Make that a double, barkeep

For an upland bird hunter, making a double on grouse is the equivalent of hitting a homerun, kicking a 50-yard fieldgoal, or scoring a menage a trois.

It happens, but not very often.

Skill, of course, is involved, but so is luck. Both elements merged for me this morning on a blue-grouse outing.

Blue grouse have a knack for quickly disappearing into trees, so doubles are rare. Today, though, two blues flew out of the bottom of a side canyon with nothing between me and them but blue sky.

I kept my cheek pressed to the gunstock, swung smoothly through the shot, and two blues were on the ground. I picked up the closer one while Xena made a nice retrieve on the farther bird.

A little later she put up another bird (or maybe more) but I only heard it flush in the trees and never saw it. That's more typically the case with blues.

While a double is special, I've made enough that I don't remember many of them. However, my two triples are etched in deep memory. Both were on prairie birds with no trees to get in the way.

In 1984, my 9-month-old English setter Georgia went on point in the middle of a huge flock of sage grouse. About 20 birds rose at once, and I just kept pumping my Model 12 blam, blam, blam until three sage grouse were in the dirt. (Note: the limit was three back then.)

The next triple was two years ago when Xena went on point and three sharptailed grouse came up. The Model 12 gave a repeat performance, and I notched my second triple.

A lot of hunters use nothing but a double barrel shotgun. Unless they hit two birds with one shot (which can happen), they are limited to only the possibility of a double.

I'll take a triple whenever I can get one.

Blue grouse hunting: Not getting any easier

My dog turned 9 last month, and I become a 60-year-old in a few months. Neither of us are spring chickens any more.

I've been hunting blue grouse for nearly 30 years, and it's never been easy. Blues live in the mountains and hunting them requires a lot of walking up, down and back up again. But the alpine country they inhabit keeps drawing me back every season, whether I find grouse or not.

Such was the case this morning, opening day of the 2011 upland bird season. I hit the same spot as last year because it's relatively close to town, has a cold creek flowing at the bottom of the canyon, and sometimes even holds a few birds.

The grouse were there this morning. Xena pointed a covey of young birds and I managed to scratch one down. She made a spirited retrieve of the wounded bird, and the new season was off to a successful start for both of us.

I noticed my dog wasn't ranging as far away from me as usual. She seemed to be a step or two slower than in the past, like a veteran NFL receiver who still has a nose for the goal line, but just takes a bit longer reaching it.

I also noticed my surgically repaired knee ached, along with my lower back that's been sore since a backpacking trip three weeks ago.

We took a lot of breaks, climbing down to the creek bottom so Xena could drink the icy water and lie in it to cool down on the hot day. I filled up my hat with the refreshing liquid and poured it over my head. Then we headed back uphill.

This will be an interesting season hunting with an old dog. Xena will get baby aspirin after each hunt to try to keep her aches and pains in check. I'll take Aleve for the same reason.

We won't set any speed records this fall, but hopefully we each have learned enough tricks from many years of hunting together to put a few more birds in the game pouch.