but an undetermined time and distance later he takes a hard left into cover, and the splashing brings a surge of hope. Here he comes, casually sauntering over with the live bird in his mouth. A gentle “hold” has him bring it right to hand. I love that dog. When I don’t hate him for running around busting dozens of birds, out of range, that is.

We find a dozen or so more birds, that earlier we pushed into this area from the same tree line as two days before. No luck getting close to them. A little weary we start back to the truck, and attention wavers. Not for Finn, who flushes a pair of sharptails from a shortgrass meadow. The two birds split up, drawing diverging semi-circles through the sky, one high above me, but in range. Temporarily unburdened by doubt, I swing with confidence and drop the bird at my feet.

We’re done, time to check the dogs, feed Finn a tailgate dinner, change boots, and fill up the tank. One more ninety-nine cents gas station coffee, a milkshake in Havre, and a jolt up to the border across an empty road. I wonder how the Canadian border guards feel, sitting in the same ramshackle building that they sat in twenty years ago when I first passed through here, while the US has treated their staff to a slightly-megalomaniac border facility, that looks totally out of place here in the middle of nowhere.

Perhaps that is why the guard shows no real interest in probing too deeply, and quickly tells me I have to back out of the chute that led to his window, because the overhead door that blocks my view of Canadian soil doesn’t work. We dash across dark highways, and make good time. Bill graciously offered me his birds, so tomorrow by this time my wife will be asking me when I plan to get rid of all the feathers in the garage.

It’s been a good trip. Maybe we can do it again some day.

Dogs, birds and sage bush

Last summer, I promised Finn we’d take at least one out-of-province hunting trip annually. For our first trip, we hunted sage grouse in Montana. This year we got invited to come to Idaho, and we didn’t hesitate long.

Day 1

The hotel in Great Falls looks a little tired, despite the ongoing renovations. Water drips from the parkade ceiling, cheap office furniture that was out of style thirty years ago piled up alongside the unmarked elevator door. The border crossing was uneventful, one twenty gauge side by side shotgun and two boxes of sixes, carried by a tired-looking old guy with a dog no cause for alarm.

We skip dinner, skip the beer, and turn in after a walk through a mostly deserted down town. I need to stop booking these cheap motels.

Day 2

We’re on the road early. In Butte we turn East, instead of following the direct route, taking the scenic backroads. Lewis and Clark, ghost towns, fly fishing shops, new housing developments. The tiny town of Ennis now has three large realtor offices. Descending from the Caribou-Targhee National Forest, we spill out onto the potato fields of Eastern Idaho. Traffic picks up closer to Idaho Falls, we miss an exit and add twenty miles to our trip. Another cheap motel, squeezed in between the highway and a series of silos. Their fans create a background hum all night, accentuated by the horns of the occasional train. Not wanting to drive anymore, I eat a dehydrated meal, washed down with a beer. Finn can’t be bothered with dinner, again.

Day 3

We meet Jacob and June early, and quickly fall in behind their truck, headed for our first hunt. June is a pup from the same kennel as Finn, one litter earlier. Slowly the terrain changes from tarmac and traffic lights to gravel and sage brush. A few more turns and we are on a two track dead-ending on the flats above a cut-up landscape. We are in a Wildlife Management Area; land set aside from agriculture, sparsely planted with crops that benefit animals.

Finn and June get acquainted quickly, and just like that we are off. Several coveys of huns bail off the cliffs like chukars, sailing to the valley below. Finn points, and Jacob gets the first sharpie of the day. Mid morning the sun gains strength, even this late into October. The dogs slow down, but not before Finn scatters a big covey. We follow up. The dogs demand all the water, and we run out. One more detour leads to a long point by Finn. His body language shows the heat, there is no intensity, he just stopped walking. A pair of sharpies flushes a long way out, and I manage to bring one down. We’re done. Two sharpies and a hun each, and lots of more birds seen, it’s been a good morning.

Later in the day we hunt cover for ruffed grouse. Finn finds a few, and I shoot one at the end of the walk, to reward him. We have a great meal of fresh birds, beans and corn. The couple of cold beers taste great too.

Day 4

Finn is limping, so he gets to sit this one out. June nicely works ahead of us, finds birds that Jacob hits, and I miss. Part of a covey flushes towards a saddle, and we follow-up. I get another chance that I squander, and a tight-holding bird in the saddle proves smarter than us, letting me pass within feet and flushing once I’ve passed. At the end of our loop, Jacob connects with the last bird to rise from a covey of huns. Another beautiful morning, in broken, mixed-vegetation terrain, with sage, grasses, occasional sunflower patches, and a few fields of something green. I try not to dwell on the misses.

We relocate to another cabin, an hour and a half North. Beautifully tucked into some trees, near a few large ponds, butting up against some hills at the end of the sage brush desert. The area is winter range for deer, elk and moose, but provides year-round habitat for sage, sharptailed grouse and huns. Where we had rocky ridges and deep valleys before, we’re now overlooking a seemingly endless relatively flat expanse of sage brush of varying density.

Towards dark we head out to walk the pond edges, to see if we can scare some ducks. Finn’s limping is mostly gone, with another good night’s sleep he will be running fit again in the morning. Small groups of ducks start flying, without giving us a real chance. The windless evening, setting sun combined with the yellowing reeds and mirror-like pond surface make for some great photo opportunities.

We sneak up to a small dam, and jump some ducks. Finn and June each retrieve one, but we may be missing a third. We see something move about three-quarters across the pond, a long swim. June goes first, calmly paddling across, making short detours left and right. She turns around not far from what we feel may be a wounded duck. Perhaps it isn’t a duck. Then Finn is up to bat, and takes the same leisurely approach, meandering across the pond, until he turns to go investigate what we hope is a bird. Whatever it is, he bumps it with his nose, and decides it’s not worth bringing. Fantastic swims by both dogs.

Day 5

Birds are scarce this morning. We stopped to take some pictures of a beautiful sunrise behind the Teton mountains. It’s June’s turn to rest up, and we hear her disapproving howls for a long time. A single sharpie flushed out of range early in our walk. Finn works hard, but it is just not a bird-filled morning. Another single sharpie flushes too close to Jacob, and finds his way into the vest.

It’s one of those afternoons where the wind is chilled enough to make a sweater not a luxury, but the sun warm enough to make the dappled shade under a big aspen tree the perfect place to be. For a few uninterrupted hours I read, watch the robins congregate and get ready for their migration, and stare across the sage flats. I can’t remember when I last had such a calm afternoon, with nothing that needs doing, nothing to worry about, and nowhere to go. Just be. Drink a lemonade. Scratch Finn behind the ear.

Jacob’s wife shows up with their ten-month old son, and cooks us dinner. Taco soup, corn bread, a cold beer. I could get used to this life.

Day 6

On the drive to our last morning of hunting, we bust a covey of a three dozen sharpies that we watch sail across the sage, hoping they’ll settle. They don’t. We suppress the tendency to follow these birds on a two mile grunt through waste-high sage, and park further down the dirt road.

Both dogs are running today. As we are getting ready, I sense more than I hear something, across the road. Four big birds sort of levitate out of the green-grey bush, and slowly, silently take off across the flats. Sage grouse! We follow up, but we don’t find them. We cross the dirt road again, and hunt slightly more open country. June and Finn work well, the sun muted by a thin veil of cloud.

Jacob shows me a plant with tiny red seeds that we found in yesterday’s bird’s crop. My internal alarm goes off, I should check on Finn. I find him stationary, tail slowly wagging. Before I can act he takes a few sideways steps, stops again, and four more sage grouse flush. We messed up that opportunity. Sorry Finn.

Not much later we are angling back towards to truck, the wind not great. Finn pops up out of the sage to my left, and freezes. He nicely holds while Jacob moves closer. June runs in front of me, and I softly call her name. She freezes and turns her nose into the wind. Both dogs are steady until Jacob gets in range. Another four sage grouse rise, I guess sage grouse live in groups of four around here. Jacob shoots the biggest one, which turns out to be a sizeable mature male, retrieved by June. What a beautiful bird. And how modest they are. Hungarian partridge flush in utter chaos, each one picking a different direction. Sharpies laugh at you while they jump. A rooster makes enough ruckus to unsettle the calmest dog or gun. But sage grouse just materialize, and almost gentlemanly try to make a silent exit.

Later that morning Jacob manages to pick off the last of a group of three sage grouse, a younger male. We don’t find any more sharpies. The sun starts to burn, the cloud cover gone, and we call it a day. It’s time to pack up, and start the drive back to Canada.

Day 7

We hit the border before nine in the morning. One car ahead of me, definitely a record. The friendly Canadian border agent asks me the standard questions, throwing in a few about the hunt and the role of the dog. We get sent on our way quickly. A five-minute border crossing, this will never happen again. I think I have officially entered the category of travelers that is deemed harmless: older, traveling with a cute dog, friendly, and genuinely surprised when he gets asked about cannabis.

Snow starts falling as we continue North.

Day 8

The return to reality is harsh. The highway is covered with snow and ice and filled with commuters. Sitting in a conference hall with 700 people feels surreal. Flashbacks recur of a sunrise on the sage flats, dusty, rocky trails, running dogs, rising birds, and lazy afternoons.

I may have dozed off a time or two. The conference coffee lacks a punch. Jacob’s morning brew was better.

Summer thoughts

It’s kind of chilly tonight. It’s been an odd day. Smoke obscured the mountain views at dawn, clouds rolled in later on, and a sudden thunderstorm provided “much needed” moisture, again.

Yesterday evening we bumped a single partridge, on top of the hill, an unusual location; and unusual to find a single this time of the year. It’s been hot and dry in June, but now that we need nice weather to create the bugs that the partridge chicks eat, we get cool and daily wet. At least we haven’t had the murderous hail yet. Still I worry about “my” birds.

Something came in the night and killed the chukars. Steadiness training with Finn was put on hold, while I fortified the bird pen. We have a pair of pigeons to work with now. A friend in need is a friend indeed, thank you, Peter. Back on track now, there is still time.

Focus on work is hard to come by these days. The mind wanders to September. It may be hot. Finn doesn’t do well in the heat. But we might hike up late afternoon, find creeks, camp, and wake up before the sun, to hunt some ptarmigan. Or at least hike some ridges, and carry a gun. We found a couple single ptarmigan up high, in barren country, just a week ago. Both were still changing from white into their summer feathers.

I inquired with an outfitter in Alaska. Six days at the lodge, three days of flying into different ptarmigan areas – they have three species up there – and three days of fishing, or looking for forest grouse. Sounded like an awesome trip. Unfortunately, I’m genetically predisposed to frugality, and my upbringing doesn’t help. As a kid, I’d get a buck for a great report card, immediately followed by a finger wag and a stern “don’t you go spend it!”

October may be a good month. Sharpies. Wandering across the plains, in and out of coulees. Maybe a trip South – past the border kind of South. I promised Finn, and myself, one out of province trip per year, going forward. Montana and sage grouse last year. Idaho, maybe. See some new country.

November will be for a few pheasant hunts, and kicking around the foothills to look for ruffies. If the snow is not too deep, maybe another look at those ptarmigan. Day hunts in the mountains are getting more difficult these days. Close to home anyway. Lots of people out there; sunrise hikes are a thing. We’ll need some time to shoot a deer, to make sure the freezer bottom doesn’t show.

December will see the odd snow-loaded hike, with hopefully the odd ruffed grouse flush. It is also too far away to really think about now.

It’s still chilly, I may go inside. Wonder how the partridge chicks are doing.

Crop Science – Addendum

A few snow storms had raged across the foothills, and what was left for berries and greens had quickly been covered. The usual covers of mixed young pine and sapling aspens, which had the undergrowth to provide both food and shelter, no longer provided either. The birds had moved.

Despite the warm-up provided by the Chinook winds further East, closer to the mountains it was still bitterly cold. Unsure where to find birds, I drove a little further West than last time, and started following a rutted trail heading North. Tall spruce trees on either side framed a pretty claustrophobic picture, with only the occasional break in the monotony where small water courses had cut into the hills side, or blow-downs had opened up the canopy. We flushed one early, but I never saw it. Finn found another, a nice male, but it had survived smarter predators. A quick run, and a flush across the trail with the sun at his back, and in my eyes, and he was safe.

We were looking for more mature aspen groves. Allegedly, ruffies switch their diet to aspen buds in winter, which are well above the frozen, snow-covered forest floor. Much of the foothills at our latitude are covered in spruce forests, not the best habitat for good bird numbers. After a while, we circled downhill and worked back South along the base of young cover, with big spruces on our right, and an open valley with lots of low willows beyond those.

We got lucky. A bird flushed from underneath the low hanging branches of a big spruce, and made a dash for a backlit opening up ahead. Feathers slowly drifted down to earth after the shot. The young-of-the-year bird lay in the snow, for Finn to retrieve. As he brought the bird, another one flushed off to our right. I couldn’t help but smile. We had one bird, it was enough.

I opened the crop to see what it had been eating. Aspen twigs and buds, a pretty rough diet, confirming what I had read. I wished the remaining birds in this area a good winter. Time for us to move on, and find some new trails. Still a little time left in the season.

Pheasants anew

Finn had shown much promise as a pheasant dog, last year, all of seven months old. Found birds, pointed birds, pointed birds where other groups with dogs had just before gone through, pointed a “covey” of four roosters, that rose one by one, the young pup staunchly remaining on point, while Kyle and I managed to kill none of them. Expectations for this season were not high, but well above moderate.

The “back 40” partridge coveys had provided good practice material, in early spring, before nesting, and in the weeks leading up to the start of the season, with the chicks flying as wild as their parents. It was not without a bit of pride that I dropped the odd hint about his steadiness. Shooting chukars during training days and a NAVHDA test had honed my skills a bit too, I thought. We were ready to have a great pheasant season!

We had drawn three slots at the Taber Pheasant Festival to kick things off. The first afternoon Finn and I and nobody else, because everybody canceled, overlooked an expanse of cattails, with a few drainage ditches leading in and out of it. I was just going to take it slow, let Finn do his thing, get some good points, work on steadiness, and perhaps shoot a bird. That cockiness was rudely and rightly crushed when the first bird went up. A straightaway, the gimme of upland shots, bird well within range, but wait, Finn hadn’t pointed it. Never mind, I was already swinging and missing. I tried to convince myself I didn’t want to kill that bird anyway, because I was training the pup to be steady, but lying to yourself is rather hard.

It went downhill from there. My notes say I shot seven times, and the limit for pheasants is two. Finn managed two sort-of points, which gave some hope, and I managed a couple of hits, but we flushed more birds without points or shots. Finn worked hard, but got a little flustered by the raucous birds, and so did I.

The next day, Finn’s brother King came out to play, and we managed to put up a fair number of birds. Miraculously I hit two with two shots, but again points were hard to come by. The birds tended to run out in front of the dogs, and neither of them hesitated to snort them up via their tracks. The third day Finn made a beautiful point on a covey of huns, and I promptly missed.

A week later we were out again, found pheasants and sharpies, got a nice point on a hen pheasant, and I double missed a rooster. Twice. Managed to shoot a consolation sharptailed grouse, so the dog kept some faith in my skills.

There was one redemption weekend left in the schedule. Finn could use some solid points, and I could use some solid hits. We started off fantastic, as Finn worked a patch of buck brush along a coulee, and drew to a point. Unfortunately the bird flushed wild before Kyle could get in range. Not much later he pointed again, at the base of some brush in the same coulee, and held till I got close. When the bird flushed, Kyle got a little trigger happy and the close hit pre-tenderized the meat sufficiently. Finn didn’t skip a beat retrieving.

The pup was having a great day. As we were walking back along the opposite side of the coulee, he went back to where we had already passed. “He’ll probably find one all the way down in there”, Kyle said, and as if on cue, Finn pointed. I started down towards him, but was still a little far off when the rooster flushed. It took a second or two before my brain kicked in, but I managed an impressive shot – at least I like to think of it as such – on the quartering bird, leading him by a double body length. Nice retrieve to hand followed.

The following day we hunted another long, wide coulee with lots of cover on one side and along the creek in the bottom, and the odd grove of trees on the opposite side. Finn pointed a bird right off the bat, but broke and grabbed the hen. Luckily he is fairly gentle and we managed to send the bird off flying minus some feathers. Not much further Finn worked a particular spot for a minute or two, breaking off but returning a few times, until finally a rooster emerged and rose above the low brush, quartering away until my shot connected. Two for two for the weekend, and half-decent points, we could have quit and gone home happy right there.

Finn dug up a few more birds from the snow, but all flushed out of my range, or obscured by cover. On the way back, looping through a connecting coulee, he disappeared into some high bush and I lost sight of him. “He may be onto something there”, Kyle yelled from across the coulee, and directed me. I found him on point in thick cover, but my approach was too much of an incentive and he dug in. After a few tries he pushed out a hen pheasant. While not textbook, the length of holding point until I got there was impressive. Best we’d seen all season.

We ended the day, and pheasant season, by a quick snapshot at a hun, that he neatly retrieved. Three for three for the shooter, and some nice points and solid retrieves by the dog. We both need some polishing around the edges, but I think the team has potential.

Crop science

Food, cover, water: the three things hunters look for when figuring out where to find upland birds (and mammals for that matter) on the landscape. Water is probably the easiest to judge with help of maps – do people still use maps? – or satellite imagery. Cover is a little trickier and bird-dependent. Sharptails often congregate in and under mature bush, like buck brush. Sage grouse, not surprisingly, like mature sage bush to hide under. They say pheasant like cattails, though whenever there is also other, less dense cover around, I’ve often found them there. Partridges, due their size, are happy with lower cover. Common theme here is that during the day birds generally don’t sit out in the open, waiting to get picked off by a hawk, so I tend to concentrate on whatever sticks out from the horizontal, whatever breaks up the monotony of the landscape.

Whenever that cover is near a food source, things can get interesting. What birds eat varies throughout the year, so if you are keen to develop your knowledge on where you might find birds, in addition to just finding and reading this information conveniently on the internet, you could investigate right at the source: the bird’s crop (provided you can shoot the first one). The crop is essentially an enlarged part of the esophagus, where food is stored and digestion is started. It generally sits right above the sternum, and, when full, can easily be felt. You can open it up by inserting a knife just at the top of the sternum, in the V where the breasts meet, and making a slit up towards the throat. Inside is a treasure of information what the birds are eating right now, where you are hunting. This information can help determining where you want to hunt next, or helps you focus on the right kind of cover or habitat.

For example, when we hunted sage grouse in September, the assumption was that they would be feeding on grasshoppers. So, we tried to focus on fields with lots of the jittery insects around. And we didn’t find sage grouse. After we killed the first birds, we found fresh greens and white berries in their crops. Since it had been scorching hot and bone dry, fresh greens could only be found near water. Ideally this story would continue by us hunting water courses and finding more birds, but that wasn’t the case. We found them later in the day, in mature sage brush, with not a green leaf in sight. But we might have, based on what we learned. Mid-to-late September ruffed grouse showed kinnikinnick berries and leaves predominantly,
information that went into the knowledge database for later.

In October, the focus was on sharptails, and they fed on insects (grasshoppers), wild rose hips and unidentified yellowish berries during the warm early weeks, and mostly rose hips towards the end of the season. An island of tall buck brush in the center and rose bushes around it had a good chance of holding some birds.

The one blue grouse I shot had nothing but unidentified green leaves in his crop, not very helpful.

In November, Hungarian partridge didn’t disappoint by confirming that they like to scrounge the stubbles for wheat kernels. But later in the day, they hid in the adjacent coulees to get out of the wind and hide from prying eyes.

The pheasants we shot had empty crops. According to a few biologists I asked, released pheasants don’t really manage to switch to eating wild foods, and the wild pheasants we shot, we found in the afternoon, when the morning feed had already left the crop. The latter is a bold non-scientific assumption, but could be true.

Perhaps checking the crop doesn’t provide immediately helpful information, but over the years, patterns might arise. Maybe some day that will come in handy.

I still call them Blue Grouse

There is a ridge in the front range of the mountains an Southwest of here that doesn’t see a lot of foot traffic. Below it runs a trail leading to a popular waterfall. To the North and above it runs a hiking trail up a somewhat popular mountain. Somewhat, because the grade and duration of ascent weed out the uncommitted. The ridge doesn’t really go anywhere, it fizzles out at a big scree field.

Enough sheep and elk hunters passed through to have carved out a bit of trail. From it’s false peak, I’ve watched a ewe with lambs relax in the sun below me, and a herd of elk wait out the heat of the day in the shade at its bottom. I’ve shot a blue grouse there once, when I still hunted with a compound bow.

Behind it is a little oasis, where water comes out of the rocks, creates small waterfalls, and a lush green creek bed. It’s a nice place to sit and relax, perhaps even snooze a bit. It’s also a place that grizzlies like.

It can be a hostile place, the area is known for big winds. Once I crawled behind a two-feet high rock, with hands so cold, I feared I actually had done some damage. I have hiked around it, to end up across a ravine from it, hoping that opening-day hunters coming up the main trail would push a ram towards me. There were hunters, obliviously skylining themselves, but no rams.

But today the weather was calm, there were no opening day crowds, and no bears. However, the climb up there was steep as ever. Perhaps even a little steeper. Finn and I worked our way up an avalanche chute, with many of the right plants, but without birds.

Crossing the barren slope to gain the ridge took a few breaks. Once there, we had barely started to follow the faint trail up when Finn got birdy. He dashed into the stunted trees lining the North side of the ridge, working his way up, with me panting and heaving trying to keep up. Just as I was thinking about calling a time-out Finn made contact, but didn’t manage to lock down the bird, that flushed onto the trail. Before I could develop unsportsmanlike thoughts, Finn followed through and thoroughly spooked the bird out of range. We continued for a bit, but lusted for the water and a sit down. We weren’t going to reach ptarmigan altitudes today anyway.

On the way down, I kept us below the ridge, in the trees, trying to string together the breaks in the cover. Finn’s bell kept chiming, and never stopped for more than a few seconds. Entering yet another clearing, a blue grouse erupted from below a lone tree. Nothing budged when I pulled the trigger, twice. Safety! A flick and a desperate swing were followed by an impressive puff of feathers. Finn quickly found the bird, but had some trouble, or was disinclined to acquiesce to my request of retrieval. As I came closer he brought the bird anyway.

We got sucked into a steep ravine, the best way out appeared down. It hardly was, but we made it, despite an unfortunate amount of bushwhacking. We even dodged the rain.

It was a good afternoon.

Why they are no longer called Blue Grouse

Back so soon?

What was supposed to be a three-day bird hunting trip, turned into a single long day quickly when I tried to pat Finn on the head and he flinched and yelped.

Camp had been made along the banks of the reservoir. Not our regular spot sheltered by trees. In stead there was nothing but grass between us and the water, and the neighbours on either side, a hundred yards away, on equally barren spots. I was hoping for a windless night.

Kyle had hurried home from classes, and skipped some work, to come out with Brizz, his thirteen-year old German Shorthair. We wasted little time getting out to a short-grass coulee where we’d been a few times before, but was new to Finn. Sharptail season had opened five days earlier, huns had been open for over a month, but pheasants were still a week away. Of course, Finn bumped a rooster not ten minutes from the truck, and Brizz and Finn tag-teamed on semi-pointing a group of three more, where the wheat stubble gave way to native grass.

We loosely walked up the high ground between two draws, with Finn trying hard to cover the land beyond as well. After the long drive, and afternoon of being staked out in camp, he had just a little extra energy, and was hard to keep under control. He had pointed a covey of huns, presumably, because I didn’t actually see it, but judging from the absence of sound, that flushed when I followed a cattle trail into the twelve-foot tall buck brush. Kyle tried, but couldn’t connect.

We got another brief point out of Finn on a rooster that wouldn’t hold, when he returned from exploring “the land beyond” one more time. He figured that chasing these big chickens was just the best thing ever. I’m still getting used to having the e-collar remote dangling on the left side of my vest, and often tuck it in a bit, so he had more than enough fun by the time I found the right button. He’d done so well on our local hun coveys, but all those lessons appeared forgotten, or at least considered temporarily irrelevant.

I had shot one sharpie, and Kyle unfortunately had missed several, when we bumped one from a patch of ten-foot tall vegetation, that I managed to drop. Finn rushed in for the retrieve, but circled wide. Brizz slow-jogged over, and they arrived at the same time, briefly pointing the still-alive bird jointly. Brizz claimed seniority for the retrieve and Finn came to me for a little praise and consolation. That’s when he cried in pain.

It didn’t take long to see the blood in his eyeball. He wouldn’t even let us point at his face without whinging. We decided to call it a day, Kyle couldn’t hit anything anyway, Brizz was already past tired, and Finn’s eye needed some attention. I called the vet from camp, and decided to pull up stakes to get him checked out in the morning.

Back home, Finn cuddled up beside me as he sometimes does when I sit on the ground. As I was stroking him I noticed something hard under his skin, inside his left elbow. Clearly something was wedged in there, but we couldn’t find any obvious entry point. More things for the vet to look at.

Fast forward and $485 later, the 1 1/4” thorn had been removed, his eye checked, labeled “bruised cornea”, and the birds cleaned. Thanksgiving dinner coming up. I think I’ll do up the Montana sage grouse.

Ruffed Grouse – The King?

“They like thick cover.” “Edge habitat.” “Undergrowth.” “Clover and berries”. “Young aspens”. “Cut blocks.” Advice on where ruffed grouse live is not hard to find. “Shoot them with a twenty-two on quad trails!”, and the best one: “They come wandering into my backyard when I’m outside barbecuing. I go inside, grab a gun, shoot them, and add them to the grill”. Hardly a bird worthy of the title “King”. Or is he?

Finn’s bell tingled somewhere behind me, as I was pushing through a dense forest of young pines. They had grown so thick that the lower branches had died, letting through enough light for an understory of leafy shrubs, and even a low-to-the-ground plant with red berries.Kinnikinnik, I think. Bears like them, as demonstrated by a few piles of scat that were full of them. Why do bears even eat berries? It appears most of them pass through their system untouched. I hoped grouse liked them too.

My musings on the inner workings of a bear were rudely interrupted by a rustle and the drumming of wings! A grey ruffed grouse exploded from under my feet, and was out of sight in a second. Finn drew up behind me, and solidly pointed the spot the grouse had just left. We had found grouse! The dog needed no more encouragement, and dashed off looking for more encounters. I dashed off looking for a place to breathe. Grouse might live here, but short of clubbing them to death, there was no way I was going to get my hands on one. The thickets were claustrophobic to a man of the mountains and prairies.

By following the flushing birds we managed to push some into terrain where a gun could be shouldered unimpeded, more or less, and we managed to shoot two. Finn found a lot more of them, and I even saw some that he found, but mostly I heard an excited bark, the wings through the vegetation, and then Finn’s bell as he was off again.

Hunting these these birds is not an easy task, if you don’t want to “shoot them from the quad with a twenty-two”, something that would be severely hampered by the fact that I don’t own a quad, nor do I like being on one much. We never found them in open cover where a guy (or girl) would have a decent chance to get off a shot, and where we did find them, we couldn’t move. Ruffed grouse, The King of Upland Birds? Definitely the King of Hide and Seek.

Shooting a limit, or the art of restraint

I stared writing this post a few months ago, but got sidetracked. Now A.J. DeRosa published a thoughtful article on Project Upland I will limit myself to a condensed version.

“Did you get your limit?”

What goes through your mind when you hear that question? I am appealing to the bird hunter here, or perhaps broader, the small game hunter. For big game, the limit often is one (I’m ignoring Eastern states in the US where whitetails are thicker than mosquitoes), but for birds limits are common. Daily limits, possession limits, how many birds can you shoot in a day, and how many can have in your truck and freezer combined.

“Did you shoot a limit?”

Tips and tricks to “get your limit” are prevalent on the web. Photos of hunters with a limit of birds on their tailgates are a dime a dozen on Instagram. Full disclosure, I have done the latter myself. A limit of
pheasants in Alberta is two birds, and you will not have to go back too far in my feed to find those two birds proudly displaced. And nothing wrong with showing some pride in accomplishing a good day of hunting: the dog worked great, your shooting was on par, you had a good time out.

The potential problem lies in the fact that a lot of the hunting takes place on publicly accessible lands, with no control over who hunts, how often it gets hunted, or how many birds are taken other than the daily and possession limits. And as DeRosa points out, in many cases those limits were set long ago, and may not have been scrutinized in a while. What really got me agitated about this “getting a limit”, was an Instagram post a year or so ago, where the poster and friends proudly showed their limits of chukar, that were obtained in the valley, the birds driven down by snow, huddled together waiting out the storm. “We didn’t even have to climb!”

I realize I have mixed up two arguments here: the notion that we have no real control over hunting pressure on a limited resource (the number of hunters chasing the same coveys), and the lack of restraint that some of us display regardless of circumstances. Chukars under normal circumstances live in terrain that is difficult enough to make them fly further than the average hunter wants to pursue them, but it is not very hard for a few guys with half decent dogs to decimate a covey of huns, shooting a few from the initial rise and following up singles, till they reach the imposed limits. That covey may not recover. Especially not, if the next day another couple of guys hunt the same area and come across the stragglers. How much nicer would it be to just shoot a few from the covey, and move on to find a new one. You see more terrain, you can stay out longer, enjoy more fresh air, and pressure the birds a whole lot less. You may get a limit of birds, or you may not. But who cares if you have enjoyed a great day out?

It is a fine line between hunting smartly, and taking unfair advantage of circumstances. When it has been hot and dry, we might hunt near water. If it has been bitterly cold, we will look for pockets of open water to find migrating waterfowl. If the snow fell deep in the high country, we kill the huddled birds in the valleys. Somewhere along that spectrum, we went from smart to unsporting, or even to detrimental to survival of local populations. State or provincial/territorial agencies cannot control our actions at that point, it is up to the individual hunter to do a little soul searching and find that point when enough is enough.

Frans