For five hours today, I guided Jackie and Jim, a married couple from Grand Traverse County, who made a very generous winning bid at the Ruffed Grouse Society Le Grand Traverse Chapter Fall 2009 Fund-Raising Banquet's Live Auction to accompany my German Shorthaired Pointer Bruno and me on a woodcock banding excursion in northern Michigan during spring 2010.
I originally had planned to take Jackie and Jim woodcock banding locally in NW Lower Michigan, but after my efforts last week scouting for hens and nests in customarily good woodcock mating-and-nesting habitats and finding none at all most likely due to the unseasonably dry weather conditions and forests we've had this spring, I decided to expand my woodcock scouting efforts to NE Lower Michigan, an area where my cabin is located and with which I have been familiar for decades.
On Monday, April 26th, Bruno and I succeeded in locating a hen woodcock and banding three very-well hidden chicks in Otsego County. I was encouraged by Monday's success and thought that the moist forest and soil conditions in north-central and northeastern lower Michigan were more favorable for woodcock to mate and for hens to nest and rear their young than in the drier forests of Benzie, Leelanau, and Grand Traverse counties. Monday evening, I returned to our home in NW Lower Michigan and reported via email to Jackie and Jim the day's banding successes along with a photo of one of the well-hidden chicks I had banded. I then proposed going to NE Lower Michigan for our banding excursion to which they happily agreed.
Precisely on time Thursday morning Bruno and I met Jackie and Jim in Traverse City at the Burger King along Grand View Boulevard. We exchanged greetings and then piled into my Tacoma 4-door 4x4 pickup truck. Our first stop was at the young aspen and tag alder habitat in Otsego County, where on Monday I had banded three woodcock chicks. I wanted to see if I could locate them again and perhaps capture and band the hen and possibly a fourth chick that I may have missed on Monday. We searched for an hour without any success and just as we were returning to my truck, Bruno snapped firmly on point just yards from the two-track trail off of which I had parked my truck.
I approached Bruno slowly, and from five yards behind him I followed his line of sight and scent to observe a nesting woodcock hen hidden superbly ten yards away beneath a small red pine tree. She was barely visible even to my well-trained eye. I motioned for Jackie and Jim to approach my position slowly and pointed where the nesting hen lay. Jim said that he thought he could discern the hen on her nest, but Jackie could not see the hen. She was definitely difficult to see. We left the hen undisturbed; I would return in a few days to check if her chicks had hatched.
I then drove Jackie and Jim to Montmorency County, where we checked a wet aspen stand and tag alder swamp which in years past had consistently produced woodcock hens and chicks. There we searched for an hour but surprisingly found no birds. Everyone was hungry after this search, so we went into the village of Atlanta and enjoyed some delicious soup and sandwiches at the Thunderbay Deli on North M-33.
After feasting on that refreshing lunch, I drove to another favorite woodcock banding area, but this one was farther north in Presque Isle County. Here we succeeded in locating two adult woodcock birds (very likely males), which Bruno pointed superbly. Unfortunately, they did not act as woodcock hens when flushed and despite our diligent searches we found no chicks. It was now late afternoon, and up to this point of our woodcock banding excursion we had encountered four adults woodcock with no birds and one nesting hen, which we made no attempt to capture and did not wish to disturb. Nonetheless, I was determined, with Bruno's assistance, to find and band a least one brood of woodcock chicks so that Jackie and Jim could experience an event that so few outdoors people ever have the opportunity to witness.
Finally, as we were walking along a two-track heading back to my truck to leave for Traverse City, I noticed a draw that headed away from the two-track and back into the woods. I suggested that this be our last attempt to locate chicks, and Jackie and Jim agreed. Just twenty five yards into the draw, Bruno squared staunchly on point (see the above photo that Jackie snapped). I instructed Jackie and Jim to stand where I was standing fifteen feet behind Bruno while I looped ahead of Bruno fifteen yards and walked back slowly towards them to see if we could locate a hen and chicks. My plan worked! A hen lifted from the ground with feet dangling loosely from her body and fluttered twenty yards past me before landing and feigning injury to draw me away from her likely nearby chicks. This was classic woodcock hen behavior. "It's a hen!" I announced to Jackie and Jim. "There are chicks nearby, so watch where you place your feet and please walk slowly. We don't want to step on and injure any chicks." Bruno stayed staunchly in place, but as a precautionary measure I had Jim leash him up and tie him to a nearby sappling. Almost instantly, I found a chick, and as I gently placed my hat over it, three other chicks raced away chirping loudly in alarm with their wings outstretched. All three little critters were fleeing fast! I quickly instructed Jackie to watch the chick that was under my hat as Jim raced to capture one of the chicks and I raced after the other two who fled together up a hill in an opposite direction. Whew, the action was fast! As I captured and placed the two chicks that I had pursued into my zippered nylon mesh holding bag, Jackie cried for assistance, "Mine's getting away!"
Jim added, "I cannot see mine any more. I've lost him!"
I went to help Jackie first. She smiled and explained that the chick had crept from under my hat, darted across the top of her boot, and disappeared immediately into the nearby brush. She was truly thrilled to have had such an exciting close encounter with this little woodcock chick. We searched but couldn't find the chick. We both then went to help Jim, who said that his chick "disappeared like magic." All three of us couldn't find that chick after a quick search.
So I quickly drew my banding equipment from my vest and explained to Jackie and Jim the need to band the two that I had caught, measure their bill length from which we can determine their age in days, and release the chicks back to the mother hen as quickly as possible so that she can recover and shelter them before dusk. See the photo that Jackie took of me banding one of the chicks. Its bill length measured 30 mm, which meant that the chick was eight days old and hatched on April 21.
Our drive home that evening was filled with enthusiastic conversation about today's thrilling woodcock banding experience. Jackie and Jim told me later that they called their children immediately upon arriving home to tell them of their great woodcock-banding adventures with Bruno and me.
Thank you, Jackie and Jim, for your very generous support of the Ruffed Grouse Society and for young forest habitats in which ruffed grouse and woodcock (along with 70 other species of wildlife)reside. Your support for RGS, conservation causes, young forests, and these marvelous game birds as well as the memories we share from our woodcock banding adventure today are priceless!
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