Bird Hunting Season Takes Off With a Bang
Published 12.10.18
What I am about to write about in this article is what was most likely a once in a lifetime experience, just saying. 5 male wood grouse, 3 black grouse, 1 female wood grouse and 1 ptarmigan all in one day. Not only was it an unbelievable catch for one day, but get this; they were all within a radius of 2 km and shot within 2 hours of each other! Truly a once in a lifetime experience. You can see the movie in the end of the article.
A group of 4 boys, we were travelling deep into the eastern Norwegian woods in search for game birds. We brought 2 well-trained bird dogs with us, Vilja and Chicko, and started the hike into the swamps we had heard so much about early in the morning. The dogs were searching in the front and we followed. The time went by, and not a single bird in sight. What? Where was the bird? We had trekked far and wide for well over 6 hours. Time to change the location.
By then we were all tired, hungry and demotivated and had no idea what to do. We had some food and checked out the map. There was a dirt road that could take us higher into the terrain so we went back to the cars and drove 4 km in the opposite direction of where we had been so far.
We parked and let the dogs out and started to get our gear ready for round two. The GPS signaled. Vilja was holding steady. Only 100 meters away from us! We excitedly went towards her and found a wood grouse den. Fredrik shouts "We've found the spot, this is where we were supposed to be!" And he proved to be right. Only 5 minutes after the first hold we came upon a second situation. We closed in on the hold and both dogs went in the same direction. We set ourselves up and there! A brood of wood grouse took to their wings. I took the first shot and saw a grouse come down. As I approached I can see it running so I take another shot. At the same time I heard another shot getting fired and saw the dusting of feathers of a bird in flight. Another hit, no doubt. Henrik was the one who shot the other grouse. Could we have managed to shoot two grouse at the same time? We quickly checked out the one I shot and proceeded to search for the other. 300 meters farther down in the forest Vilja found the bird. Fantastic! We had two grouse and felt incredible.
If you thought this was good enough you might as well stop reading here. We kept trudging and ten minutes after we gathered two grouse in our packs another grouse takes flight. Øyvind takes a shot and shouts in celebration. He had hit it and the grouse fell. The dogs ran in its direction and Øyvind followed. We soon heard another roar of celebration "There's two of them! Two birds fallen!". Was it possible? Øyvind had managed to hit a male and a female grouse in one shot. The female had been in the male's blind spot. Isn't that crazy? We walked down to the bog 50 meters below in ecstasy. Time to take pictures and wouldn't you believe it; a brood of ptarmigans took flight up ahead! Fredrik took the shot and a ptarmigan fell. This can't be real?!
It was time for me to return home. My tired body was still recovering from an illness and I had an exhausted dog who deserved to rest. We parted ways and I headed back to my car. I crossed another bog and saw Chicko hold steady 5 meters ahead of me. I loaded my gun and walked up. 2 grouse took flight. I shot and a female was hit. Believe it or not, 300 meters along and the same thing happened. As if it was a replay, I added another female grouse to my pack. The other boys got two more wood grouse and one more black grouse.
What an insane afternoon. I will never forget it. In addition to everything we got, we saw many other large and beautiful broods and single birds. There were literally speaking birds everywhere. Just as if all of the birds from the entire eastern region had gathered right there.
Visit my YouTube channel to see my video from this glorious day. Subscribe, like & share J I post new films about hunting, fishing and other wilderness adventures regularly.
Read more about hunting for ptarmigans here.
//Christer Nannestad - Youtube & Instagram: Nansen_Bamsen
Translated by Bergljot Sindredottir Støer - Instagram: bergy_b