Seize the moments when they arise!

At the end of last September, things really fell apart at the old law firm that I was working with.  To sum up, it felt like I was on the sinking Titanic.  I did some soul searching over the next few days and the unmistakable answer came to me in the lyrics to a song I like, but rarely think about, “Fifty Ways to Leave your Lover” by Paul Simon: 

Step out the back, Jack 

Make a new plan,Stan

No need to be coy, Roy

Just get yourself free!

Hop on the bus, Gus

Don’t need to discuss much

Just drop off the key, Lee

Just get yourself free. 

On the first of October, I followed the prompting and started my own law practice, with my oldest daughter, Emma, as my legal assistant.  While it was definitely the right decision, I knew it would not be easy.  I also understood this new venture would likely put a damper on my grouse hunting that fall, which was the mildest I can remember.  That’s life though, you just do the best you can with the hand you are dealt.  

As any grouse hunter knows, you’ve got to seize opportunities whenever they arise. It’s not unlike snap shooting. On Friday, December 31, 2025, the last day of the season, I thought I was destined to be stuck in the office preparing for a nasty hearing the following week in a custody matter.  To my surprise, a heavenly ray of light came down and the matter was suddenly continued to a later date.  Within minutes of the continuance, I recognized my opening to chase grouse one final time that season. I called my good hunting compadre, Johnny Anderson, to see if he could get away for an afternoon hunt and he was game for his favorite gamebird.  I introduced John to the fold back in 2019 and he now has an incurable case of Grouse Fever with his own bird dog and over and under. 

After picking up Rainey and then John and his GSP, Una, we headed to a newer covert.  I’ve been hunting it sporadically since 2023. The property is an 80 acre parcel, which is mostly a wooded canyon, with a small spring at the bottom. I had found a few ruffies in the canyon in the past, but the pickings seemed slim.  I usually wait until the end of the season to hunt this covert when the roads to all of my other coverts are closed (i.e. read literally blockaded) for the season.  Anyone who has read my books and knows my track record on back country roads in winter understands that this is probably a good thing for me. However, with this particular covert, the road is private and is passable as long as the snows are not too deep.  So, you can oftentimes reach it in December. While there was snow on the ground, it was not enough to stop us from getting to our destination.  

In fact, we ran into the new landowner, a longtime acquaintance, driving down the road as we approached the property.  We stopped to talk briefly and he reported to me that he had just been down in the canyon to leave a salt lick for big game and ran into a mountain lion down by the springs.  I knew exactly where he was describing as the previous landowner named the property “Canyon Springs” after this special feature.  The landowner pulled out his phone and showed me the video of the large cat walking up the trail.  Honestly, that sight made me a little nervous for the dogs, but I brushed that feeling aside and the warm and bright sunshine reflecting off the surrounding snow helped me replace it with the hope of finding a few grouse.  Still, I had no expectations, but was just glad to steal one last afternoon in the grouse woods.   

We parked the car by the unfinished cabin, released the dogs, and hiked downhill through the light snow into the canyon through the thick quaking aspens.  At the bottom of the canyon is a two track that spans its whole length, which makes for easy walking in a scenic area.  We first followed the two-track up to the top of the canyon (in order to give the mountain lion time to clear out of the springs area at the bottom).  To our good fortune, Rainey quickly found the first grouse which flushed into a nearby quakie.  

With the constant stress of work, my shooting this past season suffered some, but on this bright day, I felt no stress and no pressure to succeed.  On such a beautiful day, to bag a bird would truly just be a bonus.  I walked toward the grouse and it flushed straightaway and fell at the shot from my RRL 28.  Una retrieved the bird and I took a few photos to celebrate the success. 

We then took the two-track down the canyon towards the springs.  As we approached the area where the landowner had seen the mountain lion, Rainey went up into an area on the left side of the valley where the quakies thinned and the cover was interspersed with sage, bitterbrush, and service berry bushes, which is not particularly what I would call “grousey cover.”  Rainey made it to about seventy yards in that area when I heard the tell-tale thunder of wings.  The blazing grouse cut across the hill and headed up the trail we had just come down.  Being the only one in position, I threw out two prayer shots, missing the first, but catching it just before the bird was out of view.  Two birds down with three shots: That’s pretty good for this Ol’ duffer! 

I retraced my steps up to where the bird fell, but it was not readily apparent.  Searching the ground for any sign, I spied a little gray spot sticking out of the six-inch deep powdery snow.  Upon closer inspection, I realized that my grouse had burrowed under the snow and was trying to hide, but the snow wasn’t quite deep enough.  I had heard that grouse will do this, but had never seen it myself.  I reached for the hiding grouse, but when I snatched at its back, the grouse abruptly moved forward so that I grabbed it by the tail feathers, which easily pulled free.  DOH!!!  I reached again and got ahold of the bird by its body and quickly dispatched it. Even my botched retrieve did not dampen the spirits, especially given the fact that I had never found more than one grouse in this covert in past visits and now had two in the bag. 

Back on the trail, we soon reached the springs and, to our relief, saw no sign of the mountain lion other than his recent tracks.  I am sure he got out of Dodge as soon as he heard gun shots.  The dogs both headed up into a quakie patch on the righthand side of the canyon and stopped on point. John went in for the flush. I missed one that lit in a tree, but John made a nice shot on the reflush for his first bird.  Not a minute later, Una pointed again up on the crest of the canyon. John honored and not one, but three grouse flushed.  John took one and I drilled another as it flew down the hill towards me.  This unexpected grouse hunt suddenly became one of the best of the season, and on the last day!

My proverbial cup ran over and I was contented with three birds, but John was hoping for one more.  We hunted down the canyon just a little farther and the dogs pointed two treed birds in a shady grove of quakies.  When I shook the tree, John made an excellent shot on his third grouse for the day.  Six birds from this singular covert were more than enough and we decided to leave the rest for seed. 

As we hiked out, John and I talked about how amazing the hunt was and how many birds we saw or heard.  I said to John as we hiked up the canyon’s slope, “That was singularly the best late season grouse hunt I have ever had.” All said, we moved probably ten grouse in what I originally thought was a marginal covert that had not yet earned a name.  On that sunny, wintery day, however, I saw the covert’s soul. But what to name it?  Sure, we could stick with Canyon Springs, as it was called by the previous landowner, but that didn’t quite do it for me. Since it is usually the last covert I hunt during the grouse season, and we experienced the banner day on the very last day of the season, I dubbed the covert, “the Last Ditch” (as in “the last ditch effort”).  That name felt right. 

Such stolen, halcyon days in the grouse woods make me relate to the bird hunters’ prayer penned by one of my favorite authors, Havilah Babcock in his book, I Don’t Want to Shoot an Elephant:

“Oh Lord, who looketh down on the frailties of a man with charity and understanding, we thank Thee for bringing us safely through another year unto this pleasant day, and for the privilege of being abroad on Thy bountiful earth.  Let no ungenerous thoughts find lodgment in our hearts, nor gluttony.  And please let no mischance befall us this day, nor those we love…”

To this, I heartily say, Amen!