November, 1918 
FOREST AND STREAM 
637 
woodland as he whirrs off his vine-draped 
rock or off his ancient mossy log, half- 
buried in leafmold in the heart of a seques¬ 
tered thicket. 
But while the grouse can be approached 
if thus located, it 'is a difficult matter to 
ascertain the direction from which the 
drumming comes. On still fall days, when 
the dropping of a 
single lazy leaf at¬ 
tracts notice, a grouse 
may be heard drum¬ 
ming in his soft, dim, 
throbbing, penetrant 
way. Is it on this 
slope of the hill, or 
across the hollow? Is 
it down the ridge, or 
is it up? How far 
off is he? It is very 
easy to err in at¬ 
tempting to answer 
these questions. And 
on the right answers 
will depend the suc¬ 
cess of your hunt. 
The thing to do is to 
stand still, listening 
until you are sure of 
the direction whence 
the drumming comes. 
Then walk a hundred 
yards in that direc¬ 
tion, pausing to hear 
the drum. When you 
are sure of your di¬ 
rection, then try to 
determine the dis¬ 
tance. I confess that 
this is most baffling, 
especially if the at¬ 
mosphere is damp, 
for then the sound 
will have its natural 
muffled quality en¬ 
hanced. But at least the hunter knows that 
if he keeps on in the right direction he will 
eventually flush his bird. He should be 
ready to shoot at any time. While stalk¬ 
ing one grouse, he may flush another; or 
he may flush the one he is after much 
sooner than he expected. If the drum¬ 
ming ceases, especially if it ends abruptly 
in the midst of a drum, he may be sure 
that the bird is probably aware of his ap¬ 
proach. Not one man in a hundred can 
crawl up to a drumming grouse; it is about 
as easy to stalk a wild turkey. I do not 
refer, of course, to the grouse of those 
regions where the lack of hunters has ren¬ 
dered the birds tame and fearless, but to 
the alert, sprightly, intelligent, crafty, elu¬ 
sive grouse of our settled regions, where 
for a generation at least sportsmen have 
roamed the woods. 
Real Still-Hunting 
F course, a man cannot depend on a 
grouse to accommodate him by drum 
ming. He must have other ways of 
; locating his game. The most natural of 
( these is by sitting still, looking, listening: 
moving on after a time, to take up the 
i silent, crafty watch at a different place in 
the woods. This kind of hunting just suits 
some men. I remember taking a friend 
deer-hunting in the South. We rode out 
to the stands in a wagon. I posted him 
, on a log on the edge of the road. “Stay 
here,” I said, “until we get back. It may 
be a couple of hours.” He subsided ami¬ 
ably on the log. “Just my kind of hunt¬ 
ing,” he answered. When we returned he 
was fast asleep. 
Where the woods are level, the hunter 
will have to do his still-hunting at random, 
until he finds a grouse; then he may be 
able to discover what brought the bird to 
that particular place. If some attraction 
in the shape of food is visible, the infer¬ 
ence is that more birds are near. The 
hunter should sit still and wait. The great 
principle of all still-hunting is to let the 
hunted rather than the hunter make its 
presence known. If the bird is an old 
cock, he. may be a wanderer; for in the 
autumn the old males range erratically, 
and one may be found miles from a com¬ 
rade. I once- shot a grouse along a creek 
flowing through a farming community; the 
mountains, whence he had come, were five 
miles away. 
Where the hunting is done on hillsides 
(where most grouse-shooting is naturallv 
to be had), the still-hunter should begin 
his day by seeking to ascertain whether 
the grouse are ranging high or low. 
Though they sometimes are distributed 
over various altitudes, it often occurs that 
they frequent the high sides of the ridges, 
or else are all down near the bottom. It 
saves a lot of tramping (not to mention 
disappointment) if the hunter will take 
time and patience to discover where his 
birds are feeding and ranging. Then he 
can spend his day either uphill or down¬ 
hill, rather than spend it in traveling back 
and forth in a fruitless search. 
The still-hunter of 
grouse must be a pa¬ 
tient man; and he 
must be one capable 
of limiting his ambi¬ 
tions. After sitting 
for several hours, 
feeling that as they 
glide by he is losing 
his bragging to the 
people at home, he 
must not be discour¬ 
aged. He should al¬ 
ways go on the prin¬ 
ciple that to every pa¬ 
tient man the chance 
comes. More than 
once I have had a 
very empty morning 
still-hunting, and a 
very full and sporty 
afternoon; indeed, 
several times I have 
saved the day after 
sundown. And what 
I can do the average 
hunter can do. 
Chance Shots 
HE chances that 
the still-hunter 
for grouse has 
are not limited to the 
chances at Sir Ruff- 
neck himself. If he 
is not too exacting in 
the matter of the 
kind of game he de¬ 
sires, while sitting quietly on his 
rock or log, waiting for grouse, he 
may also be waiting to see a moun¬ 
tain covey of quail, a fox-squirrel or 
a gray squirrel come within range; or per¬ 
haps a rabbit that another hunter has 
started will come jumping sedulously 
along. I have known foxes, wild turkeys, 
and even deer to be killed by men who 
were still-hunting grouse. I take it that 
while few men like to “kill them all,” every 
man likes to take something home, lest the 
kiddies think that Dad is a back number, 
and lest someone else who has been count¬ 
ing on a game dinner will have to re¬ 
arrange her menu. 
Men in the woods will act almost as they 
do at home; I mean that their natures will 
betray them or will save them. Whatever 
you do, try not to be a buffalo in the 
woods. I have a friend who is a giant of 
a man; in business, he “butts the bull off 
the bridge.” Unfortunately he carries his 
ideas of success into the woods. On a still 
day he can be heard for miles, tearing 
through the brush, calling his comrades at 
the top of his powerful voice, dislodging 
boulders that go thundering down the 
mountain, getting all out of breath and 
“overhet”—to what end? Presumably be¬ 
cause he thinks the mere expenditure of 
energy can win in the game of hunting. 
(continued on page 662) 
