By Dave Workman
Editor-in-Chief
As this is written, the 2024 grouse hunting season opener in Washington State is exactly one month away, Sunday, Sept. 15, and my plan is to be there with a shotgun, a .22-caliber pistol, an ice-filled cooler and a very clear conscience about potting a fool hen with a handgun.
Once a couple years ago, my mere mention of this apparently nasty habit on a hunting forum attracted some snippy remarks from a few folks to whom plugging a game bird with a rimfire fell somewhere between blasphemy and treason. Others were more sympathetic, noting that one man’s choice may not be another’s, but if it is legal where I live (and it is), that’s sort of that! By no surprise, a couple of other respondents acknowledged they also shoot grouse with rifles and pistols.
So, here is the real question, and it’s about what constitutes “sporting?” That is, does a grouse on the ground or on a tree limb have a better or worse chance against a single projectile than a bird on the wing trying to dodge a full pattern of No. 6 or 7 ½ shot which might contain well over a hundred pellets?
There may be no correct answer, depending upon the marksmanship capabilities of the person with the pistol versus the wingshooting prowess of the individual with the shotgun.
One of my best buddies, now long deceased, grew up in Washington’s coastal Grays Harbor County, where it was almost a given that a Friday night high school football game would be followed by an early Saturday morning drive through lowland timber country looking for grouse in September and early October. Shooting grouse along old logging roads is sometimes called “ground sluicing,” and it can elicit critical howls from traditional upland hunters who go afield with well-trained dogs, sometimes expensive smoothbores and well-earned pride in their endeavors.
Later in his life, he bought a Benelli Super Black Eagle 3 1/2-inch 12-gauge for, as he once told me with a chuckle, to ground-sluice grouse at 50 yards. I’ve never figured out whether he was serious or just pulling my leg. I know he never went hungry.
It is no small accomplishment to produce a good bird dog, and no small feat to bring down a flushing ruffed grouse in the hardwoods. But, of course, out in the Northwest, many hunters consider it no small talent to be able to head-shoot a blue grouse sitting on a log or stump, refusing to fly while it tries to size up the situation.
There is a reason grouse—and especially blue grouse (aka “dusky” or “sooty”)—are known generically as “fool hens.” They can literally “ba-doop” along the edge of a gravel road, or strut maddeningly along a trail, appearing too lazy to fly and evidently presuming they are somehow invisible to that guy with the shotgun approaching through the brush. If you’ve never experienced this, count your blessings.
I’ve actually walked to within feet of several blue grouse who were either trying to bluff their way out of impending danger, or simply oblivious to my presence. Dumb doesn’t quite define the situation.
However, there are other times when these birds can literally explode in a flurry of thundering wings, catching even the most experienced hunter completely off-guard, only to watch in awe as they sail away to find refuge on a tree limb anywhere from a few yards to maybe half a football field away. Sometimes the buggers land where they are completely visible, and all I’ve had to do is get close enough for a shot while they smugly and mistakenly conclude they’ve outfoxed me.
In Washington, the traditional Sept. 1 season opener was moved back to the 15th last year, ostensibly to protect more hens from early harvest. Some hunters suspect other motives might also have been involved, such as to give bowhunters—whose season also opens Sept. 1—a chance in the forest for some relative silence, and also to prevent conflicts with Labor Day weekenders who apparently prefer camping and hiking without having to encounter people wearing shooting vests full of shotgun shells, and toting scatterguns.
Regardless, the Fish & Wildlife Commission moved the season finale back to Jan. 15, which is something of a fake opportunity, since that time of year is typically so foul in the weather department nobody in his right mind would be out beating the brush for grouse, and no grouse of any intelligence would be dumb enough to be seen!
So, for all intents, my grouse season remains pretty much an early fall activity with mild temperatures, sunny skies and a .22-caliber pistol close at hand, along with either a 12- or 20-gauge double-barrel shotgun within reach.
Is it sporting? Well, who wants to take his or her chances of missing a shot with a rimfire rifle or pistol, or would you rather take a shot with a smoothbore?
