Every once in awhile the man upstairs

takes a shine to us and rewards us

with a little something "extra" to make

our lives a bit brighter.  I have read over many years of the halcyon days of old when the likes of Burton Spiller, William Harnden Foster, Col. Harold P. Sheldon, Corey Ford and John Alden Knight enjoyed the finest ruffed grouse hunting known to man.  I had long since come to the conclusion--amply reinforced by the opinions of a multitude of other contemporary hunters-- that those "good ol' days" were done forever, if, indeed, they really had ever existed.  Last fall I found that not only did such days exist, but they still do--and maybe, in at least onearea, the current grouse hunting is even better!

  Some time before, I had called Sam

Pursglove, the head man of theRuffed

Grouse Society and an old friend, for his sage advice about where to go grouse hunting.  If Sam didn't know, what was the point of even trying?  Samknew, Each year the society runs a National Grouse and Woodcock Hunt out of Wayne Jacobsen's renowned Sawmill Inn in Grand Rapids, Minn., and he has gotten to know both the areas and the guides.  He put me in touch with Howie Hill, a young man who is well-known for both his fine pointing dogs and his almost uncanny knowledge of grouse.

  I pulled into Grand Rapids about 8 p.m. on a Northwest Commuter flight after making a connection in Minneapolis.  I checked into the Sawmill Inn and went to bed fairly early, hoping that somehow everything would work out.  Sure enough, my phone rang the next morning, and Howie was waiting for me with his German shorthair, Fritz.

  I was able to get a rundown on Howie's past experience in the hunting field while we headed for the Balsam Area.  Aged 35 last fall, he had already been hunting for some 21 years.  He had been training dogs since 1973 and had stayed with Chesapeake retrievers until 1982, producing several champions.  He had owned shorthairs when he was growing up, and in 1983 he started training bird dogs.  His primary breed has always been German shorthairs, but he takes on the occasional setter or pointer as well.  In conjunction with his dog training, he has also become known as one of the best grouse and woodcock men in the area--if not the country.

  We pulled into the Balsam Area and Howie released Fritz, who, I noted, was wearing what looked like a training shock collar.  It wasn't.  It was something I had never seen before, but can attest--as an old frustrated grouse hunter--that it is the greatest thing to come along in hunting since the invention of the primed shotshell. It was a battery-powered "beeper" that, when the dog trotted along casting coverts, gave a steady--almost bell-like-beeping.

If it stopped within what you knew to be hearing range, it was a pretty good guess--especially with Fritz, as it turned out--that the dog was on point.  Ah ha!  You say: How do you find a dark-colored dog staunch on point in a thick cover? Simple.  In about 30 seconds (actually you can set the time), the beeper begins to give off a single beep every few seconds.  You can locate the dog following the beeps.  If the dog moves, the beeper goes back to its steady bouncing beep, and you know the bird has flushed or had moved out earlier, and the dog has slipped his point.  Boy, does it work.

  Anyway, since we were a bit late getting started that first morning, we shot only one grouse and two woodcock, which I thought was just great--ranking right up there with one of the best days I could expect in our New Jersey coverts these days.  Howie was plainly disappointed and, after a quick lunch where I must have passed some secret test, he decided to take me to one of his private "secret" spots.

  There is no way to relate what happened that afternoon in about two hours.  We had a total of 32 grouse starts--of which probably 20 were over points--and 10 woodcock flushes, mostly over points as well.  We ended up with four more woodcock and five grouse for the day, mostly shot over points.  If that isn't a heck of an afternoon, I don't know where to go.

  The second day we hunted Kennedy Lake area in the morning and Bower Lake Trail in the afternoon and had 22 grouse starts and eight woodcock flushes, with a bag of three grouse and four woodcock.  Through it all, Fritz did a magnificent job.  One time he ranged beyond what I had already gotten to know as probably hearing range for the beeper.  As it happened, Howie's hearing is a bit worse than mine--which is saying something--so he was using me to establish where last I heard the beeper. When the dog was gone and we couldn't hear the beeper, we headed off in the direction where last I remembered hearing it.

  We had to press on through thick alders for about 10 minutes until I finally heard a faint solitary beep coming through every few seconds.  The dog was still way ahead of us and was on point.  He still was--and had been so for probably 20 or more minutes--and when we walked in beside him, wonder of wonders, a grouse flushed out about 15 yds. in front of him and, double wonder, I dropped him!

  The next day was almost anti-climactic.  We went to the Stony Ridge Forest Trail land and started to move woodcock.  The first one--beautifully pointed--flushed right out into the open for the easiest woodcock shot I've ever been presented.  I missed.  Howie looked into the distance, gently humming; Fritz cast about in disgust.  We then pointed and flushed four woodcock in a row, some difficult, some reasonable, none easy. I went four for four.  While modestly accepting a smidgen of approval from Howie and Fritz, I silently thanked that Man Upstairs for yet another unwarranted gift.

           1990  American Rifleman