A Hunter’s Genesis
I believe hunters have one special experience that launched a life in pursuit of wild game. A memorable occurrence made so by a mix of amazing people, wildlife, or the wild surroundings themselves. A magical moment set apart from all others; that one experience that sustains them through cold grey days when game is scarce.
I’ve have reflected on my early years growing up in the region known as the inland northwest. Like many others from that time, I found a certain appeal in the rugged outdoors. There is a connection to the creatures hunters seek as sustenance which often cannot be explained. My earliest recollections are of following the allure of wild things and longing to take part in the struggle of life in wild places.
Certainly, the stakes are not as high for human hunters, it is rarely a matter of life or death. However, it still requires effort—sometimes a great deal of it—and more often than not, it is simply the adventurous spirit that is fed.
This overwhelming desire would have me slip back to the edge of cut hayfields after a long day of hauling just to watch whitetail nibble on stubbled vegetation. During one late afternoon scouting, as I lay in wait for the deer to arrive, a wandering ruffed grouse scampered across the back of my legs. Awe, yes - the ruffed grouse. There are few creatures more wild, yet still accessible, than the ruffed grouse. I yearned to be just another predator for grouse to outsmart. A challenge often bested by the beating of stout heart and wings.
So, for me, the quarry became our native ruffed grouse and the place was often the cherished forests in and around my aunt and uncle’s 300-acre wood. The apex of my efforts was the attempt to take the agile ruffed grouse on the wing. Easier said than done when the firearm is a single-shot Stevens .410 manufactured in 1913. Rest assured, it wasn’t new when I bought it!
During my first season I learned what to look for and was taught to hunt safely. Though I knew better than to hunt with the hammer set to fire, there were obvious grouse holding haunts where that rule might have been stretched a time or two. With thick stands of alder or patches thimble and snowberry, small creek crossings in the bends of old logging roads often temped my resolve. There were open glens in the forest that became treasured secrets. Places that provided enough sunlight to grow large stands of elderberry, their branches bent over with waxy purple fruit. This journey began at just such a place, over a half-century ago.
I hesitated briefly with apprehension before descending the hillside into deeper woods. In a matter of steps, I would truly be alone. Checking back over my right shoulder, I could see that the forest had veiled the old log cabin where my uncle and cousins rested after a morning of gathering winter firewood. They had no desire to venture into the forest for a mere “bird.” In the minds of my cousins, they’d seen enough of the forest already.
Reaching into the pocket of threadbare jeans, my fingers rattled about in a mix of lint, wood chips, and a dozen or so cigar-like .410 shells. Clasping a selection, I retrieved a single round from the many. A moment to blow away the loose chips of wood and, even though they were alike, to read the black print on the red paper cylinder, “WW 7 ½ “. Satisfied with that, I opened the gun’s well-worn breech, stuffed the round inside its single chamber then, taking brief notice of the head stamp, clapped the gun closed.
Aside: In the hands of a twelve-year-old set off alone to bring home wild game for the table, a gun was powerful medicine - a step toward adulthood. Before considering condemnation, it is best to keep things in historical perspective. First, sporting firearms held greater familiarity and, I dare say, caring mentorship within the family unit more plentiful, in that regard. Statistically, it is still far safer to allow a responsible pre-teen to tote a gun alone in the woods than to allow a teen to drive a vehicle on today’s highways. This is undeniable.
We entered the grouse woods on a sun-dappled September afternoon; just me and my nearly antique Stevens four-ten. I even recall what I was wearing: blue jeans, a three-quarter sleeved purple football jersey – number 77 – and a brightly colored cap I got that summer in Alaska. This being my second season, I wasn’t totally new to the sport. Before that, always eager to learn the many grouse habits and haunts, I had tagged along a few times with my uncle Jim.
The dry creek bed with its tangle of wild raspberry and thimble berry did not produce the thundering flush of a ruffed grouse that I had hoped for. A bit disappointed, I climbed out of the wooded draw toward the top of a long ridge. As I neared a familiar opening, I moved the diminutive four-ten to port arms and placed my right thumb firmly on its hammer’s spur. I crept with purpose, armed with expectation gained by the experience of having been there before.
Soon, I could see the tops of the monster elderberry bush above and, as yet, did not spy a grouse feeding among its berry-ladened branches. I listened for the tell-tale chirping twill of a startled ruffy, the noise it makes while deciding its mode of escape. If caught early, it could be dropped from a branch or sluiced off the ground prior to its flush. Most often, all it allowed was enough time to thumb the hammer, raise the hardwood stock to my cheek, and loose a parting volley toward a flash of feathers.
Aside: Sluicing a grouse (the act of potting a bird off a branch or the ground) was generally how all young hunters started down the path. Much like a lioness returning with a wounded young antelope for its cubs, that’s how we began. There was encouragement yet, always a clear message that, to be a “real” hunter, you must eventually snatch birds from the air. The hunting literature and mentoring adults, all in one accord, preached the sermon of the sport’s highest-level of skill and excitement.
Startled without the benefit of warning, I was caught as much unaware as waiting. The large male grouse, its broad tail feathers exquisitely fanned like a deck of cards, exploded from the base of thick elderberry! It coursed up-slope, following the ridge’s spine! Youthful reflexes allowed a fleeting attempt, though failing in desperation. There was no disappointment - to the contrary. I enjoyed the action and the mere act of shooting. Besides, to my way of thinking, hitting a flushing grouse was near miraculous, not impossible but certainly not to be expected.
Earlier experience had shown that ruffies, though quick and explosive, often didn’t tend to fly far. Generously offering multiple flushes - and therefore, shots - if you followed the direction of flight. To its list of tendencies, it can be added that they tend to land short of entering openings such as logging roads and forest clearings. I knew that there was another opening above the forested bench it had flown into and an excellent chance that it would take a seat on an evergreen bow before leaving the relative safety of the trees.
Large Ponderosa pine and Douglas fir shaded a sprinkling of seedlings underneath; giving the bench a park-like appearance. The bird and I had likely met here before and it had always left the victor. Like a dance, the steps were repeated, the outcome to be expected.
As I neared the opening, squinting eyes scanned the branches above for the bird’s silhouette. There was another elderberry there, not as large as the one below. I looked from yellowing branches to base without a seeing a grouse or hearing its nervous chatter. The elderberry brush was in my path; I had to make a decision as to which side to pass. Knowing that if I chose wrong, the brush may cover the grouse’s escape. In all respects, I would choose right.
Decades old, the elderberry was surrounded by the clutter of dry branches accumulated over its many years. Ahead and slightly to the left was a large rotting ponderosa stump, notched for springboards and likely severed by axe and double-handled cross-cut saw. I imagined old black and white photos of lumberjacks as I passed the elderberry; its very existence likely traced back to the felling of the pine and its neighbors. Having stopped for a moment, I cautiously stepped forward. The sole of my left boot subconsciously pressed down against a brittle elderberry limb. Dry and hollow, the dead branch gave way with a loud “crack”!
As before, the clever bird had not given itself away in boisterous alarm. Madly chopping the air with stout wings, like a ghostly apparition, the grouse materialized from the ground in a whirling mass of leaf and feather! Choosing the previous tact, its flight followed the open ridge to the beckoning arms of evergreens beyond. The hammer went back as the gun raised to my shoulder! The greater distance the frantic bird traveled across the opening allowed an additional split-second. The feathered comet streaked across a backdrop of autumn greens and golds with a grey steel barrel tracing its path! The hammer dropped at the pull of the trigger, the ensuing detonation sending less than an ounce of lead shot hurtling through the air like a hive of angry hornets!
Divinely handed over, the upland king faltered at the bark of the diminutive round! As fanatic in death as it was in life, the noble bird beat its wings against the ground in protest until, in bitter acceptance, it was still. I cannot tell you how many past shots had been tried – and failed. How many grouse had slipped through similar strings of shot. All for the exhilaration that is, for the briefest of time, a life and death interaction between hunter and hunted.
There have been several memorable shots since - my own and those of my companions. Yet, for me, this was the moment, a genesis seared and sealed into my spirit forever. The charge that propelled me like a shot toward a lifelong passion for upland birds and the dogs that would eventually join me in their pursuit. In a moment both mournful and momentous, the king had fallen. Long live the king!
