In the Western uplands, these species get little pressure.
Oct 4, 2004
At 13,000 feet, the world
is an unforgiving place. Your lungs work overtime and your muscles protest with each step you take. You wonder why you're there, but then your dog suddenly dashes ahead and puts a flock of birds to air, and you know. It's the challenge of the unique landscape and the ptarmigan that draw you to this hostile mountaintop.
For many years, a buddy and I would head to the country above timberline in the Colorado Rockies each fall. We eagerly anticipated the annual ritual in which we'd try for three Western grouse in one day. With luck, we'd shoot a limit of white-tailed ptarmigan in the high country, then jump in my pickup and drive 75 miles to a spot loaded with sagebrush and serviceberries, where we'd try to limit out on blue grouse and sage grouse. More
often than not we weren't successful at collecting all three birds, but the thrill was in the chase as we attempted to complete our little slam.
One of the attractions of this hunt was the lack of other hunters. My buddy and I were both from the East, where bird hunting has a large and storied following. Head into grouse cover there, and chances are good you'll
encounter other sportsmen. In the West, however, we seldom saw others, perhaps because it offers an enormous amount of land to hunt and birds are widely scattered. Big game is also the primary quarry in the West; far fewer hunters go after birds.
During four consecutive years of ptarmigan hunting in Colorado, I saw only one party of other hunters, a group led by Tam Scott, a judge from Aspen. Tam and his pals, like my
buddy and me, were passionate bird hunters and would do whatever it took to find birds-even if it meant suffering at high altitudes.
Blue Grouse
It's easy to understand why a great many hunters don't particularly care for traipsing around for birds above timberline, but I'd always wondered why
species that are easier to go after don't have much appeal.
Take blue grouse, for example, which range throughout the Rockies and into Canada. These birds are often incredibly numerous during periods of high cycles, but very few people seem to hunt them. I love to go after them in aspen stands located in a draw surrounded by large stands of sagebrush. Birds are commonly concentrated in those depressions because the areas are cool and moist. My favorite strategy, where roads are conveniently located, is to dump a hunter or two off on a ridge. From there they can slowly hunt their way down to a lower road, to be picked up at the end of the day.
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