By: Frans Diepstraten
The horizon is nothing more than a shift in color where the undulating plains end and the gray sky begins. The land seems empty. Cattle have been brought in and the deer hunters have all gone home. Snow starts falling. My muffled steps feel like an intrusion.
I plod along, eyes half closed to keep out the drifting flakes. Suddenly the chatter of a departing covey breaks the silence. A dozen partridge sail across the contours and land in wolf willow and Saskatoon serviceberry.
The huns have perched high. They watch my approach and fly once more, voicing their disapproval. My fingers are freezing inside my inadequate gloves. I take them off and tuck my hands under my shirt to warm them up. Two steps later, a single partridge rises, presenting a perfect crossing shot that I can’t take.
For a while I follow the coulee, hoping to find another covey. It’ll be dark in a few hours- already the light is getting milky. A partridge calls behind me. As I turn, a covey explodes from the willows, and my hasty shot does nothing but bruise my cheekbone.
With no fixed plan, and nowhere to be, I decide to follow the birds for a bit. Suddenly a single flushes from cover below, climbing above the grass, over the sage and roses, gaining wildly to get across the willows. “Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast”. For two long heartbeats I think I have missed, but then the partridge rises sharply, and flutters down to the ground, just over a small hill.
Finding a mitt-sized bird in eight inches of snow isn’t easy, but luck is on my side as it barely sunk in. Memories well up of dogs that have long left my side. They would have found this bird swiftly. I tuck it into my bag and move on. A few more coveys flush, but I leave them alone; these birds have been disturbed enough on this wintery day. They are smarter than I am anyway, and need to get back to feeding. One bird will do today.
Bag limits vary wildly for upland birds. Tips and tricks to “get your limit” are prevalent on the web. Photos of hunters with a limit of birds on their tailgates are a dime a dozen on Instagram. Full disclosure, I have done so myself. There’s nothing wrong with showing some pride in accomplishing a good day of hunting: the dog worked great, your shooting was on par, and you had a good time out.
However, much hunting takes place on publicly accessible lands, with no control over who hunts there, how often it gets hunted, or how many total birds are taken from it. Hunters hope that game managers set limits based on the abundance of the game resources.
Field surveys, hunter harvest polls, and wing collection programs are sometimes used to inform management. In many cases, upland bird limits were set long ago, and may not have been scrutinized in a while. Game birds really get the short end of the stick with respect to government biologists’ attention.
Since it is not very likely that wildlife management agencies across North America will suddenly allocate more resources to getting a better handle on trends and fluctuations of bird populations, it is up to us as hunters to take a look at our behavior and how it may impact birds.
It’s a new winter day, and I’m out in the foothills. After early snowfalls and a minus thirty cold snap, the vegetation and berries that attracted ruffed grouse in October are gone or buried. Lower down there are sections of willows and poplars. Large spruce that evaded the chainsaw provide snow-free shelter.
The dog and I move slowly. With the wind all but gone, Finn works the ground scent with enthusiasm. When he connects with a bird the point is brief, as the ruffie makes a break for an opening in the trees. A few feathers float on the frigid air, indicating that my hasty shot found life.
As Finn dashes after the fallen bird, another slyly flushes behind him. I can’t help but smile. I wonder how many birds have tricked us today. We have a brace of birds in the bag, and a couple of stories to tell. We call it a day and hike back, followed by a lonely raven that has a lot to say.
In this area, I never hunt the same ridge or valley twice. It’s not too far from the big city. Many birds get shot on the ground by ATV riders. Wingshooting over a dog is less productive but more fun. Hopefully, I have less of an impact on the overall bird population. Ruffed grouse have seen a sharp decline in numbers, so I’m content to only shoot a few.
There is a fine line between hunting smartly and taking unfair advantage of the birds. Sometimes, hunters can jeopardize the survival of local populations. Relentlessly following up singles after the covey rise, hunting birds that are struggling because of long periods of inclement weather and consistently giving away shot birds so you stay below the possession
limit are just a few examples of such behavior.
Managing agencies can only mandate ethics so far. It is up to the individual hunter to do a little soul searching and find that point when enough is enough. Our survival does not depend on killing every last bird that is legally allowed. Their survival, and the survival of hunting opportunities may depend on us not doing so.
