Pat and Chewy

 

 

Birdie wants to hold her grouse a little longer. I just wanted her to look at the camera.

Sid, my year old English setter wrapped up her first season in the UP hunting grouse for three weeks. She shared time in the woods with Birdie a more polished setter. I’d hunt one in the morning and the other in the afternoon. I keep notes on where I hunt and how many grouse I flush. I don’t count re-flushes and often count family groups as one (don’t know why). We hunt exceptional cover and go both morning and afternoon. There were a few travel days and the ten spent heading to Florida, but after that I was in the woods most of the time until Halloween. Lucy and I like to hike and we would get on UP trails and see where they went. Along the way we would find birds. Later with a buddy I was able to crack into the covers for a week.

My notes show that by the conservative way I count the dogs saw 265 different grouse and many uncounted woodcock. Some grouse were heard and not seen and others held well for the dogs.

Sid started the year chasing and “busting” nearly everything she smelled. On her first trip north she would lose herself and I would have to shoot my gun for her to find me. In time she learned to keep track of me and would circle to find my track. She also started holding her points and would stand tall at the first scent with her nose and tail held high. She’d hold too until I got there and then it was anybody’s guess what she would do next. She might break and flush, or she might go off hunting in another direction if she had lost the scent. I never knew what to expect.

Unlike Birdie who loves to retrieve, Sid isn’t interested and needs to be professionally trained. I tried last summer with no success and quit before I started teaching negative things.  – If anyone knows of a pro trainer here in Michigan who does the “trained retrieve” I’d appreciate a heads up.

Overall I’d give Sid a B grade for her first season. She needs me to work with her on being steady to wing and shot and maybe that will help her understand the rest of what she is doing too. A little more maturity, a lot of training, and a lot of wild birds next fall will help her come along. Many hunters that I know would love her just as she is full of hunting desire, style, and quite a bit of experience for a young dog, but I want more. Time will tell, tune in here for the Sid Report next fall.

Life doesn’t always turn out as we expect – of course we all know that. In my case my neat little plan to hunt grouse all fall in both the northern lower and upper peninsula of Michigan took a U-turn when Lucy and I received a call from Florida that a key family member was in hospice care and we headed south to help.  I won’t share the sadness, but will tell you about some pretty cool fishing that goes on there in October.

I had read about the mullet run in SE Florida for many years where huge schools of bait fish (mullet) migrate along the shore followed by all kinds of hungry predators and this was my chance to see it in the morning. Lucy and I stood on the Juno pier and watched as schools of mullet shaded the water dark in schools about the size of a large house. Every now and then something would attack them and shoals of fish would  clear the water in their effort to escape. As soon as one school passed another could be seen coming along. For the fishermen on the pier it was a bonanza as they cast silver spoons and hooked bluefish, jacks and Spanish mackerel. One guy hauled a 25 pound king mackerel off the pier proving that big fish follow the food right in along the beach. I saw several sharks, but had no idea whet kind they were.

I took my fly rod to the beach and had a good morning when it was calm, but the next day when the surf pounded in my fly rod was no match for conditions.

Small jacks on a fly rod are fun to catch.

small jacks and blues were feeding like crazy from the Juno pier.

 

Despite the high wind BIrdie was in charge, or maybe just lucky.

packing lunch in the morning. Sid looks ready to go out the door. Birdie wants some more pats before she goes out into the snow.

When I suggested to Lucy that we go to the UP and do some outdoor stuff she signed on with the stipulation that we not return to the cabin before 5:00 p.m. . We like to walk  and she was game for the woods, but not if it meant that we would be lounging around the cabin after a little morning out. You have to understand that she was an unrelenting second-grade teacher for a long career and slacking is not in her DNA. I could be talked into an afternoon nap, but if I have to keep after the grouse I guess I’ll have to suffer.

We encountered snow on the ground when we went out in the morning. Not thickness, but skiffs and heavy dusting.  It melted with the sun and created snow lines where the shadows shielded the snow from the sun. If you don’t understand what I mean by that you must be from far away. 

We went to the Quarter Mile More cover and explored it fully. We flushed three birds and it was obvious that the birds were out of the wind and fresh snow. We arrived back at the truck after almost three hours of  walking with a grouse and three wood cock in the bag. 

In the afternoon it was really windy. At times the beeper collar was hard to hear even at close range. It was Sid’s turn to find the birds. She worked hard and we flushed several, only the birds were going up 40 yards ahead of Sid before she even knew they were there. The blustrery wind made them nervous. I never came close to a shot until we were in the last mile of the hunt. Sid slammed into a great point and as I started moving to her, a grouse went up 30 yards to the front. Sid broke with the flush, I shot, and the grouse went on to happiness somewhere else.

While I would have like Sid to be steady, I really liked her point, stopping when she first smelled the bird at a distance, and her style. To be honest, after that she bumped two woodcock before we got back to the car. I don’t fault what I don’t see, but I suspect she was out of control wth herself and ran the birds over because she was driving too fast for conditions. Teen drivers are scary to those who love them and probably to those who don’t as well .

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Sid was impatient to get out there. She had a great point on a grouse that I missed.

 

Birdie and one of her grouse.

We’ve been out looking at new covers and trying to find walks on trails that didn’t have exposed clay that was turned to glop in the last rain. Walking with an extra pound of mud on each foot is hard. Anyway, yesterday afternoon Dennis stopped by on his way back from a two-week duck hunt in Manitoba and after talking with him we got a late start to the afternoon. I headed to a road I/we had been exploring, looking for a hidden gem that other hunters didn’t hit because circumstances lead them away from it. Well, we found it. I saw a closed forest service road barred with a gate to vehicles but not to walkers and illegal 4-wheelers. The road didn’t have any good-looking cover, but did appear to be of about the right age to have been a logging road in the past. We parked and walked northeast.  Could see some side roads that went to aspen cuts and thought that most hunters who wandered this way would take those. Lucy and I plowed ahead. I was unprepared and had the gun hanging at my side in an easy way to carry and as you would know a grouse roared up beside me and I felt the fool as it sailed away in the open. It would have been an easy shot. On we walked and the cover stayed open and old, not grouse cover.

 

As we passed three-quarters of a mile of this I thought we should give up and go back to the cover we had seen. Lucy, who likes to walk and log miles, said we should give it another quarter-mile and that’s what we named the cover we found, Lucy’s Quarter Mile More Cover. Ten-year old aspen and spruce mixed. It was broken and irregular like grouse like and there was food all over in the form of yellow nettle fruit and other “grouse berries.” Not knowing the shape of the cover I GPSed in our starting point and we starting walking only to hear Birdie’s collar beeping point! I found her; the bird went to the sky and came back down where Birdie retrieved it.

 A few minutes later I saw Birdie slow and went after her before the beeper sounded. She went on point and a grouse I couldn’t see flushed ahead. Knowing that they aren’t all singles I stayed at ready and caught the second bird.

We continued to move and Birdie found more grouse, but none I could shoot at. Finally she was on point in an open area and I thought maybe she had a woodcock pinned when neither a bird flushed nor she would give up the point. I released her; she did a small loop and pointed the same area again. By this time the grouse that thought it could sit it out could take it no longer and birdie retrieved it again after the #7 ½-shot caught up with it in the aspen.

I added a woodcock to the bag and we were near where we started our circle. I said to Lucy that I though we had enough. Three grouse and a WC in less than an hour was enough, even though I think I might have collected two more if we continued on. I didn’t need a limit to find happiness.

Along the way back Birdie pointed two more birds. One was impossible to see and I knocked a handful of feathers out of the second, but was not able to collect the bird. I saw where it went and Birdie pointed again and the bird flew behind cover and I couldn’t shoot. I didn’t feel good about losing that bird, as I know it will die. Maybe someday I will understand how I can shoot these birds and still feel bad when I lose one that has been wounded.

 

It was late by the time we got back to the cabin. Lucy started the chili while I groomed dogs, cleaned birds, and took a shower. While I mixed rum and coke Lucy had her shower and we ate with a happy tired burn going on in our woods-weary legs. I think we walked nearly six miles through the woods and trails and we needed rest like the dogs.

 

Birdie did a very good job. She’s nearly finished in her grouse education and most hunters would kiss the ground she walks on. She’s really good; although both she and I know that there are things she has yet to figure out. Seeing as many birds as she does will do it for her.

 

Sid is like a 16-year old with a driver’s license and her parents car. She means well, but she doesn’t always do well. Her breeding drives her through the woods at a dangerous speed and I can only remember with a shudder how Birdie did the same at her age and suffered serious leg, nose and tail injuries that needed medical attention, not to mention raw, furless, bloody skin on under her eyes and across her ankles from running through the thick with her foot pinning the accelerator in her desire to find birds.

 

Fortunately, knock-on-wood, Sid hasn’t injured herself to that extent yet. She burns through the thick stuff and would hunt on the horizon if I let her.  She’s learning to check in and hunt with us, although she often forgets. She is so into the game that she sees little of how she can do it better at this time. Her points are tremendous and stylish. Just the other day she hit a scent and she skidded to a stop, nose up, reaching for more with tail lifted high. I looked for the bird but found nothing.  I released her and instead of moving cautiously, she floored it, tires leaving double skid marks in the fallen leaves in a sliding fishtail. The grouse, some 30- 40 yards away blew out and that was it. The initial point was great, but the rest needs a little work. She’ll get it and I keep telling myself that Birdie out-grew the same stage and look at what she can do now.  Only when I’m in the moment with Sid it is a little stressful – think teen driver with your car.

 

Mac is Sid's brother from this year's litter and is only 18 weeks old. Pat was pretty proud when Mac pointed and retrieved this wood cock.

 

Queen Sid on the left, Me and Birdie on the right.

Red and gray phase birds can best be seen in their tails feathers.

Some of you expressed an interest in hearing more about my two bird dogs, Sid and Birdie. Sid is the white pup with a little tan in her hears and Birdie is the tri-color. Both come from lines of serious grouse dogs. Sid, the pup, is not quite a year and a half old and while she hunted with me as a six month old dog last year, she was just a baby who had fun with the birds. Sometimes she would deliver great points and other times she chased the birds with glee just to see them fly. I let her do what ever she wanted and in the process build positive foundation for this year. Now in her first real year of hunting with an adult dog’s brain she is figuring it out – with my help. 

We started the season around Traverse City and moved some grouse and woodcock. Sid would point, but after a half minute or less she would charge in to flush the birds.  At first I thought she would get over it, but later had to re think it. We went to the UP for a long week and in between running too far and getting lost  several times (I had to shoot the shotgun in the air to show where I was) and continuing to bust birds I knew I had to be more active with her. 

On Wednesday I took her hunting around here and watched the pressure build in her as she pointed a grouse. I could see that she was going to break. After she did, I put down my gun, collected her, returned to the spot of the point and whoa-ed her. She didn’t get it of course, but that was a beginning. I took her to a woodcock spot I know and told her whoa every time she pointed and returned her to the spot each time she broke. Without the bird distracting her she remembered whoa from her yard training. Fortunately there were lots of birds and she starting looking at me quizzically, like she was trying to understand. I re-enforced whoa at home in the yard and walked all around her and even threw her favorite dog treats near her and made her whoa until I released her. Her attitude was a little shy. She didn’t like being told what to do and her english setter nature made her cower a little. I  patted her told her I loved her , which she likes, and put her away to think about her day.

The next day, yesterday, I took her to the wood cock spot. When she pointed her first one I whoaed her and she held her point although she shifted focus from the bird to me. that was OK, I flushed the bird, she followed and came back to the whistle. We repeated the performance several more times before I shot a bird and that really lit her fuse. With the next bird she didn’t want to listen to whoa and I had to go get her and put her back where she started. I made her stay there while I walked in circles around her. From then on she held her points and gradually shifted her focus from me back to the birds. I shot two more birds and she showed no sign of wanting to rush in. We hunted over to an area where there had been some grouse and she bumped two different birds before  locking solid on one that I shot. Grouse are spooky compared to wood cock. They don’t let a dog get close and dogs have to learn that on their own. 

That’s the Sid report. Birdie, who has all this mastered couldn’t understand why she had been left at home. My wife said she was softly mournful all the while we were gone letting out sad sounds every so often. I took her out in the yard and ran through some drills with her which seemed to placate her. Dogs – go figure.

I’ll put some more photos here in a couple of weeks and hopefully report that Sid continues to get better. I hunt so much that the dogs get to see plenty of birds and that is what it takes.

One of the other charter guys stopped over today and I asked him how the fishing was. He said that one day this week he left Leland at 7:00 and headed to the island. By 8:30 he had 17 salmon, mostly 2 and 3 year fish. Then the bite slowed and it took another hour to catch three more for a 20 fish limit. He went out again that afternoon and had a high teens catch.  This is what we expected and what I wrote about in an earlier report. The fish are feeding on the bait stacked around the island and will stay there until after the last boat is put away for the winter.

And then the grouse report-   I opened the season near here and flushed quite a few birds, but only got one in the first three days of the grouse season . Then it was on to the UP where I met an old friend and we hunted for a week. The warm summer-like temperatures limited our hunting to a couple of hours in the morning before it became too hot to hunt. The dogs work so hard I believe they would hunt to their deaths if I let them. While there weren’t as many birds as last year there were enough to keep us interested and eating grouse.  Our flush rate was about 3-5 and hour and didn’t include any follow-up birds that I know of. We had some lucky shooting and had one bird in the bag for about every 6 flushes according to my notes. With all green still hanging that was lucky in my experience. There were still some family groups of birds that pushed up the count and if I counted a covey as one bird the hourly rate as probably in the range I mentioned. 

My older dog Birdie did a very good job and handled the grouse differently than she does a Woodcock, which she loves to crowd. She got a refresher course in grouse that if she pushes at all the fly and she doesn’t like that. 

Sid the year-old pup got overly enthusiastic at first and would hunt herself into being lost. I had to fire the gun several times for her to find me. After a couple days of that she seemed to get the idea of checking in and staying with me although I’m not trusting her yet.  She pointed some grouse, but then bumped them to flight. I think she’ll get over that with experience. her high points were tracking down a broken-winged  grouse and bringing it back alive and then when I was feeling so good about her she found a tire rut in a logging road filled with soupy clay mud. She rolled in it until she looked like a chocolate dipped ice cream cone. The speaker on her beeper collar filled with mud and quit. My friend found it too amusing and I had to laugh a little too.

 

This is one of the small kings I was seeing on the first bank this morning. I wish I had a photo of the full coolers of big fish from the island to show you.

The boats that I saw that went to the north end of the island early this morning all returned with big coolers of fish. Lots f big three-year fish. Temp was in the 80 foot range.

I slept a little later and didn’t leave the dock until it was nearly light out. I set up on the first bank looking for  a fish for dinner and it didn’t take long to catch one. By the time I quit I caught five kings and a trout. The kings on the first bank that I saw weren’t all that big. A couple would have been good if they had been stream brookies and I let them go. The others will be “good eaters”, as they say.

Catching a dinner fish was one goal for the morning, but my other two of changing the boat’s oil without making a mess or cutting myself were still ahead. I got everything all set up and ready. I was going to be careful, very careful. Only how did I know that the bag I slipped the oil filter full of black oil would break and do a number on my shorts and sock. Lucy hasn’t seen that yet and I don’t expect a big smile. But then I didn’t cut myself, so I got two of my three goals, which is better than some other times in the past.

The boat comes out of the water this week. Time to move ahead to other things. This will be my last regular fishing post until spring, however if you want to drop in now and then I’ll put up some hunting and fishing stuff that might be of interest.  

Good luck and get out there!

Sunday dinner. Trout are our favorite.

“This is some of the best salmon fishing of the summer.” That’s what Jack told me when I called him this morning from my cell. He said he had 16 or 17 kings and by my watch it was only 9:30. He was on the far north end of the island with some of the other guys and they all were into the fish.

 

Later, I talked to Scott and he said that the catches were all double digits this morning and were a mix of all the age classes. One guy did well fishing all spoons and another did about the same with all rotators. He said he set up short of best action and still caught six as he trolled up to the action where he caught more. Best of all he reported the fish were only down about 80 feet.

 

I took my boat over to the sanitary pump-out station to empty the tank as a part of the winterization process. Afterward, with the calm lake, sunny sky, and pull of wondering what was on the first bank, I went out a mile. I dropped three lines, set the auto pilot, and went to work getting things ready for winter storage. You might as well be fishing while you work, I reasoned – I’ll bet you can’t do that. Anyway, temp on the first bank was 55 down and there were fish there that didn’t want to bite. I listened to football on the radio, did “work”, and watched for a hit that didn’t come. I was going too fast and if I had a customers out I’d have adjusted better, but I didn’t have customers, didn’t have to produce fish, and didn’t care. The day was nice and that was all that was required.

 I’m going out in the morning on the first bank again to see if the last fish of the season will be there for dinner tomorrow night. I need to catch a small trout, its Lucy’s favorite, before going back to the dock to change oil. I get it all over myself no matter how hard I try to be careful. Odds are that I’ll have at least one bloody knuckle too.  I have a cigar that I got in Boston and I think it would be a good idea to smoke it before all the oil and blood.

 I’ll be home by 1:00 to watch the Lions. I have to admit that Lucy and I have been fans throughout the pain of the last decade or two. They are our team even if they remind me of my bleeding while changing oil. Maybe tomorrow there will be no oil spills, no blood, and Lions will win. I’d count two out of three as a big victory.