Bird Hunting In Western NY On The First Weekend In October

Blue Skies And Rolling Farmland Near NY Grouse Country

I opted for staying local on the first weekend in October. On Saturday, I hunted/ explored a spot I had only driven past and labeled “Check Out” on my map last year. It had several areas of obvious “disturbance,” and seemed a fair bet to hold some partridge. Since the covert is only 68 miles from my front door, it is also far and away the closest possible spot in which I might bang-bang-damn a grouse.

I parked the car just off the road and, after determining that 280° was “in,” put Gordie down. For the next 30 minutes, we walked either on the remnants of a skidder trail or armpit deep in brutal blackberry canes. “Disturbed” was an apt description for more than the landscape. When the trail petered out against a mature canopy, we turned south for about 400 yards so we’d have the easier walking just inside the edge of the blackberry-canopy border on our way out. His stub of a tail a merry blur, Gordie showed his appreciation of this more user-friendly cover by snuffling under, around or through it all in the pleasant morning shade.

After almost an hour, Gordie flushed a beautiful red phase bird from a large rotting log into a golden shaft of sunlight. I whiffed gracefully at this calendar-art shot, but sent Gordie out for a precautionary sniff anyway before we moved on. As it turned out, we were less than 60 seconds from where the car sat parked.

On my way to a second parking spot, I stopped for howdy and shake with the dairy farmer whose property is adjacent to this bit of state land. After I explained what I was doing, he told me that he’d often seen partridge near a road just a bit to the north, and encouraged me to give it a try. I thanked him and promised that I would. But when I got there, the block of cover was a bigger bite than I wanted to chew, so I saved it for another time.

I parked once more and hunted another disturbed piece of cover. It, too, was very attractive, but we had no flushes in our short hour on the ground. Even so, with the bird and cover I’d seen, and with the farmer’s endorsement (unless he just wanted me away from the edge of his herd ;-) I felt very pleased to have added a decent partridge place that was birdy and close to home.

On Sunday, family commitments left us just an hour to see whether we could take a pheasant left over from the morning’s hunts at my release club. The weather was again gorgeous; but in 58 minutes, Gordie didn’t make game once. I already had my 16 ga SxS broken and resting on my shoulder for the last 100 yards to the car when the dog went into hyperdrive. I swung the AyA 4/53 from right to left and was rewarded with a dense puff of feathers floating slowly downward in the after-shot stillness. In a jiffy Gordie brought me the stone-dead hen and we were done for the day.

I was delighted with the mild report, at both ends, of the shell I’d used. For the record, it was a 2.75” RST 16 ga. “Best” Lite 1 oz. load of #6 lead. Although the load put very little hurt on me, the pheasant was mercifully dead in the air.

On Monday, woodcock season opened, so out we went for our third species in three days. We went to an old spot we’ve been scouting for the last two weeks, turning up a bird or so on about half the visits. Today, unfortunately, belonged in the wrong half, although Gordie worked with enthusiasm for an hour and a quarter. I noticed with disappointment that a single Posted sign suddenly has appeared in a corner of our hunting area. But the posting was the only small blemish on three days that were otherwise terrific.