At 02:37 PM 2/27/02 -0500, Lang wrote:
>I once rigged a mirror at a Ruffed Grouse drumming log, hoping that the ma=
le
>would see his image at dawn and give alarm calls. I had a mike hidden next
>to the log, and I spent the night in my van about a hundred yards away,
>connected by a long cable.
>
>Sure enough, after drumming for half the night, the grouse began giving
>alarm calls at the break of dawn, then flew away after around two minutes =
of
>calling. Within a minute or two, he began thumping from another log severa=
l
>hundred feet away. I got my recording! Next morning he was back on the fir=
st
>drumming log, drumming away normally.
>
>I do not feel in the least bit bad about what I did. In fact, I chuckle wh=
en
>I think about it.
>
>Lang
Hello, especially Randy:
Lang, I can just see it! Stories about ruffed grouse!
One that drummed about 200 ft from the end of my driveway, for several
years in a row, decided one year that every slow-moving vehicle was a
territorial competitor. {Sound playback, mirrors, etc. have NOTHING to do=
with it.} We would back our small truck out of the drive, and the grouse
would come running out of the puckabrush from across the road, and position=
itself in the middle of the road (Hannah Drive) behind your vehicle, then
as you began to accelerate forward, up the first hill, the grouse would
rush triumphantly (sorry, Walt!) after the departing vehicle, running at
full tilt but, of course, losing the chase. Then it would strut around in=
the road for some time and disappear back into the brush. Here, I am
struggling to avoid jokes about spousal impressment.
We told my hunter friends about this and they just looked at eachother, as=
if to say - another city slicker who don't know grouse. Then one day, the=
MOST expert hunter was visiting me, and he backed HIS pickup out of the
drive, made the turn and as he accelerated away the grouse made an
especially convincing lunge for his tail gate. He stopped, got out, and
walked back. The grouse gave ground, a bit, then both stopped and just
looked at eachother. I was watching all this. He just looked at me and
said: "Marty, I don't know what you feed your grouse around here but he
sure is mighty spry!" He then drove away.
He was not the only visitor to experience this Galliform tempest, and the
bird kept it up, amazingly avoiding residence's cats and dogs for almost
three breeding seasons. Now, we miss him (I'm allowed to say that, right?)
At a point during all this, in April, I did record him one quiet morning
with no roll-offs of any kind. During the recording process, the bird
alternately drummed then acted like a nesting female, jamming its breast
into hollows between the Cinnamon Fern fiddle-heads and making movements
that I took at the time to be "come hither" gestures (sorry, again,
Walt). One confused bird.
my very best,
Marty Michener
MIST Software Associates
75 Hannah Drive, Hollis, NH 03049
coming soon : EnjoyBirds bird identification software.
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