Followirgthe Flights Hunting along the pathway of the north-to-southwoodcock migration. BY TOM KEER awoke to pitch blackness-the usual time for striped bass fishermen and waterfowlers, but an unreasonablehour for bird hunters. The wind gusred so hard that it rattled the window panes as a profound chill cooled the cabin. \When I went to bed, it was 50 degreesand raining; however, the weather changed overnight. I walked past the dog boxes and after yesterday'soutstanding hunt, my settersweren't raring to go. Somethingwas up.
as many grouse as timberdoodles. The birds were gone, and I made my decision that I, roo, would disappear.
A flick of the light switch revealed an even more painful truth. There was snoq lots of it, and it went all the way up to the very top of my truck tires. The snow rhat was cleared by the crossing winds was being replaced by more dump-
my bags and hit the road. The passing few weeks JRacked I meant the birds already had staged in Cape May, New Jersey.They staged and waited for a stiff tailwind to help push
ing down from the sky. The weatherman forecasted balmy temperatures with winds from the south, but the mercury in the thermometer suggestedthat he, too, was caught off guard. I felt like stamping my feet, but there was no need to wake up the household. I stoked the fire while my coffee brewed, and when it was ready I sat on the couch and stared at the yellow and orange flames climbing the seasonedoak logs. The previous week's hunts were remarkable. stellar in every way.'Woodcock were everywhere we looked, and the marquee coverts were loaded and the low-yield coverts held more birds than usual. Ife pulled out the 28-gauges and the .410s, and we popped caps only when the dogs looked classy enough to appear in a Ripley etching or an Abbett painting. No meat-dog points were allowed. ime passedslowly rhat morning, and when the shoveling was done, we headed out. One coating of aerosol grease
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on the inside of a bell would keep the clapper ringing, and a coat of wax on the dogs' pads would keep them hunting instead of rooting out snowballs. Snow fills up beepersand renders their run/point tones silent, and my white setters disappear due to their camouflagecoars. Part of me wished I had
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back into the coverts, this time with my friend Joe and his pointer. That day characterized rhe rest of the season: We found one or rwo birds under the pines on a wet day, or a few along the river bottoms on a sunny day.Joe and I hunted hard, but our seasonreally had ended with the snow. The migration began earln and on the Voodcock Moon we moved four times
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a dark-colored dog like a black-and-tan Gordon setter-but I quickly came to my senses. For that day, we had one point on a solitary bird in a seep uncovered by snow and we let it go. Our trudging continued for the next few days until the sun shined bright. A string of normal 5O-degreedays melted enough snow so I could get
them across the Delaware River. I suspected they were now way below the Mason-Dixon line, where it was still warm and the ground was soft, so I drove along the highway . . . and then drove some more. Ask a Southern bird hunrer about woodcock and he'll swear you're nuts if you hunt them. Rightly so, for quail in the pearl millet and wiregrass are king, and that hunring is a tradition I know and respec. But with woodcock in my blood it's easy for me to carve up a quail field quickly ro get to the lowlands. If there is a river or a pond with an outflow, so much the better.Along a corridor of bicolor lespedezaand switchcane, you'll probably find a woodcock. Show greenbriersto woodcock hunters and we'll smile and forge ahead. My Louisiana friend Randy Srreethunts woodcock in addition to quail. On some days, he'll practically have to pull his dog off point to get out of a cover. He never really pulls 'em off, though, for every contact makes his dogs better and wiser than before. Those high bird counts means Randy turns puppies into experiencedgun dogs in a season.There's something to be said for that. He hunts in a winter wonderland, parricularly becausethe experiencedoesn't involve snow. Nowadays, when the birds depart rhe Northeast and the snow flies, you'll find me prowling Southern woodcock coverts. I may be one of the few doing it . . . and that's okay. Wouldn't it be fun to pack up the dogs, head to New Brunswick, Canada, for the September woodcock opener, and follow the birds down the coast through February? For a woodcock hunter like me. that's the stuff of dreams.
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