260 The Ruffed Grouse 



less than 0.3 grouse to 1.7 grouse, not an alarming record to say the 

 least. Leopold ( 1933 ) gives 0.3 grouse per hunter for the seasonal 

 average in Wisconsin, M'hich checks well, since all of the Wisconsin 

 hunters are not grouse hunters either. 



Other grouse-hunting states show similar records. For example, 

 in 1938, Pennsylvania hunters averaged .3 grouse, Connecticut 

 hunters .4, each for the season. For honest-to-goodness, dyed-in-the- 

 wool grouse hunters, the average is very much higher. Many of my 

 grouse-hunting friends make their daily limit several times each 

 season, and regularly take their seasonal limit. Van Coevering (1931), 

 in speaking of the miraculous recovery of the bird, noted that tv\^o 

 hundred and sixty-five grouse hunters in 1930 put up 11,000 birds, 

 and took 1,248. The average kill per hunter was 4.7, less than half 

 the legal seasonal limit. 



Data on daily hunters' bags was gathered in the field studies of 

 grouse hunting, already discussed. In New York in the 1930 and 

 1931 studies, it took 19.0 and 12.6 hours of hunting, respectively, to 

 bag a grouse. The average hunting "day" was 5.75 hours in 1930 and 

 3.4 hours in 1931. Adjusting the take to the basis of an eight-hour 

 day, the average daily hunter bag was .42 grouse per man in 1930 

 and .63 in 1931. The actual daily bag on the short hunting days was 

 .33 and .37 respectively. This daily bag probably increased some in 

 successive years as both grouse and grouse hunting increased. How- 

 ever, the tendency is more marked in the increased total take than it 

 is in the individual take; that is, the increase is mainly in more hunters 

 taking grouse rather than the same hunters taking more grouse ( see 

 comparison of graphs in Fig. 11). 



The distribution of hunting take is of interest too. Only about one- 

 quarter of the hunters took any grouse at all. Again we see that 

 relatively few hunters get grouse, even among those who are hunting 

 in grouse cover. If we convert our figures to include only the approxi- 

 mately twenty-five per cent of hunters who can hit grouse, the daily 

 eight-hour-day bag per hunter would range from 1.6 to 2.8 birds 

 per day. Half of these figures would give the approximate take on 

 the basis of the length of day actually hunted. 



The records in Michigan in 1932 (Ruhl) indicate an average daily 

 bag of 0.7 grouse per hunter. It may be noted that this is consider- 

 ably lower than Van Coevering's (op. cit.) record of 4.7 birds per 

 average three days' hunting in Michigan in 1930, or 1.6 birds per 

 man day. 



