grouse question

[BIGINNER]

quick question.  when targeting grouse, do you guys stay on the roads or go off the roads a bit.  is it better to get off the roads if you have dogs?

[rtspring]

Use roads to find grouse. Then hunt areas just off the road where you found them.  Also try dirt bike trails

[Bone_Collector]

I like the roads that are a bit over grown the grouse may be a bit harder to see on the ground but flushing them is half the fun!

B_C

[AspenBud]

Both.

Tip, as the season progresses you can find more off the path. Grouse get smart after a while and head for cover and in general, they will seek places to hide once the leaves fall.

Honestly I think you're odds of finding birds go up when you get off the road, assuming you have a dog that knows what it's doing that is.

A dog is a huge help when grouse hunting, but it's not doing you any good if it is simply running the road and not searching the cover for you...scratch that, a dog is an asset no matter what if it knows how to retrieve or point dead game. But you will get far more out of it if you get the dog into cover and let it do its job.

As always however, hunt the food, not the bird. Find what they eat and you'll find them.

[snowpack]

I like the roads that are overgrown to the point that you can reach your arms out to the sides and your hands are in the brush.  Figure that hawks have too much trouble getting in and out of those tight areas and grouse get to grow a little longer.

[Stilly bay]

I like the roads that are overgrown to the point that you can reach your arms out to the sides and your hands are in the brush.  Figure that hawks have too much trouble getting in and out of those tight areas and grouse get to grow a little longer.

good advice.
There needs to be over head cover to protect the birds from hawks but not so much that the grouse has trouble getting air born if something on the ground is after it.
the ground cover also needs to be sparse enough for the bird to walk through some what easily. for instance you won't typically find them in heavy salal patches unless there are berries around, its just too thick for them.
The best rules is: grouse are where you find them.

obviously road huntingshooting is an effective way to kill a grouse, no denying that. I just think there are far better ways to  find one than cruising the logging roads at 20mph trying to spot one the camo'ed buggers or  hoping one is dumb enough to walk out in front of your rig and watch you get out and load your gun to take a shot at it. What about all the grouse you pass by that you never had a chance at because you never bothered to get out of the truck and hunt? what about all the ones on the side of the road that flush or run when they hear the truck?

[Dave Workman]

obviously road huntingshooting is an effective way to kill a grouse, no denying that.

Yes and it also happens to be illegal!  No shooting along, across or in the road.

I ain't saying that it doesn't happen, probably a lot, but it's a no-no. I did  story in Gun Week about 6-7 years ago after talking to wildlife officials in several states. 

i've found more blue grouse along roads, but shooing them back into the bush makes sense and it is the particularly cooperative bird that flies up to land on a tree limb. That's happened to me more times than I can remember. It happens to the grouse only once.   

[bobcat]

obviously road huntingshooting is an effective way to kill a grouse, no denying that.

Yes and it also happens to be illegal!  No shooting along, across or in the road.

It's only illegal if you do it negligently.

[AspenBud]

Shooting them from your vehicle is illegal, on foot, that's a different story. Particularly on a logging road.

Speaking of that, Weyerhaeuser has most, if not all, of its logging roads gated in a lot of places as do several other timber companies. You won't be driving up and down those much.

[merkelman]

quick question.  when targeting grouse, do you guys stay on the roads or go off the roads a bit.  is it better to get off the roads if you have dogs?

On foot of course,  we carouse the cover just off of the road, but with dogs we really hit the cover well off the roads as we generally have better luck. Knowing the area really helps too! 

[nryche]

Yes and it also happens to be illegal!  No shooting along, across or in the road.

From WDFW
http://wdfw.wa.gov/help/questions/70/What+are+the+rules+about+shooting+from+a+road%3F
and the RCW
http://apps.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=77.15.460

[Mike450r]

The shooting from the road comes up every year and was covered pretty well in a recent thread.  I have shot so many different birds and animals from a road I can't even count them all.  All were legal, and most were while walking the road rather than driving and seeing the bird/animal.

Private timber company roads aren't even part of the discussion as they are not public which is a key word, negligently is also a key word in the RCW which is left out of the WDFW regs.

Back to topic, roads are where I find most of my grouse for sure.  Typically I look for roads that are just starting to get grown over with plenty of grass but also plenty of gravel left as well.

[Curly]

It is interesting that a most important word is left out of the regs.  The other word I don't like in the RCW or the regs is where they say "public highway".  I wish they would just simply say "public road" instead of highway...........kind of misleading in my opinion. 

[Mike450r]

It is interesting that a most important word is left out of the regs.  The other word I don't like in the RCW or the regs is where they say "public highway".  I wish they would just simply say "public road" instead of highway...........kind of misleading in my opinion.

I agree.  The way I look at it is if it is a paved, commonly travelled road it would be negligent to shoot there, pretty much common sense to me.  If it is in the state forest where hunting is common and the road is "public highway" by definition,  it may not be negligent depending on the circumstances.  I would say shooting a grouse or other legal animal from the road in Capitol Forest if done safely would not be illegal even though it falls under the "public highway" definition.

[KFhunter]

Most folks just ground sluice the birds off a road in the evening, the birds pick up rocks off the gravel road to help digest their feed overnight while they roost.


If I'm after grouse I take the dog and hike the brush in snowberry patches, hopefully she'll get a good point before they bust and I have time to get into position - it's hard