Pineridge Grouse Camp
 

I was fortunate to buy the Pineridge grouse hunt at the annual meeting auction. I had limited grouse experience and never previously hunted woodcock, so this hunt was perfect! Jerry Havel, the owner ensured every detail of my stay was perfect including loaning me his personal 20 ga Remington era Parker skeet gun. The gun featured a single selective trigger, 26" barrel, beaver tail forearm, straight grip stock and checkered butt. When Jerry told me to just show up, he meant it as he even provided me with the shells to use.

For the hunt, woodcock were not a problem. Although the flight had not started yet, I shot 7 total. I was 2 short of my limit on day one, since we focused on grouse cover that day and stopped hunting a bit early due to high temperatures (ticks were plentiful). When you found the timber doodles, limiting happened fast, as they were in groups.

Grouse were very tough!
Day 1, I shot 3 with some luck, out of only 5 seen, due to some great dog work. 2 were shot on the second point and flush.
Day 2, the birds would not hold. The dogs were ranging a bit, bumping birds, with around 10 birds seen. I had 1 legit chance at a wild foot flush and missed. The cover we hunted this day was extremely thick.
Day 3, was a repeat to day 2 mostly. 10 birds seen with 1 legit chance at a wild foot flush and a miss. The dogs pointed 1 bird that held, the rest of the flushes were wild.

Leaf cover was still a bit thick. I averaged 10 miles during 5 - 6 1/2 hunting hours per day through extremely thick cover. Jerry's guides are passionate hunters and worked very hard to present opportunities for grouse. They even cooked us a mid-day lunch over a Coleman stove....what more can I say!

The camp itself is fantastic with more comfort than I have ever experienced while hunting. All meals were perfect and adult beverages were in ample supply. A real treat was the camp musician, Kevin who played guitar, harmonica and performed blues one might expect to hear in a Memphis night club.

Pineridge is an experience, not a place!!

I was at pineridge when you arrived. Glad to meet a fellow Parker person. I also had a great time, shot some woodcock,but the grouse avoided me. Enjoyed my time at Pineridge.

Boy, I thought the grouse population was approaching peak in the Lake States. Your flush rate does not seem to support that. You guys had a good time though and that is what counts. Thanks for posting. I am always interested in seeing what the cover looks like in different parts of the country.

When you brought up the grouse population the guides chuckled a bit. Every report said drums were up 57% but they all thought we were one year off the bottom of the cycle. I will be interested to hear other reports. I think in chatting with hunters in camp they were getting 5-10 flushes per day with some of those being reflushed birds. Peak years I got the impression you would expect 20-30 flushes per day.

Randy and Jerry Havel are longtime PGCA members. A group of us hunt at Pineridge yearly .
I spent a week further north then came back for several more days up north then the remainder of the week with Jerry. He runs a first class operation.

Grouse are down this year. I had my Pointer and my new setter pup along, she was just 15 weeks old at the time but nothing better to get a pup on birds early. The wolf population is high so I keep her very close. The photo is Dick Dow with her. Off for pheasant in a week.

Does Jerry Still have the black and white pointer Big AL? Dale Herden from Saginaw MI offered that pointer to me because he wanted to see photos of Big AL out here in the West...I had to pass cause I had to many dogs. I've been kicking myself ever since! :banghead::banghead::banghead:

Dale has some dandy dogs. His cabin is about 5 miles north of mine on the Au Sable River.

Dale's a helluva a guy. I've been to Lo Banks twice to fish the Au Sable River...in fact I plan to be there this coming summer. Love that country

Work with Dale to arrange a float trip in my Riverboat. I'm not a pro, I just like taking folks fishing

My thought on grouse numbers are that they are about the same as last year. I always saw birds every day I went out and I spent a month hunting. Due to the heat I only hunted mornings some days but there are birds. Where I hunt in the U.P. they had a very wet spring which may have adversely effected the hatch rate as harvested birds were adults for the most part.