RSSCategory: Woodcock

Lessons from 2012 Maine-NH Hunt

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 […]

November 7, 2012 | By | 10 Replies More
Ontario Grousin’: Season’s End (Part 2)

Ontario Grousin’: Season’s End (Part 2)

[Here’s the second and final part of contribution by Serious Canadian grouser Jeff Laberge on his season and lessons learned in winter grousin’. We continue with the rest of lesson 2 (hunting grouse on snow) as well as a wrap-up. Thanks Jeff!] Theoretically the birds would stay in thick cover until the sun hit the […]

December 30, 2011 | By | 2 Replies More
Ontario Grousin’: Season’s End (Part 1)

Ontario Grousin’: Season’s End (Part 1)

[This is contributed by Jeff Laberge, a Serious grouse hunter from Sudbury, Ontario – an area known for hard rock mining, a big nickel, and Saturday Nights (search Sudbury Saturday Night). He hunts along the North Shore of Lake Huron, apparently one of the best-kept secrets of Serious grousers.] In my book, Dec. 15 is […]

December 28, 2011 | By | 1 Reply More
Field Report: MN Grouse Hunts

Field Report: MN Grouse Hunts

Here’s a brief report to all from Tim Brandt, a fellow Serious bird hunter. Tim lives in Minnesota, is a ruffed grouse fiend and actually gets paid to hunt (!) since he’s the PR guy at Federal Premium Ammunition. (In fact, if you ever watch the Duck Commander show, you might have seen him on […]

November 8, 2011 | By | Reply More
ME Roundup, How We Found ‘Em (2)

ME Roundup, How We Found ‘Em (2)

Day 8, the last day of our 2011 Rangeley, ME-area (plus a day in NH) grouse hunt, started with a bang. We hunted a new area, and ended up flushing 15 grouse and 2 woodcock with two grouse down. We were fired up and wondered if we’d exceed our record for the week of 26 […]

October 27, 2011 | By | 7 Replies More
ME Hunt Roundup, How We Found ‘Em

ME Hunt Roundup, How We Found ‘Em

Before our Maine hunt we wondered whether 8 days in a row of grousin’ was too much. Would we physically hold up? Would the weather (and whether we got into birds) make the time go fast or make it feel like a slog? Didn’t have a clue, but we were thinking about it so we […]

October 26, 2011 | By | 3 Replies More
Days 6-7, ME: Decent Numbers, But…

Days 6-7, ME: Decent Numbers, But…

Where’s the next good cover? We don’t know, but we’re going to find it. Sometimes that’s our problem when we’re after birds. We’re always in search of the undiscovered honey hole or clue to finding more birds. It’s a problem and a benefit at times. Day 6 of our Maine grouse hunt was more on […]

October 24, 2011 | By | Reply More
Day 4, ME: All Woodies, Shooting Blanks

Day 4, ME: All Woodies, Shooting Blanks

Preseason scouting with Google Earth is a lot of fun. But it also can be too much fun when you end up with lots of spots to check out, not all of which are as easy to get to as they appear on Google Earth, maps or even a GPS. That’s why after a couple […]

October 20, 2011 | By | 4 Replies More
Day 3, ME: All Grouse, None Down

Day 3, ME: All Grouse, None Down

Monday meant we were back hunting in Maine, but this time in a totally different place. Our general m.o. is to check out a bunch of new territory, find productive areas, try to find other places like that on Google Earth and by driving around, etc. until we have spots we can milk-run at the […]

October 19, 2011 | By | 2 Replies More
Day 2, NH: All About the Habitat

Day 2, NH: All About the Habitat

Since Maine is one of those few, stubborn states that don’t allow hunting on Sundays – apparently the folks in Augusta still drive Model Ts – we headed to New Hampshire…on Sunday. The bad thing was we we’ve never hunted New Hampshire before – which was also the good thing. We’re always up for new […]

October 18, 2011 | By | 2 Replies More
Maine Day 1: Altitude Adjustment

Maine Day 1: Altitude Adjustment

How do you find a chicken (or two) in a million-plus acres of wilderness – without a dog?  A little Google Earth, a lot of walking and some grey matter. We’ve never been to the Rangeley, Maine area before, and were/are (we’re still here) psyched to go. Brendan did a ton of Google Earth, map […]

October 17, 2011 | By | 1 Reply More
8 Days in Maine: Are We Insane?

8 Days in Maine: Are We Insane?

Today we’re finally off to chase some chickens, of the wood/furry variety: ruffed grousin’ in Maine. And yep, we’re going for 8 solid days. Eight! This is after we (Brendan and Jay) swore that we wouldn’t hunt more than 4 days at a stretch after last year’s week-long Maine marathon followed by a week-long Minnesota […]

October 14, 2011 | By | Reply More
Serious Phez/Quailer Goes Grousin’

Serious Phez/Quailer Goes Grousin’

What if you were a Serious grouse hunter and had the opportunity to take a serious pheasant- and quail-chaser into the grouse woods for a virgin trip. Would you be licking your chops? Issuing warnings? Secretly laughing inside? Well, that’s what Bob St. Pierre recently did, and we got the scoop on it. Bob is […]

October 12, 2011 | By | 1 Reply More
Grouse, Woodies Up in West Virginia

Grouse, Woodies Up in West Virginia

When a state issues a press release about ruffed grouse that’s combined with one about raccoon populations and then it puts the ‘coons first, that shows you where the crazy forest chickens rank in the pantheon of game…in that state, at least (lol). Anyhow, the good news is that West Virginia’s grouse populations are supposed […]

October 10, 2011 | By | 3 Replies More
Maine Not Looking Great But…

Maine Not Looking Great But…

…We’re Going Anyway! Maine is one of many states that doesn’t publish an upland bird forecast – which we used to think was slacking but now think might be a good idea (more on that later in the week). So every year at least one member of the press chases down the upland bird biologist […]

September 12, 2011 | By | 3 Replies More
Rabbits, Cutting Trees and Birds

Rabbits, Cutting Trees and Birds

We’re still amazed – literally – that the New England cottontail rabbit is a candidate for listing under the Endangered Species Act. The cottontail freakin’ rabbit! Okay, not the similar eastern cottontail, but still. And what’s the issue? Apparently people – including people we all know – think it’s “cruel” or “ugly” to cut trees. […]

April 29, 2011 | By | 4 Replies More
WI Woodcock Projects, Favored Habitat

WI Woodcock Projects, Favored Habitat

The Ruffed Grouse Society, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and a few other groups recently announced “at least 10” projects to help improve woodcock habitat in Wisconsin. Any such work is much appreciated by us birdmen since unfortunately woodies are in the same boat as many gamebirds: populations are trending down. “With a steady […]

March 9, 2011 | By | Reply More
One Way to Cook a Woodcock

One Way to Cook a Woodcock

And some things we don’t understand… Woodies don’t exactly have a rep for being good table fare. We’ve seen a few guys almost drool over the thought of woodcock prepared so-and-so way, but most comments have been along the lines of the old brick joke: Prepare woodcock, put in oven with brick, when the bird […]

February 17, 2011 | By | 10 Replies More
Would You Eat a Woodie Cooked Like This?

Would You Eat a Woodie Cooked Like This?

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 […]

December 22, 2010 | By | 1 Reply More
How to/Where to Walk Up Woodcock

How to/Where to Walk Up Woodcock

A SeriousBirdHunting.com reader named Chris emailed us after our Maine hunt reports were published with a question about woodcock: “How do you guys get the woodcock to flush by walking them up? I’ve never walked one up, actually did not think much of it without the use of a dog. Would be interested to know […]

November 23, 2010 | By | Reply More