Home Forums Birds & Dogs Upland Game Ruffed Grouse

What type of cover are you guys finding these in the late season? I've never been able to find many, if any at all, in January. I live in western NY near the PA border in Steuben county if that helps... Thanks!

They like the abandoned and thickly overgrown Christmas tree plantations around here. They can sit in the branches and be safe from predators both above and below.

Thanks! We have a few of those around here. I've been hunting tightly clustered pines that have seeded themselves from state run pine plantation areas on state land around here. Nothing so far... What do they eat this time of year?

Ruffed grouse like thick cover. During winter I find them in cover (briers and brambles) with barberries, winter berry and bittersweet. If you have stands of pine with a lot of barberries you should have grouse. If you go into, what you think may be grouse cover, and exit on the other side with scratches on your face, hands, ears and your clothes torn to shreds, then you have been in grouse cover. When you are hunting them, if you do not have a dog, stop walking frequently through the cover. Many times, when you stop walking, a nearby grouse may flush that might have held tight as you walked by. That grouse that just flushed will now put the tree nearest to you between you and it. Good luck!

Thanks! I used to be able to find winterberry, or at least what I thought was, quite a bit. We always found grouse near those. The places I used to find them didn't have it the last couple years. I'll keep looking. We went out tonight to a place that looks promising in a couple years. They just select cut a chunk of state land and the briars are starting to grow up. I have a dog that's still young and learning(lost my last one 2 years ago).

Pines are great when they are going to roost. When they are out feeding a good cover has many downed logs or slashing for them to move into quickly. They also spend the night there frequently. Look for droppings on the logs.

Without downed logs or slashings, what looks good will never turn into a good cover.

Find the cover with food and you will find the Grouse

Problem is Ruffed Grouse eat most everything:

From a Ruffed Grouse web page:

"A variety of foods fill seasonal nutritional needs, and the diets of the ruffed grouse are diverse. In the spring, grouse eat 98% vegetable matter, including buds and newly sprouted leaves of aspen, birch, cherry and apple trees as well as some herbaceous plants. As they come into season, fruits (strawberry, blueberry, bunchberry and raspberry), seeds, and plant parts (sedges, clovers, violets and grasses) become mainstays in the diet. Preferred fall foods include other berries (dogwoods and viburnums), sumac, grapes and acorns. During the winter, the food of choice and perhaps necessity is aspen buds, but they will also eat catkins and buds of hazelnut, willow, beech, birch, maple and some berry bushes. Principal non-vegetative foods include ants, beetles, flies, spiders and other insects."

They also need a certain amount of overhead cover to give them a fighting chance against ever increasing numbers of Hawks and Owls. With trapping being mostly a thing of the past, the Raccoons, Possums, Skunks, Foxes and other egg eaters make it hard for a brood to hatch.

There are also some studies that seem to indicate they are also fighting West Nile Virus.

These are hard times for Ruffed Grouse in the East.

When the Birds are down there are many great covers with few Birds.

In fact all Birds in our area are in remarkable short supply. Used to see many song Birds during winter hunts. Not so much anymore.

The Ruff Grouse worst enemy in the east is the Wild Turkey . They are destroying the Nesting Eggs and Food supply for these upland birds. As the Wild Turkey Population grows the Grouse will cease to exist in these parts of the US.

I've said the same for some time. The GC says IFOS.

Not sure on the food supply side, in that Grouse can bud on many trees that will not support a Turkey. Completely agree on Turkeys scratching thru the wood and destroying the Grouse nests.

I never knew this. Good info

That's the other thing. I could be looking in the right places, but with such a low grouse population, they're just not around. I heard that about turkeys and grouse too. A guy I hunt with that grew up in Wisconsin said the same thing. His dad's place has turkey's everywhere, but few grouse anymore. When he was younger, it wasn't weird to have close to 10 flushes in a couple hours. We've never had many grouse, but we'd get at least 1 flush every time out...

If it's good cover they are around, just not in large numbers.
You are probably dealing with mostly older Birds and they know the game better than most of us.

Addition: Two of us hunted for 7 hours last week and he lives in Grouse country. Has good Dogs and trains other peoples Dogs pretty much year round. We had 6 solid points. One the Bird came out behind us. Another we saw leaving early. There was snow on the ground and with 4 points we saw the tell tale tracks of them getting out and gone. He has excellent hearing and the day was quiet. The Dogs locked up at least 20-30 yards from where the Grouse were sitting and most certainly didn't bump those four. They were out and gone way before we walked into the point.

They knew how to play the game.

Interesting about the inverse relationship between turkey numbers and grouse populations. Wonder if the same correlation exists between turkeys and quail? I've never heard it as an explanation for the bobwhite decline. If someone had told me 15 years ago that I'd see more turkeys in a year's time than I see quail, I'd have said they were crazy. But that has become the reality.

My bet is that this turkey thing is more about habitat change than the actual turkey doing damage to grouse. Grouse habitat isn't good turkey habitat, ect. If the habitat changes improve turkey populations then wouldn't those changes adversely affect grouse populations? Thus seeing more turkeys and fewer grouse and not looking at the big picture might draw a false conclusion?

This would make sense if each species had the same level of habitat change tolerance, but they don't. Turkey's survive and thrive in more habitat scenarios than Grouse.

Where we always found a number of birds a few years back you are now hard placed to find a single grouse but Turkeys everywhere. Turkeys are the Ruff Grouse worst enemy .

In Price co Wisconsin we had a lot of grouse , 12 bird flushes were common. Then the turkeys came, the grouse declined a bunch. Now the turkeys are gone and the grouse are doind realy good. Now doubt a flock of scavanging flock of turkeys will know enough to look for eggs when it kicks up a grouse. Chickens eat their own eggs, and turkeys will eat eggs too. Most likely will chase down little grouse and eat them too.

I seem to find Grouse on my place any time but hunting season. I would love to know where they go!

Don't grouse have something like 7 year population cycles?