Owen and I made the annual trek to our sagehen spot yesterday and popped a limit each (2 birds/per) by 7:00 a.m. He almost connected on a nice 3-pointer with his front-stuffer just before dark, also, but he didn't have a clear shot through the head high wild rose bushes and didn't chance hitting some does running with the buck 30 yards from him.

We'll hit the sagehen again next weekend at his rifle deer opener. There were quite a few birds this year, so we'll take a few more than the four we cap our hunt at. He and I agree that young "chickens" are our favorite table fare.

Rosie had a great time. We kicked out nine different rises, from four birds to sixty birds. Apologies for the poor resolution photos. I have no idea why they are like this???

CLEANED UP PHOTOS...




Rosie commented on gutted sagehen smells...



This one's for John Barsness per Owen.

Great stuff Bruce !
GitNer done ..

Thumbs up icon

Geno

Wonderful!

Nice job, fellas!

Fall has *arrived* out here. Spent the day fuggin with a damn truck that won’t run for schit and all I could think about was the fact that it feels like bird hunting season! My Griff even seems to have an extra bounce in her step!

I bet that is fun, killed lots of quail over dogs, but never a Sagehen.

Great!

Shooting em the's easy part.....eating em's when things get difficult.

Good luck next weekend.......hopefully Owen can procure some back strap to ease the pain your poor taste buds endured this weekend.

Rosie is stepping into some big shoes there...

Awesome!!!!

Good thing about birds, they don’t exactly fill a freezer!

I’ve been more than thankful some ducks don’t make much meat.

Those are actually a pretty good size for eating......as good as it gets anyways..


I'm surprised you guys are seeing that many birds Bruce......Sage Hen were getting pretty scarce when I left No.NV.

Nice! 👍

Actually most of them flushed at 100-150 yards. Hitting them on the wing at that range with an open-sight 22 is tougher than an old sagehen rooster.

...and they are a helluva lot better eating than the turkeys and ruffed grouse you're forced to eat.

That is cool, nice photos!

Always enjoy your bird hunt photos !

Very cool, thanks for sharing.

Sage grouse numbers are WAY down in so. Idaho. They keep a season going with a 1 bird limit. I think they would close it but that would tell the feds that they need to be put on the endangered species list. Doing that would have serious repercussions in many areas from big game hunting, cattle grazing, and recreational land use.
I don't know any hunters who bother going after them any more. I haven't hunted them in years.

Mining has been hell on the sagehen here in NV, but it can literally get you killed if you are in any official capacity and tell the truth. Wilderness study designations here have closed me out of some of my old haunts, but they go a long way in keeping the sagehen populations from vanishing. Answers aren't easy. West Nile is clobbering them, too.

Very cool!

Nice lookin pooch too!

One thing is certain with sage grouse, they're sagebrush obligates. Populations rise and fall dramatically, but, if you loose the sagebrush, it's a done deal for the grouse... Lot's of ways to phucqk up sagebrush country to where it doesn't work so good for them as well. If we could predict rainfal in the high desert, we'd have it made.

Pretty damned slow to get it back. In 1999, I visited about 15 sites of documented historic wildfires in Wyoming big sagebrush stands in OR, ID, and NV, ranging roughly 20-50 years postburn. BLM, USFWS, and private lands. Not in a single location were there native forbs or sagebrush in measurable quantity. Litterally nothing but cheat grass and weeds. The idea that you "rest" a burned area from grazing for only one, two, maybe three years postburn, it a crock of chit. The commonality of all the sites, grazed heavily since the fire. Can't blame them, they eat the palletable stuff and leave the rest. The rest ain't worth a chit for grouse generally. Not anti-grazing as I also saw productive beef operations right alongside productive sage grouse populations... It's certainly not a super simplistic. Guess that's two certainties. I'll leave it at that.


People will knock university stuff, however, the prof I worked with had a saying that made the bunny hugger's heads spin. He'd say, "I love to save wildlife, they're great to eat!" RIP...


An interesting, EARLY, read on them is Patterson, '52, The Sage Grouse in Wyoming.

My sage grouse days were' 96-'03 and' 05. Starting to seem like a long time ago... LOL

Now, I'm done.

Thanks for sharing those, looks like a great time. The pooch looks all business with the birds.

Hey Bruce, love the pics. Was the wind horrid where you were? The wife and I took the folks to the Austin, Kingston and Belmont areas this weekend to see the aspens turning. It was gorgeous but the weather was schidt.

Thanks for posting up my sweet Rosie.

Rosie told me to tell you she misses sitting in your lap in the Ranger.

It was calm Sat morning when we got the birds, but the storm blew in that afternoon, and we had driving corn snow Sunday morning. Since we had enough sagehen, Owen hunted deer for a couple of hours again early Sunday, but we bugged out early...didn't want to pull the camp trailer over the two mountain ranges in snow. Turned out as we went west from Reese River and Ione the weather broke. There was a gianormous dust storm that blew over the mountains into Reese River...couldn't see Arch Dome from the west valley.

Same here, with and without dogs, quail and pheasants. I'd sure like to add prairie chickens and sagehens to that list.

Well hell! Sorry we missed you. We were staying at the castle in Reese River Friday and Saturday nights and were over in Big Smokey Valley and in the Monitors as well.

On Saturday in Belmont there was a thunderstorm with as big of rain drops as I've ever seen and had some nasty hail. Still was good to get out in the country.

Please give Rosie pat for me.