Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, February 16, 1993 TAG: 9302160036
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Bill Cochran
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
GROUSE SCARCE, BUT THRILL OF HUNT IS BIG REWARD
The grouse season that ended Saturday is destined to be remembered as more bearish than bullish, but we savored a couple of fine late-season hunts.Our outings were tucked into the tangles of wild grape vines, hawthorn trees and other fortresses that you press through, half walking, half squatting, one arm holding your shotgun at port arms, the other pushing aside branches that can rake the flesh from your face.
We traveled the rocky hollows where spring-fed rills trickle out of the mountains, and we crossed the sides of ridges that were as steep and slick as the roof of a country church.
You never know where or when a grouse will flush, if at all.
At one stop, we parked the pickup, crossed the gate where we had permission to hunt, poked some shells into our shotguns and had moved up an old road a few strides when three birds flushed. We didn't get a shot. It was like the other team had scored a touchdown while we were walking onto the field.
But one of the grouse had made the mistake of sitting there, when the others flushed, hoping its woodland colors and earth hues would obscure it from our prying eyes. When we stood around discussing how to follow-up the other birds, this one apparently grew nervous. It took off with all the suddenness, and some of the sounds, of an avalanche.
One of my companions got his gun up as the fat bird turned slim enough to thread through a maze of gnarled hardwoods and sun-starved pines, its wings pounding like a jackhammer tearing into asphalt.
"I missed," my companion said the instant he pulled the trigger, but from my angle I saw the bird fall. The score was tied.
It was when we began flailing through real cover that we didn't fly a bird, places that you walk across on legs of rubber because the habitat looks so promising you know the very next step will trigger a thundering flush.
At one point we came across a huge flock of turkeys, running uphill through cover so thick we could only hear them. Their big feet on the dry forest duff sounded like water gurgling over rocks until I realized no stream flowed here.
"Turkey!" my partner whispered.
Where were they during the turkey season?
We strained our ears until the last sound was swallowed up by the forest, our thoughts going on fast forward to the spring gobbler season.
All this is more than enough to keep a grouse hunter afield, even during a string of lean years, the kind most sportsmen in Virginia have languished through since the mini-peak of the 1986-87 season.
Why have grouse numbers remained lean for more than a decade?
Some say turkeys are taking over their habitat, although we flushed a bird not far from were we'd heard the flock.
Others say it is predators.
Still others blame the restrictions on clear cutting, saying the national forest lacks the young regrowth that stimulates grouse food and cover.
Then there is the population-cycle theory, which says grouse numbers fluctuate widely over 10-year periods, brought about by weather, food or some natural phenomenon not completely understood.
Take your choice, one or all, but be aware that the grouse - no matter the season - nearly always is going to outscore the hunter. Most of us simply are delighted to share the same playing field with this noble bird of the highlands.