A Hunt with Matt & Abby

I got an email from fellow blogger Matt Ortiz of An Upland Odyssey fame that he and his wife would be in my area over the Thanksgiving Day holidays. We set a date and watched the dismal weather forecast hoping for a break and we got it. Today turned in to a sunny mild day with only slight winds, not the quickly dropping temps and high winds that the forecasters were calling for. Sadly I don't have any "hotspots" here in southcentral Pa. but took Matt and Abby to a handy game lands with plenty of clearcuts to hunt. As we were hunting through the second clearcut I heard Matt's 16 ga Ithaca Long Range bark twice and then saw a grouse boring down at me from Matt's side of the clearcut. I left the bird glide by me and then gave it the "two shot" salute as it continued on its way. At the end of the cut Matt related how Abby had done a good job flushing the grouse from the greenbrier and had stayed steady to flush and shot. A couple of clearcuts later I again heard Matt shoot. Once again Abby had done her job but Matt missed on a grouse that flushed low and stayed low on its escape route. We hunted through a half dozen more clearcuts but the birds eluded us. Here's Matt and Abby taking a short break in some open timber between the clearcuts.We ended our hunt with only the two birds flushed but with a new friendship started. Matt proved to be a enjoyable fellow to hunt with and hopefully we'll be able to share some woods time again some day.