Lost Bird

Emma and I hunted a reclaimed stripmine that lay on top of a mountain on Monday. It's a long hard climb to the top but I usually move a couple of birds in this cover. I always walk up an old road that winds it's way to the top but this day Emma raced straight up the side of the mountain and went on point near to top. As I huffed my way up the near vertical climb I stopped to rest, looked up and saw the woodcock fly over my head. So much for that bird. I was over a third of the way up so I continued the climb and hunted the nice cover.

 

 

The spruce, goldenrod and alders looked like nice cover but we found no more birds there. The cover then turns to islands of aspen and locust with a goldenrod, blackberry brier understory.

It was here that Emma found another bird that I flushed and dropped with my right barrel. It was a fairly close shot and with feathers still floating in the air I made my way toward where it fell, calling Emma in to find the bird. We search and search but it seemed that the ground had swallowed the bird. Emma has been an excellent finder and retriever but this bird must have been "airwashed" for she could find no scent of the bird. She finally grew tired and wandered away while I kept tramping down goldenrod and briers in a desperate attempt to find the bird. I too finally gave up and hunted on. We had a wide circle and came back to the scene of the point and again attempted to find the bird, but with no success. The day was heating up so we called it a day and made the long walk down off the mountaintop, discouraged with losing the one bird that I had clearly dropped.