A Gunless Hunt in Oregon. 
I awoke suddenly and sat straight up in bed. 
The “Crack, crack,” of a double barrel sounded 
as if it were right at the foot of my hill, while 
the echoes rolled away down the river. In reality 
it was just across the river on the island. Some 
fellow had flushed the bunch of ten quail I had 
been watching since they were chicks, for they 
were hatched at the edge of an old brush heap 
on the bank above the river. 
It was the first morning of the open season. 
There was a fog, but it was not dense; just a 
low-hanging mist above the water. Across on 
the other side I could make out a dim outline 
of the dark firs and hills. 
My ten acres lie on the east bank of the 
Willamette, nine miles south of Portland. Part 
of these acres is in level orchard and field a 
hundred feet above the river; the rest is in a 
long slope to the river bank and terraced by two 
wide benches. Part of the place is in the wild 
state, and I suppose it always will be, for I have 
hopes that some day another flock of quail will 
find shelter in the tangle below the house. May¬ 
be another ruffed grouse will make her home 
there. Besides these I have seen both China 
pheasants and bobwhite here on my ten acres. 
I had not been hunting for over two months. 
I was as excited as Buck; perhaps more so, for 
he often gets a hunt by himself. He satisfies 
his hunting instinct by trailing two or three rab¬ 
bits that have paths through the tangle of hazel, 
vine maples, salal and ferns that are so thick 
on my hillside that I seldom try to penetrate 
their precincts. 
It did not really take me long to get into my 
big hunting boots after breakfast, but it seemed 
long. I had milked my two cows hastily. They 
did not seem to understand why I put them out 
this morning before they had half finished eat¬ 
ing. My chickens scattered as I fed them on the 
run, instead of collecting about my feet. The 
rest of my chores suffered. With some apples, 
crackers and nuts in the roomy pockets of my 
hunting coat I took the hill, not by the path, but 
in the steepest place in four or five long jumps. 
It is a paddle of 200 yards across to the inlet 
at the upper end of the island. As my canoe 
shot into the cove, a spotted sandpiper flushed 
from among the rocks and flitted across in front 
of me, but he was too small game for my bag. 
I was after ruffed grouse and quail. 
The region across the river from my home 
is one of the best covers for ruffed grouse I 
have ever seen. It is practically the untouched 
wilderness. Years ago some of the big firs up 
the mountain side were logged and hauled down 
a skid road to the river. That was so long ago 
that in places the road has disappeared. The 
wild crab apple thickets have never been touched. 
The ash bottom and the alder swamp are just as 
nature made them. 
Once across the river I climbed the bank 
through the brush. From an alder tree just 
ahead of me a mountain quail flushed. He was 
one of the flock that had been scattered by the 
hunter shooting at daybreak. He was cunning 
enough to fly so that he kept the tree between 
us, so that I failed to catch a glimpse of him. 
But I knew the whir of quail wings, and that 
was enough to set my pulse beating quicker. 
I passed through the remains of an old or¬ 
chard along a little swale across a creek, and 
then set out straight up a side canon along the 
old skid road. This is a typical summer haunt 
for ruffed grouse. I had often flushed them on 
this trail. The alders and maples grow thick, 
fallen limbs and logs are covered with moss, and 
the whole is over-topped with ranks of tall fir 
trees. But I knew that at this time of the year 
the grouse would be higher on the hill, out more 
in the open places where food was plentiful. 
Toward the top of the hill I came to a little 
open space where two big maples glowed yellow 
in the midst of the dark-clothed firs. The maple 
leaves filled with summer sun, radiated a rich 
golden light through the forest. The heart of 
the old woods was still and sunny and restful. 
No grouse or quail yet. But I found something 
else good, a pair of varied thrushes. The flick¬ 
ers and sapsuckers were here, too. All at once 
there was a whir of wings and a small bunch 
of quail were swallowed by the thick trees be¬ 
fore I got sight of them. Buck failed to find 
them, and I went on. This was a typical spot. 
I knew I should see a grouse up here, and I 
trod with cautious step on the tip-toe of expec¬ 
tancy. But nothing flew save a song sparrow 
in a nearby bush. A small flock of Oregon 
snowbirds flitted about in the hazels and dog¬ 
woods and twittered almost as if spring time 
were at hand. 
I never flush grouse just where I expect to 
find them, and this day was no exception. A 
hundred feet beyond when I was least looking 
for it, one thundred up from the side of the 
path and went straight away. It was an open 
shot. I could see the mottled plumage of his 
jet black feathers on the side of his neck. 
Bang! He surely would have been a dead bird, 
but there was no report, no echoes through the 
woods. He was certainly a foolish, inexperi¬ 
enced bird, for following a wood path is poor 
grouse policy. 
Later I came to the border of an old farm. 
Crawling under the barbed wire fence I began 
skirting the field. Here, indeed, I was sure to 
find something. It was a good place for China 
pheasants. A song sparrow flushed almost at 
my feet, and even the flutter of his wings made 
me jump in expectancy. It remained for Buck 
to find the game. As a rule, a China pheasant 
holds to the field, but in fall and winter they 
take more to the brush, and even to the thicker 
timber in places surrounding the fields. A little 
way ahead I heard the beating of wings and the 
old familiar cackling sound of a China rooster. 
To my surprise the sound continued. The bird, 
instead of flying out into the open as usual, 
had, like a ruffed grouse, lit fifteen or twenty 
feet up in a tree and sat cackling at the dog, 
an unusual performance for one of these birds. 
I hastened to get nearer, and just for a moment 
I caught a glimpse of his gorgeous coat and long 
tail. The moment he saw me, instead of swing¬ 
ing out to the open and giving me a better 
chance, he flushed straight through the timber. 
He mistook me for a gunner instead of a harm¬ 
less individual with a stick. 
The next bird Buck flushed among a thick 
growth of scrub oak and ash trees. He flew a 
few yards and I heard the flutter in the branches 
that told he had lit. Then I began creeping 
through the bushes. I find nothing more in¬ 
tensely exciting than trying to locate one of 
these birds. I never cease to marvel at the skill 
they have in hiding. I got within twenty-five 
feet of the bird and scanned every tree and bush 
and branch. But he must be there, I thought, 
so I began to go over again every part of the 
foliage. I did this three times and was then 
positive the grouse must have fooled me in 
lighting. I started to move closer, when with 
a sudden whir he was gone, but I saw him 
clearly as he flew, and he was, indeed, my bird. 
I stood staring at the swinging branch on which 
he had been perched, wondering—I have often 
before—how he could be in plain sight and not 
be seen. 
When I came to the upper edge of the crab 
apple thicket, Buck acted like a veteran, for he 
swung down toward the lower edge and put up 
a pair of grouse. Both came toward me. One 
lit off to the right, the other sailed straight over 
my head and stopped in the limbs of an ash. 
He craned his neck and we stared at each other 
for a full minute before he decided I might be 
dangerous, and was off. He was game for me 
sure enough, for I had not had such a good 
chance at a ruffed grouse since summer before 
last, when I found an old bird leading off a 
covey of chicks. 
I made doubles on this pair in the crab apple 
thicket, for I got a good look at the second 
bird perched just beyond a fir sapling in a scrub 
oak. As I raised my glasses that bird seemed 
to think he had never looked down such a dan¬ 
gerous looking double-barreled blunderbuss as I 
had, for he got away like a streak before I could 
level my glasses. 
I went on following old trails through the 
woods and I thought I never had hunted in bet¬ 
ter ruffed grouse covers, nor had I ever seen a 
finer fall day. Buck flushed two more birds, but 
they got away before I saw them. I scared an¬ 
other out just ahead of me at a bend in the 
trail, and he ran for ten or twelve feet before 
he took wing. Like the first grouse I had seen, 
he would have been an easy mark for a gunner. 
Under our game law a hunter is not allowed 
more than five grouse in one day, and as I had' 
reached that limit, I turned toward home. I 
went by different trails, and before I had reached 
the old skid road to the river, Buck and I had 
put up three more grouse. 
When I entered the open glade again by the 
river I heard the call note of a mountain quail, 
and then the answering whistle of another. I 
sneaked along under the low limbs at the edge 
of the woods. In a minute I saw two or three 
