Larry ,That is a beautiful Pup , looks like a great day afield and pretty good shooting to me ! If you guys would have gotten one more Grouse ,You would be dead even in Grouse Numbers as my entire last season ,and I only missed one Bird ! I moved a total of four Grouse the entire second Grouse season last year which runs from just after Christmas till the end of January ! I suppose the Woodcock will eventually show up here but Old Chip isn't going to be able to put in any long days this year ,I'm sorry to say ,we will probably use my Buddies Short Hair " Sam " for the biggest part of our hunting this season , he's a fine Dog but there is nothing like having your own Dog in the Field !

So far this season in Vermont I have seen just 1 woodcock. It was one of the biggest I've ever seen and was probably a local female. Never got a shot because it stayed directly between a hunting partner and myself before darting around an apple tree and out of sight. Even with the "Woodcock Moon" on the 18th we still have not had any 'flight birds' yet. I sure hope they don't come through in the middle of the week and keep on going... I've seen that happen all too often.

My hunting partner, John, took this hefty brown phase bird yesterday at about 1:30 pm as we were heading back to the car. This was one of eleven flushed in about two hours. He shot it with his 'new' Ithaca 16 bore that I talked him into buying while we were at KTP a few months ago.... his wife still won't talk to me. Beautiful little, all original - right down to the Jostam pad - SXS. What a sweet handling gun of about 6 lbs.


.

Dean ,That appears to be a large Grouse also , The Woodcock I posted ,was quite large with a very long beak and I suspected the same as you , probably a local Female with no reason to have left yet ,she just wasn't aware Chip and I were heading her way !

It is a big bird for certain... John is 6'1" and weighs 235 just as a size comparison.

Am moving lots of woodcock in my neck of the woods - resident birds. I have been moving unusually high numbers since the beginning of Sept training runs. I try not to shoot resident birds so I am also awaiting the flight birds. Not moving many grouse though. As expected, since I saw very few throughout the summer and last year was the worst for me in 50 years.