Well, I TRIED to hunt with a Parker

[Richard Flanders]

Went out to my favorite ptarmigan spot yesterday. Didn't see any tracks so I just snowshoed a trail on the hillside to scout for tracks and to put in a trail to use next time. I left the gun, 28" VH20, in the plane, of course, which guaranteed that I'd run into a bird, which I did. I watched it fly away feeling like an idiot. There were a lot of tracks, which was encouraging. Today was another brilliant sunny day so I loaded up and went back out to see if the bird would be in the same spot. Unfortunately, SOMEONE, not sure who, forgot to grab the forearm off the second set of bbls for the Repro 28. I certainly wouldn't ever do something that stoopid, now would I??? Anyway, putting my plane survival .22 into service as an alternate, the bird was very near to where I found it yesterday and was just consumed sauteed in a sherry/cream/mushroom sauce over rice. During the post hunt rest periods yesterday and today I read some of a friends dissertation on the gold deposits of southwest Alaska and sipped Earl Grey tea. Does it get any better than this?? TOMORROW I will remember the Repro forearm...

[Daryl Corona]

Now if you tell me that you hit that bird on the wing, I'll really be impressed!:bowdown: Thanks for the great pics.

[Dean Romig]

Great pictures again Richard. What was the temperature that day?

Do those small lakes have any trout or are they mostly inhabited by pike and forage fish?





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[Eric Eis]

"TOMORROW I will remember the Repro forearm... "

Richard, just don't forget the rest of the gun this time....:)

[Gary Laudermilch]

Ditto on the great pictures! I always enjoy them. Look like you guys finally got some snow.

[Richard Flanders]

Well, no trip down there today; we're heavily clouded over so I couldn't work on my tan. Guess I'll go soak in the rec center jacuzzi to get rid of the "creaks" from all that snowshoeing instead. I doubt there would be any fish in a lake like that Dean. Too shallow and no real creek in or out. I doubt that even grayling make it that far up the river. There's a beaver house in the lake but it hasn't been occupied in a long time. It was a toasty 30deg when I landed so officially "T shirt wx". This spot is up in the Ak Range at 3200ft elevation so always gets good snowfall. There was a good 8"-10" snowfall up there within the past week - the leftovers of the 8" that Anchorage got.

[charlie cleveland]

nice richard....charlie

[Richard Flanders]

Change of plans. It wasn't near as bad as I figured and it was clearing so I saddled up for another try. This time I actually hunted with a Parker and got 3 birds. I snowshoed over the hill into the same creek where I got 6 birds in a day last year and saw lots of tracks from the air yesterday. It worked. I had 16 flushes of about 12 birds. A few I flushed more than once. It was a warm day and seemed more like wading through wet concrete than snowshoeing by mid afternoon. I thought I hit one of a pair that sailed off and on the way out I flushed just one of them in the area where I thought they landed. Ha!, I thought, that bird was hit and is dead here in brush somewhere. I started looking and sure enough I actually spotted it, face down, a white bird in white snow and in dense brush from about 50ft away. What are the chances? I kicked his buddy up again also and knew he was hit but hot hard and I found him also. I used all old paper shells - a vintage #9 load from somewhere and green ribbed Remington Express and red Western Super-X. I love the old shells; why would anyone want to use anything else? That might be my last trip of the year as it's 45deg here and the snow is going fast. You can see that the bird on the left is starting to change to summer colors. The one on the right is likely YOY; small beak, just a touch of red around the eye. They sure are pretty. Strangely enough, as white as they are, that's how you spot them in the snow; they are whiter than just about any snow so you just look for anomalous white spots and once you tune your eyes you can actually spot them from at least 150yds away, sometimes further. You can see the contrast in my picture; they are much whiter than the snow beneath the shoes. For whatever reason also, they stink to high heaven compared to other grouse, and it's not a pleasant 'stink'. I'd suspect a decent dog could smell these things from a very long ways off. They have really cool little furry "yeti feet" too. Maybe that's what I need! I am so glad I got off my butt and went out again. I will have no trouble going to sleep tonight; a good workout on snow shoes is unlike any other form of exercise.

[Eric Eis]

You say it easy, but I still don't know how you find those birds without a dog.

[Richard Flanders]

You just walk through the brush until you either kick them up or, more often than not, you hear them clucking their distinct alarm call which you home in on and head towards, looking hard. Quite often they'll sit and let you get pretty close; not today though for the most part. Most of them flushed pretty wild or I would have had more than the three I got. The creek bed isn't all that wide either so you can pretty easily cover it all by weaving around some and they generally start giving an alarm call from pretty far out and often hop onto a hump or a lookout will go up into a tree for a better view of what's coming, which certainly helps. You learn to ID and follow fresh, and I mean really fresh tracks also. I find a lot of ptarmigan that way; I'm constantly assessing the tracks I cross and often follow them. A lot of people seem to not know how one finds birds without a dog. The simple answer is that you just have to become a better hunter. Once in the creek today I got the 16 flushes in less than 1.5hrs, and most were within an hour; that's not bad. I don't think a dog would do well in some of this deep snow either and certainly not a smaller or short legged dog. There's places where you sink to over your knees on these big snowshoes. Some winters the snow up there is waist deep powder when I go up; that would be pretty tough for any dog. Sure wears me out.

[Eric Eis]

Hell, wears me out hearing you describe it.....

[Phillip Carr]

Richard thanks for taking the time to share some of your hunting trips and pictures. Absolutely beautiful area, and birds.

[Thomas L. Benson Sr.]

Richard: After viewing your photo's it brings back a lot of memories of hunting in Alaska and as for the photo of you in your lawn chair in front of your plane you should now be called Sir Richard. Thomas

[John Dallas]

3rd picture from the bottom should be on the cover of PP or at least the monthly cover here

[Richard Flanders]

After all that snowshoeing, if I didn't have the chair I'd be, and have been before I took a chair, flat on my back laying on my engine cover in the snow recovering. The chair was a great addition...

For anyone not familiar with these snowshoes, they are vintage military issue shoes made by several contracted makers in the 30's and 40's. Every shoe has a serial number and is dated. I have owned and dealt car loads of these up here and have several near mint pairs that I use, at least one pair which has never been on the snow. The dates on mine range from 1934 to 1944, if I remember right. All of the surplus supply of these in the lower 48 have been purchased and sent to Alaska by the connex full. The last load and the supply from which I got most of mine was a batch of 2500 pairs that were sent to Anchorage and sold in an army surplus store for around $75/pr. They are still a favorite of pilots, trappers and the natives living in remote villages. You can't buy wooden shoes of this quality and especially design any longer; if you could they would likely cost at least $800/pr. It has to be quite the project bending the wood and lacing all that rawhide. The current US military white magnesium shoes have excellent - incredible actually - bindings and are good on harder spring snow but are way too small and are useless in deep powder.

Update: I have never before last night investigated the red spot over a ptarmigan's eye. What's under there when you part the feathers was a surprise to me. I assume they make these show somehow during their mating ritual.