I let the dogs out last evening while I worked in the yard. Woody the golden retriever usually hangs around in the yard jus to be nearby. Mae the pointer circuits the yard checking out every smell and sound. I had been puttering around for about 15 minutes when I looked down over the brook behind the landing where I keep my boat and saw Mae hard on point. I quickly put Woody in the house so as not to have him in the middle of things and headed down over the bank. Mae was very staunchly on point with that pointer intensity showing on her face. I walked in toward her and a ruffed grouse took off and flew across the road. I have no idea how long those two had been staring at each other. Mae ran off in that direction when I let her out of the kennel so it could have been as much as 15 minutes. When I released her she was psyched to be sure, a bundle of energy going to find another bird. Unfortunately it is nesting season and I can’t have her out and about disturbing hen birds from their nests in the evening so I had to return a disappointed dog to her kennel. Luckily there was no nest where that bird had come from. But it was fun for both of us to begin thinking about next October and finding those birds!
As if to round out the evening I received an E-mail from the National Ruffed Grouse Society asking me to complete a survey about membership. I good idea that I had suggested when I worked for them a year ago. True to form the server that was handling the survey crashed mid survey; I tried to complete it twice but was locked out both times. At lest they are consistent, as I have written before they are very wide of the conservation mark in Maine , rarely showing up on the important issues.
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