On Tue, 20 Oct 1998 Denny Granstrand wrote:

(snip)

> ... It is real work to look for SPGR. It definately is not for the
> faint-of-heart. You really have to want to see one to go searching.
> Unless you are among the lucky ones who happens to see one right along
> the forest road.

(snip)

> There is a very healthy population of SPGR in Okanogan County.

(snip)

> The Department of Wildlife needs to be prodded, or forced, to protect Spruce
> Grouse from hunting.

In general, forest grouse are under-utilized. Spruce Grouse are probably
similar to Ruffed Grouse in terms of the kill being largely confined to
narrow strips along roads. The birds that inhabit the areas away from the
roads are largely unhunted.

Denny's comments (above) are contradictory to my mind. He describes a
healthy population that inhabits areas where they are virtually inaccessible
to humans. The potential for hunting to harm such a population is basically
nil.

However, I know that what I found contradictory was not the basis for the
plea to stop hunting spruce grouse. It is clear from Denny's statements
that his basis for wanting protection is the lack of sporting qualities
to this bird. It is unwary and, once located, easily killed. It sounds
to me like the effort required to find one is enough to make it a challenging
and therefore sporting experience for a hunter. I guess I would consider
Moose to be similar in some ways. Once you've gone through the work of
locating one, the killing is not that difficult (there aren't too many
hunters on Tweeters so I'll probably get away with that gross generalization).

Interesting discussion about this phantom grouse. Washington's hunters
are reporting that they kill them in lots of places including the
Blue Mountains (Asotin, Garfield, and Columbia counties), northeastern
Washington (Pend Oreille, Ferry, Stevens, Spokane, and Lincoln counties),
and on the east slope of the Cascades (Okanogan, Chelan, Kittitas, and
Yakima counties). There's even reported harvest from Walla Walla, Whitman,
and Douglas counties. The highest average harvest from the 1992 - 1996
period comes from Okanogan (778 birds), Stevens (443 birds), Ferry
(307 birds), Yakima (306 birds), and Chelan (213 birds) counties.
Unfortunately, all of these data ("data" being the plural of anecdote)
are dubious. However, the hunters of Washington and the Washington
Department of Fish and Wildlife are not the only ones who are less than
all-knowing on distribution of Spruce Grouse in Washington. Wasn't there
a recent Tweeters message discussing how the Breeding Bird Atlas authors
had to try to deal with reports of Spruce Grouse in the Olympics and there
was enough credibility to the reporters that it wasn't easily dismissed?

It's always good to have some on-going mysteries to work on.

Kelly McAllister