Does anyone have personal experience hunting ruffed/spruce grouse (forest/wild chickens) in different parts of Ontario ? I know from personal experience that grouse are very slow & easy to hunt within 20 yards away with a .22lr or 410 (head shots to save meat) as they walk/hop along a trail or logging road in northern ontario. I have hunted grouse around Thunder Bay, Timmins, and as far south as the Port Loring/French River area. Even in the French River area (roughly 3 hours north of Toronto) the grouse are very slow & easy to hunt with a .22lr from short distances before they take off. The area I live, in SW Ontario the grouse are much more difficult to hunt, and are very fast and skittish, and also much more difficult to find. If I see a grouse Brant/Oxford County, you pretty much need a 12/20 gauge shotgun and shoot them in the air once they are found.
My question is for people with experience hunting grouse in different areas of Ontario. At which point from Southern to Central Ontario are the grouse slow, easy to hunt, and kind of not scared of humans which causes them to just slowly walk around even if you walk towards them ?
At which point North are the grouse easy to hunt with a .22lr ?? Orillia ? Bracebridge ? Huntsville ? I know Port Loring is about 1.5 hrs north of Huntsville, is the most Southern area in Ontario that I have hunted grouse & they are just as slow, and easy to hunt with a .22lr as it is much further up North like Timmins or Thunder bay. I figure it is a human population reason of why grouse are fast & timid/skittish or if they are slow & not so scared of humans getting near them, and to put it bluntly, the grouse seem almost dumb. If this is the case, then I would think that once you start travelling North of Orillia and away from large population of humans, then grouse are slow & easy to get near to and easy to hunt with a .22lr ? Also, I would think that if you travelled North of Listowel, and up into the grey/bruce area then grouse may be easy to hunt at those places also since of the low human populations & mostly farms/forests with only a few Towns. Perhaps between Wiarton and Tobermory in the bruce peninsula the grouse are easy to hunt with a .22lr in those areas.
The theory that I have, but would like to have it confirmed is high human populations in southern ontario means the grouse will be difficult to find, and require a shotgun to hunt as they quickly fly after they are scared up. If there is a low population of humans, then the grouse don't see them often and are not as afraid of them, and are easily hunted with a .22lr at close ranges because you can walk up towards them. Another way to look at it is, any areas of ontario that have low human populations also have black bears in the forests.
So basically, if a area of ontario has a black bear presence then the grouse in those areas are easy to hunt with a .22lr as they walk around in the open....but if there are no black bears around due to large human populations, then the grouse in these areas are skittish, fast, and need to be hunted with a shotgun in flight ? Any verification by experienced grouse hunters from different areas of ontario would be appreciated, thanks.
My question is for people with experience hunting grouse in different areas of Ontario. At which point from Southern to Central Ontario are the grouse slow, easy to hunt, and kind of not scared of humans which causes them to just slowly walk around even if you walk towards them ?
At which point North are the grouse easy to hunt with a .22lr ?? Orillia ? Bracebridge ? Huntsville ? I know Port Loring is about 1.5 hrs north of Huntsville, is the most Southern area in Ontario that I have hunted grouse & they are just as slow, and easy to hunt with a .22lr as it is much further up North like Timmins or Thunder bay. I figure it is a human population reason of why grouse are fast & timid/skittish or if they are slow & not so scared of humans getting near them, and to put it bluntly, the grouse seem almost dumb. If this is the case, then I would think that once you start travelling North of Orillia and away from large population of humans, then grouse are slow & easy to get near to and easy to hunt with a .22lr ? Also, I would think that if you travelled North of Listowel, and up into the grey/bruce area then grouse may be easy to hunt at those places also since of the low human populations & mostly farms/forests with only a few Towns. Perhaps between Wiarton and Tobermory in the bruce peninsula the grouse are easy to hunt with a .22lr in those areas.
The theory that I have, but would like to have it confirmed is high human populations in southern ontario means the grouse will be difficult to find, and require a shotgun to hunt as they quickly fly after they are scared up. If there is a low population of humans, then the grouse don't see them often and are not as afraid of them, and are easily hunted with a .22lr at close ranges because you can walk up towards them. Another way to look at it is, any areas of ontario that have low human populations also have black bears in the forests.
So basically, if a area of ontario has a black bear presence then the grouse in those areas are easy to hunt with a .22lr as they walk around in the open....but if there are no black bears around due to large human populations, then the grouse in these areas are skittish, fast, and need to be hunted with a shotgun in flight ? Any verification by experienced grouse hunters from different areas of ontario would be appreciated, thanks.
) but having hunted them allot in the last 4 years, I tend to find the dumbest birds earlier in the season then it just gets tougher. I didn't hunt until the 3rd week of the season in 2013, and got out about 5-6 times~didn't shoot a single bird. By that point, I'd have driven anywhere to get a bead on one. As to what you're asking though...I've yet to spot a grouse in the Haliburton area that didn't spook 50-60+ yards out and even then....not many. Almost stepped on one last summer while groundhog hunting in Grey/Bruce. It was a few feet into the tree line on the edge of a hay field. I've never gone back and hunted there in the fall. (maybe that's my problem) To have a crack at one that will sit there and look at you while you line it up...I honestly think you have to be about Huntsville-ish. Not a guarantee, but that's about the north/south cut-off in my experience but again...I hit my spots north of there in 2013 and didn't shoot one. Flushed a couple way off that I never saw.
