Last shot of the year for me in WI

[Kevin WI]

I think tomorrow will be the last time out hunting for the season...had a pretty good year. Tomorrow I'm heading North to Park Falls, WI area again with a buddy for one last hurrah in the snow for them ruffed grouse. Wish me luck!

[lawoodcocker]

In your neck of the woods, how many flushes would you get on an average hunt? Do you see any woodcock where you are?

[Kevin WI]

anywhere between 10 to 20 flushes in a 4 hour stretch. This time of year the woodcock are long gone.

[Kevin WI]

Well, I'm back...we walked literally miles of trails and only one flush that I didn't even see. My legs feel like jello....to top it off on the way back home I saw a grouse fly across the road only to look and see where it was flying....into a large popple tree with 6 others sitting in it :roll: ....felt like the twelve days of Xmas!

[Grange]

I talked to a co-worker yesterday that went hunting this past weekend as well. He only had three flushes on his all-day hunt. My hunting weekend the week before didn't produce much better. The first day I had three flushes and heard one more, and 6 flushes the second day.

[Kevin WI]

ah well...it was a good season overall....never chased ruffies after deer season in the snow before....now I know why...but with the number of grouse I saw during deer season, I would have thought it would be really good.

[dugger13]

remember you can hunt grouse until feb 1st this year in wisconsin.

In the snow is always fun. they seem to group back up late in the year. I also went out last weekend, and never saw a bird. In the same places i was seeing 10-20 birds 2 months ago.

[rkelly]

I have hunted them a few times in the snow and have never really had any luck finding them. I did one time flush up a covey of around 10 or so in late dec. that were buried under the snow, but that is about it. Generally where is a good place to hunt ruffied this time of year?

[rkelly]

It was definitely a cool thing Howie. Reminded me of late season pheasant hunting. They were coming up all around me, I somehow didn't even manage to get a one of them, even had time to reload my gun

[dugger13]

Normally, they are in the same places you would find them if there wasn't snow, but with so many people baiting deer around here, i bet the grouse are at any corn pile you can find.

Your right, once you find them in the snow, it does get fun.

[Kevin WI]

I'm beginning to wonder....grouse come out on the trails for clover and gravel....with all the snow on the ground, I see them more near plowed roads due to all the gravel available than in the typical places I would find them in the fall.

[ceadmin]

I always take a trip to hunt in Dec/Jan. Your right they like to move around in the seasons. You need to find some birch/aspen with small-med size pines around. Check the bases of the trees, this is where we found them. We also "road" hunt them as well. Meaning, we drive around and try to locate them coming to gravel. Then its drive past, stop, unload the gun and the dog ever so gently, then the dog bum rushes the grouse and scares it a small distance and then locates and points and we finish it up with a miss.

We were just up around Black River State Forest the 12th-16th and got about 6 up a day. We didn't bag any but it gets your heart pounding when the dog is on point in 8-10 inches of snow and they bust out of that homemade cavern that you stepped in. They also seem to hold way better when its super cold out (wouldn't you know?). I think our Monday morning hunt was -27 wind chill, it was mighty cold out and we didn't hunt long for our poor dog's sake plus we didn't find any just alot of tracks where they were.

[Kevin WI]

remember you can hunt grouse until feb 1st this year in wisconsin.

In the snow is always fun. they seem to group back up late in the year. I also went out last weekend, and never saw a bird. In the same places i was seeing 10-20 birds 2 months ago.

I know you can hunt until then...but I really don't want to....deep snow just takes it all out of me. So, I just call it a year and go back to training and running tests until next season.