An adventure in Grouse Hunting with a few timberdoodles along the way
Heavy rains have fallen over the Northwoods of MN, WI and the U.P in the past few days with reports totaling more than 10″. Many roads and bridges are washed out or heavily damaged. June rains last year are reported as the primary cause of low grouse and woodcock recruitment across the region. Time will tell what these events mean but it certainly isn’t helping.
14 Day precipitation summary as of June 19, 2018
Grouse annual drumming survey results from the WI DNR report an overall statewide decline of 34%. The Northern Zone index declined an even greater amount, 38% to 1.28 drums per stop. Weather conditions were rated better for this survey over last year, adding to the concern. This Grouse Hunter noticed a sharp decline in flushes per mile walked last year with very low apparent recruitment. Others observed the same and indeed the RGS national hunt results in Grand Rapids, MN last fall produced a record low harvest measured in birds per hunter hours and also revealed low recruitment. The 2018 drumming survey affirms these observations. As a suspected contributing factor and wild card, West Nile Virus will get further study this year and we can look for officials to ask Grouse Hunters to provide samples.
More information can be found in this article from the Wi DNR website.
And this article from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinal
I’ve reserved this small corner of the web to share thoughts, observations, and engage in conversation on grouse and upland bird hunting oriented topics. We’ll see where this goes. As with most things grouse hunting, it’s best to be flexible and keep expectations in check, lest one be humbled yet again.
I look forward to your comments and suggestions, and invite you to reach out to me via the contact Grouse Hunter page or respond to a post. Thanks for visiting.
Chris, a Grouse Hunter
