The pictures of the farm fields are NOT where we hunt. There are sharptails in the area, but, I don’t know anyone who hunts them. I’ve never shot one in LOTW county. I wouldn’t say they are abundant. There are no pheasants in the area that I am aware of.

We hunt in the forest for Ruffed grouse, and woodcock. The fields are what we have to drive past to get to the state forest areas.

Hunting with pointing dogs on the forest trails is tough. The grouse spend a lot of time walking back and forth using the trail to get from one side to the other. My Setter pointed a few times at brush on one side of the trail, only to have the bird flush from the other side. I’ve also noticed the birds in that part of the world seem much more likely to run than the grouse I encounter in the southern half of the state. They don’t run like pheasants, but, they can and do get a move on.

I only hunt because I have a dog. While I’ve owned a dog that was perfectly capable of great work on pheasants and grouse, the current pooch struggles a bit with grouse, as did her predecessor. I typically pick an edge between a popple harvest and some sort of evergreen trees, locally, and just walk it until it peters out, with the dog working in a windshield wiper pattern. She tried the same up there, but, I’m guessing the grouse study movement on the trails because they can see it coming. We had some bumped birds, and some that just did not hold for a point, and, some beautiful points. She had a spectacular, and amusing point at a bird that ran under the car.

Long ago, I decided to just take what comes, and enjoy the day. I enjoyed them all.

Photo credit to Lloyd-my pooch and I coming out of the woods. Artsy, me thinks.

[Linked Image from i.ibb.co]

Best,
Ted