pine hen

[MountainMan]

Anybody know a good place or technique for blue grouse in SU? I think I might get a new shotgun, and I'd like to try it out going grousin' for the first time.
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[Matador]

A few years ago I was hunting elk in the UM Creek area near Fish Lake. We saw several pine hens. They were very big and I believe that they were blues.

m
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[cat_man]

If they were very big they'd have to be blues. The ruffed grouse really don't get that big. I've never hunted for them in southern Utah, but I've seen a ton of them near Strawberry Reservoir, and I've got them in Hobble Creek, Provo Canyon, and Rock Canyon, all just above Utah Valley(provo). I've also seen them in the Uintahs.
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[TubeDude]

[cool]My most effective blue grouse hunt was on an archery hunt for deer above Salina. While breathlessly waiting for a big buck to take the next two steps from behind a tree...broadside at about sixty feet...a blue grouse flew up right in front of him and spooked him back up the trail. The grouse flew up into the tree directly overhead from my stand.

A half draw at short range and a three bladed broad head up the anal orifice insured that I had camp meat that night. Revenge tasted good.

I've probably nailed more grouse with a slingshot and steel balls or marbles than with firearms. Slingshots have been a part of my family's huning gear since I was a kid in Idaho. Works good on bunnies too. Even snuffed an aggressive coyote once, that I suspect might have been rabid.

I guess it pays to be the deadliest kid on the block. I used to be the kid no mother on the street wanted her kid to associate with. Slingshots, blowguns, throwing knives, bullwhips, pellet guns and of course bows and arrows. I don' need no steenking guns.

Good luck on the grouse. My suggestion is find anywhere with some water nearby...higher altitudes early in the hunt and then dropping as the snow flies in the high country. Water is likely to be a key factor in the current dry conditions. That area above Salina had several little springs that helped bring in the game...and the birds.
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[frogfish]

I'll echo what Tubedude said about high elevation and water. Find a spring on a steep slope and they will be close. I typically find them in willows, aspens, spruce, or chokecherries. Focus on springs and you will find some honeyholes that will consistently produce every year. I've never seen anything but blues south of i-70.
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[Matador]

I neglected to answer the second part of you question. Here is my best guess.

The technique that I have found most useful for finding grouse of any kind is to hunt something else. If you are hunting deer, elk, cottontails, or hiking to your favorite fishing hole you are far more likely to scare up some grouse. But good luck to you. Let us know how you do

m

PS. I've never taken a grouse. I've always been hunting something else.
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[cat_man]

I think the key to success in grouse hunting is basically, like has been said, locate areas that have food sources such as chokecherry, elderberry, oregon grapes, etc. near a water source, especially in these drought years. I've also found lots of blue grouse in pine stands at higher elevation a bit later in the hunt (late October) like in Daniels canyon on the way up to Strawberry. Besides that, if you don't enjoy hiking, you won't enjoy grouse hunting. Sometimes it just takes covering a lot of ground, often in thick oak/maple type forest, to locate the birds. This spring I want to try my hand at Turkey hunting. Has anyone been successful?
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[TheJensenKid15]

I knocked them dead a couple of years ago on top of Mt. Dutton. I just drove around on my dad's elk hunt, and when I saw em, I killed em.
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[Kayote]

Anyone know if the sage hen hunt on Parker Mountain is still open?. Koosharem?.

Good Hunting, Kayote
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[maraboujigs]

The Sage Hen hunt is still open on the Parker, but you now have to get a special tag that allows you to shoot 2 sage grouse for the whole hunt and you have to apply for a permit just like deer.

Unless you love hunting sagehens I don't know if it's worth the trouble for 2 birds. Although there are places that 2 birds a day would be well worth the effort. That is if you like eating leather that tastes like sagebrush.

As for pine hens, mostly blue grouse, as was said in a previous post, are what you will find south of I-70. I have killed them on every mountain range on the Fishlake forest i.e. Monroe, Mytoge, Hightop and etc., but in one area that they seem to flourish one year the next you don't hardly see any. I have always found the blue grouse on the tops of pine covered ridges where there were open areas with plenty of feed nearby. Water was always in the area but I never actually found them right by it. As for the few ruffed grouse in the area they will be closer to the water and the thicker brush.

MM if you are really serious about coming to the area give me a PM and a specific area I will either direct you to where to go or could take you out. I am sure that I will be making a couple of trips out.

MJ
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[Kayote]

Had a buddy who's a chef show me a recipe that makes the sage hens most palatable. Bone out the breasts and place them between two pieces of wax paper. Use a meat mallet and pound the breasts very thin. Roll the meat around some prepared Stove Top Stuffing, place in a baking dish and cover with chicken gravy. Roast until done. It's a lot of work, but it's the only way I'll eat those old tough sage chickens.

Good Eating, Kayote
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[cat_man]

Another great recipe is actually borrowed from an old carp recipe...put the deboned breasts on a wooden shingle and bake at 300 for about 2 hours, then take it out, throw the meat away and eat the shingle! Sorry, I couldn't resist.
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[Shrimpboy]

When I shot a sage a few years back I thought that I would just fillet off the breasts, but the smell of the meat alone was so bad that I almost puked. I couldn't handle eating it although I honestly tried.
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[maraboujigs]

I have eaten sagehen several times and it wasn't the best flavored meat, but ever since a roomate at college left 4 sagehen breasts out of the freezer for 3 days and then realizing his error replaced them. Needless to say I found out two weeks later when the microwave filled the room with the smell of rotting meat and sagebrush, and ever since I cannot even clean one without reminiscing.

MJ
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[Kayote]

That was a very graphic account. Reminds me of when I found the blow fly larvae in a cottontail one time. I used to eat a lot of bunnies. Now I think of that Schwartzenegger maggot every time I try to cook up a rabbit. Ruined it for me. Same thing with the yellow grubs in the bluegill and bass at Pelican. Bluegill fillets are delicious, but I can't eat fish out of Pelican without thinking of those grubs. Yum Yum.

Good Hunting, Kayote.
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[TheJensenKid15]

This is the only way I eat sage grouse:

Put 2 cans of cream of mushroom soup into a crockpot in the morning, and put the meat in there with it. Cook it all day, and it is tender, unrecognizable, and smelless.
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[Shrimpboy]

You know the funny thing about the strict regulations is that whenever I am in an aread that supposedly has a "huntable" population, I never see them. However, I see sage grouse at least 70% of the time in an area of western Utah County that I hunt for rabbits and chuckars. I see lots of them too, but I guess they aren't considered to be a large enough population for hunting.
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[TheJensenKid15]

Maybe it's worthless for you to hunt them, but not for me. I hunt up on diamond mountain, and I get my limit, always. The meat, though, really does taste like their name: sage. Maybe if you put in some effort to getting a sager, and really taste the meat, then your oppion will differ.

Jerry Jensen, the kid.
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[MountainMan]

That's excellent news for me because I know of some excellent fishing in the area. I am planning a trip to there in the next month. Maybe I will put it off till after the 13th just so I can bag me a few hens. Mostly I'll probably be in the South. I know of some in the Pine Valley areas, but I'm not aware of any other habitat. If anyone would like to share that would be great.
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