Not just for the birds

Tag: idaho chukar

  • New Chukar Natural

    First chukar of the year with the natural
    First chukar of the year with The Natural

    We don’t have kids. Angus is our kid. But a friend who doesn’t bird hunt has a 10-year-old who read a book about bird hunting and wanted to go, so we took him today. Until we got out there on the hills I was worried he wouldn’t be able to keep up. Not that I’m such a mountain animal, but, geez, the kid’s ten and the hills are steep.

    Not a problem. At all. I ran up slopes when Angus looked birdy, unable to resist my selfish desire never to miss an Angus point. Huffing and puffing, I’d turn to see how far back the kid was, and he’d all but run into me. On my heels all day. Impressive. Plus, he was just fun to have along because he asked good questions about what we were doing, and he taught Leslie and me things about the land that we didn’t know because he comes from a ranching family. Cows were getting moved (they play a part in the video; see below) and he told us what was happening, where they might be taking them for the winter, how many dogs they probably had…

    And we got the first chukar of the year! He schlepped the 20-gauge the whole day, never was able to get a shot off, but never complained or got tired. We saw surprisingly few birds, but that didn’t deter him – he wants to go again soon. That’s good. I have new motivation to find more birds in this strangely sparse early season. Stay tuned.

     

  • Cold chukar time

    cold leaf
    Even the leaves were cold

    Another cold day. What is it, winter or something? Sun. My first jaunt uphill in a month. Felt good. Angus pointed a big integrated covey of Huns and chukar within about ten minutes, and we had a nice walk after that.

     

  • Lousy with chukar

    Brittany spaniel chukar hunting
    Angus rehydrating

    Angus, Leslie, and I sucked it up yesterday in the crappy weather to look for birds in a spot we hadn’t explored before. It was lousy with chukar, and so was I. I shot two-thirds of a box and brought home two birds.

    Still, despite both Leslie and I being a bit under-the-weather and hiking around some pretty steep country in underwhelming weather, it was a great day. If you watch the video (see below), you’ll notice no shortage of action. (Please realize in the scenes where I’m running back and forth like a brainless buffoon my safety is indeed on.) I think because of the stiff wind, Angus seemed to have more trouble than usual pinpointing birds, and some of the birds seemed warier than usual, often busting on their own well outside of range.

    Chukar hunting near Brownlee
    Leslie in her Saturday uniform

    A couple of my recent posts discuss my confusion over chukar tactics, and today did nothing to clarify anything for me. I’m tempted to give up trying to figure out how high or low they might be in whatever conditions on whatever terrain and just do my best to think like a chukar. This worked a little today, when I speculated that in the heavy wind the birds might prefer to be on the leeward side of ridges. That’s where we found most of them. But there were notable exceptions to this, and in more than one case I called Angus away from windy areas that actually (we found out later) harbored birds.

    Hungarian Partridge
    Hungarian Partridge

    Anyway, it was nice to get that much action and see so many birds, including the interesting and beautiful Hungarian partridge. Angus made two spectacular retrieves, including one on a Hun I knocked down – I thought – cold. Angus couldn’t find it where I saw it fall, and I was sure it wouldn’t have run anywhere. But my Brittany boy wonder was hot on the trail of something, and I followed him, thinking he was tracking the covey members that busted a moment earlier. A couple hundred yards later he pointed hard, and a one-winged bird jumped and ran, with Angus in tow. Weaving in and out of sagebrush, the intrepid but ill-fated Hun eluded Angus for some time before the mutt finally won.

    Brittany with chukar and Hun
    A chukar in one hand, Hun in the other

    So there you have it: a triply lousy day. Lousy with birds, lousy shooting, and lousy weather. I wouldn’t trade it for much.

    Here’s the video: