Brendan flew into Newark from North Carolina last Monday morning with a stomach bug and three hours of sleep, but he was up for hunting – of course. He swung by Jay’s house in Jersey, and we high-tailed it out of town to our old stomping grounds in eastern Pennsylvania. Yeah! Though our hunting area […]
[Our PA hunt reports will be up next week – can’t find the camera cable….] Every year we have to plan our Maine hunts around Sundays because, as many of you know, hunting is prohibited on Sundays there – and in five other East Coast states, with five more states having some other Sunday hunting […]
We read recently about two Minnesota Pheasants Forever chapters having a Long Pheasant Feather contest. Entry fee was $40 per two-person team, and prizes were awarded for first, second and third place – of course for the longest tail feather. Love it.
Next week we’ll be hitting a patch of eastern PA forest we haven’t hunted for a couple years. In many ways it’s where we (or at least Jay, since he started late) cut our grouse-hunting teeth. Lots of grouse, even though we were assured by many knowledgeable folks (including DNR folks) that almost no grouse […]
We all know ruffies are in many states, but even the most diehard, knowledgeable grouse hunters probably would doubt South Carolina had any. Turns out it does. Of course the big question is how many
To continue on the theme of why ruffie hunters (and all upland hunter numbers) are declining, check out this quote from a recent column in the Bowling Green (KY) Daily News:
A while back, before the start of grouse season, we and many others read a column in the Minneapolis Star Tribune that asked why the number of ruffed grouse hunters is down. At the time we were too busy running around trying to find birds to address it. But now, even though we should be […]
Holy cow! Next time you hunt farmland make sure a pesticide wasn’t recently applied (maybe some of you check every time? let us know). Unfortunately, some South Carolina hunters weren’t aware of a recent pesticide application, and four dogs – no breed mentioned – paid the ultimate price. Highlights from this article: > A group […]
One reason we like the Pheasants Forever guys so much is because they are Serious bird hunters. And in a recent PF column about hunting in snow shoes – we love it! – was the above photo with this caption:
We don’t – probably because we’re mostly grouse hunters…. But seriously – do you keep score? We’re talking dead birds here, not flushes, and then using that bird count as the ultimate value of your experience and your (alleged!) proficiency. We’re asking because of two things. One is that we got a note from a […]
In a column about grouse hunting in Maine that ran in The Boston Globe earlier this month was this description of cooking and eating woodcock: Woodcock is classically served whole, feathers on the head, body plucked, roasted hot and fast in bacon fat with the insides intact. The old wives’ tale goes that woodcock empty […]
Even if you followed Pheasants Forever’s recent Rooster Road Trip – in which PF staffers hunted only public land – you may have missed this great follow-up video. In it, PF’s Andrew Vavra talks about the reference books/atlases he and his pheasant-busting compadres used for finding the spots they hunted, and where to obtain said […]
Recently Perth, Scotland acquired a new grouse – it’s 49 feet tall and weighs 1.5 tonnes (“es” = metric tons). How cool is that? The sculpture was commissioned to celebrate Perth 800, a year-long celebration marking the 800th anniversary of the granting of the Royal Burgh Charter to Perth by King William the Lion in […]
Here’s the final part of the interview with Pheasants Forever’s Bob St.Pierre, Anthony Hauck and Andrew Vavra re: their rooster odyssey: driving 2,200 to hunt five states in 6 days (that’s Serious!) – aka the 2010 Rooster Road Trip.
Part 1 Who says you can’t find pheasants on public land? After Pheasants Forever’s recent Rooster Road Trip (RRT), the answer should be “nobody.” In case you missed it, the RRT was PF staffers Bob St.Pierre, Anthony Hauck and Andrew Vavra driving 2,200 miles in 6 days to hunt five states: North and South Dakota, […]
We don’t know how this was made or who the heck made it, but sounds like a hunter – note the Fox reference – except for the “ruffled,” which might have been on purpose to make it funnier. Why hunt every weekend for grouse? And we quote: “Because the ruffled grouse is the king, regardless […]
Ran across a dog eulogy recently written by Eric Sharp of the Detroit Free Press that’s one of the best pieces of dog/bird writing we’ve ever read. Titled “Goodbye to Ghost, the bird dog with the finest nose I’ve ever encountered,” it’s about a friend’s “phenomenal” English setter, named Ghost, who after 12 years had […]
Shannon Tompkins of the Houston Chronicle recently wrote a poignant, personal account of the decline of bobwhite quail in his home state of Texas. We’d love to run the piece in full but that’s a no-no, so here’s a link to the full piece – below are some excerpts:
It’s the apocalypse. That’s the premise behind this “survival” vid published by the UK’s The Guardian newspaper. To quote, “Govt is gone, the water is off, electricity is gone, everyone is dead – well, nearly everyone.”
Winter can be a great time to hunt ruffed grouse. Okay, anytime is a good time to hunt grouse (maybe – maybe – no so much in the early season) but winter can be particularly good. If, as always, you find where the birds are.
Just read this article on hunting ruffies in MN this year. So much of it, while well-intentioned, is wrong. Here goes: > The good news is, counts were up 34 percent this spring in parts of northern Minnesota. Counts remained stable in southern Minnesota. This COULD mean that there’s more easy birds (young ones) early […]
Lessons from 2012 Maine-NH Hunt
Don’t know if we’ve fully recovered yet from our not-quite-a-week of hunting Maine and New Hampshire for ruffies and woodies. We all actually bailed 2 days early, having put in 5 consecutive days instead of our usual 7. Felt like wimps about it, but hey, we were BEAT…from 5 days of the most brutal hunting […]
No Grouse Comeback in SW Penn?
Sounds like ruffed grouse will never be as much a part of the landscape of southern Pennsylvania as they once will. “Never” sounds ominous. Permanent. But that’s the conclusion of an article by Bob Frye in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. Why should you care if you don’t live or hunt in PA? Reasons: > Pennsylvania is […]
Hey: All Ruffies Drum Differently!
Did you know that? Not until now…. This info won’t help us hunting, but it’s interesting – and makes sense. Here’s more, from newscientist.com: Male ruffed grouse are the first animals known to make unique non-vocal sounds. Humans and many other animals, particularly birds, can be identified by their voices. But no one had looked […]
Ran across this quote from an article about Iowa’s pheasant count: > “I haven’t even gone pheasant hunting the last couple of years because the birds just weren’t there,†said Tim Wolf, a 61-year-old bank president who lives in Waukee. YES THEY WERE! They most definitely were there. Maybe not like this… > “But I’ve […]
Top 10 Reasons To Go to Phez Fest
Pheasants/Quail Forever’s Pheasant Fest/Quail Classic is coming up soon at KC, MO (see info in right column), and just in case you’re thinking it’s too far or whatever, here are the Top 10 – really just 10 of many – reasons to go. We’re doing it Letterman-style, 10 to 1. 10. What else are you […]
Across the Pond Bird Follies, Vids
Ah the UK, the land that gave the world 17 pieces of silverware on the table, animal rights and other questionable stuff. Okay, it wasn’t all bad – that’s where our bird hunting came from too. But it’s different here…or there, depending on your perspective. Here’s some recent bird news plus some interesting vids. Katie […]
Do Congress, Tea Party Hate Pheasants?
We make it a point to try not to get suckered by political hoo-ha, so that’s not what this is about. We ran across a blog post on the Discovery-owned treehugger.com titled “Why Does Congress Hate Pheasants?” and a related one, “Do Tea Party, Heritage Foundation Oppose Hunting?” Interesting stuff, written by the same gent, […]
Quail, the most beleaguered of our beloved gamebirds, is getting a helping hand in Kansas. Or rather, a bigger helping hand. The state just announced that it’s “launching a new quail restoration initiative aimed at making a difference in declining bobwhite quail populations at a landscape level.” Here’s more: > Includes the designation of two […]
Worms and Birds: What Else Don’t We Know?
Believe we’ve talked about this at least once, but a recent Wall Street Journal article on the plight of Texas quail got us thinking about it again. Here’s the applicable stuff: …Rolling Hills Quail Research Ranch, a 4,700-acre spread an hour west of Abilene. Last month, researchers there found that the levels of parasitic worms […]
Top 10 Reasons To Go to Phez Fest
Pheasants/Quail Forever’s Pheasant Fest/Quail Classic is coming up soon at KC, MO (see info in right column), and just in case you’re thinking it’s too far or whatever, here are the Top 10 – really just 10 of many – reasons to go. We’re doing it Letterman-style, 10 to 1. 10. What else are you […]
Lone Star Outdoor news recently carried an article on a speech given by Dr. Dale Rollins of the Rolling Plains Quail Research Ranch near Rotan, Texas. Seems that a major threat to quail, at least in the Lone Star state, may be an eyeball worm. News to us! Highlights: > Especially mysterious were the continued […]
