If you ran into Frank Jezioro in the grouse woods, you wouldn't guess that he served as the director of the West Virginia Department of Natural Resources under two governors which is practically unheard of until he stepped away into retirement. You wouldn't know that as a friend and confidant of West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, a hunting and fishing buddy, Frank serves as a liaison and conduit between the senator and the myriad hunting and conservation groups seeking to have their voices heard on Capitol Hill. What you would know is that you'd be looking at a real grouse hunter. You'd be looking at a man who knows how to breed and train grouse dogs, building them from the ground up, because for Frank, grouse hunting is all about the dogs. His setters and pointers over the years have been the best anyone could ask for. And they've had to be in the up-and-down Appalachian grouse country where Frank lives and hunts. But he doesn't just hunt there. Frank's chased ruffed grouse in Canada and after sampling New England and all the Lake States, he has settled on Michigan, and every October will find him there, and too rarely I'll be there with him. This book is the distilled knowledge and experience of a man who has pursued this King of Game Birds for the better part of six decades and counting. He knows the bird, the covers, the dogs, and the guns. Spend time with this book, and you'll come away perhaps not knowing as much as Frank Jezioro does, but you'll know a whole lot more than you did.

Building a Grouse Dog: From Puppy to Polished Performer by Craig Doherty, is the most comprehensive, how-to manual there is for taking an eight-week-old little squirmer of any pointing breed and turning him or her into that most coveted game bird finder there is: a finished grouse dog. Unlike many general pointing-dog training books, this one concentrates on one species – the ruffed grouse. Grouse are notorious for their caginess, their wariness, and their difficulty in being pinned down so a hunter can get close enough to flush and shoot. It takes a dog that has been trained nearly from birth to handle that task, and no one knows how to do it better than Craig Doherty. Craig was the driving force behind Field Trial Magazine, is a columnist for The Pointing Dog Journal, regularly competes in grouse trials throughout the Northeast, professionally trains grouse dogs for clients from all over the country, and – this is important – guides grouse hunters using his own dogs trained in his outstanding methods; important because paying clients need results, and those results can only come by following dogs that know the game. A number of how-to training books tell you what to do from beginning to end; but if you have started your own training, run into problems, and consult the literature, many times you’ll find that the advice is something along the lines of, “Well, you messed up because you didn’t do X, Y, and Z. Remember that so you won’t ruin your next dog.” Not Craig – if you have run into a snag with your current dog, Craig tells you what to do to get past it and on with the dog’s completed training. So if your aim, your goal, is to own and hunt behind a finished grouse dog that knows what’s what in the coverts, Building a Grouse Dog is the best guide you’ll ever have.

Over a half century ago, John Swiss acquired a remote property on the far shore of Cook Inlet 100 air miles southwest of Anchorage. Polly Creek is a place of dreams. With a backdrop of snow-draped peaks, razor clam beds stretch out from the cabin's front door, salmon race through nearby seas and fresh brown bear tracks pockmark the sand at his doorstep. Moose and bear, beaver, eagles and whales are his neighbors. Over the years, he has trapped, fished, hunted, prospected, guided and flown his way into the realm of legend. John's career as a bear guide spans Alaskan bear hunting from the immediate post war period to the present time. He has guided black and brown bear hunters for all these years and polar bear hunters for 18 of the 20 years it was a popular sport. This book is told for the most part in John's own words. John's spellbinding stories unwind slowly at first, from his upstate New York childhood. He is a true pioneer of the North and just as Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett did before him, he blazed a trail into the unknown land to the west of civilization and carved a life out of the wilderness.

50 years of bird hunting in New England.

• Revised edition cites up-to-date statistics reflecting the trends among grouse hunters • Includes a chapter of grouse recipes Dennis Walrod takes beginning and experienced grouse hunters alike through an examination of key aspects of the hunt: how to get the most out of a covert, choosing guns and dogs, as well as concerns particular to autumn stalking or winter hunting. The emphasis falls on grouse hunting as a sport pursued for the thrill of the hunt, the adrenaline shot brought by the force of a flush, rather than the quest for impressive numbers.

Like that earlier grouse hunter Aldo Leopold, Mark Parman takes to the woods when the aspens are smoky gold. Here, in an evocative almanac that chronicles the early season of the grouse hunt through its end in the snows of January, Parman follows his dog through the changing trees and foliage, thrills to the sudden flush of beating wings, and holds a bird in hand, thankful for the meal it will provide. Distilling twenty seasons of grouse hunting into these essays, he writes of old dogs and gun lust, cover and clear cutting, climate change, companions male and female, wildlife art, and stumps. A Grouse Hunter's Almanac delves into the mind of a hunter, exploring the Northwoods with an eye for more than just game. "Notable and quotable. Parman stakes out original territory and provides a vivid snapshot of the Northwoods."—John Motoviloff, author of Wisconsin Wildfoods: 100 Recipes for Badger State Bounties "Extremely rich and detailed. Parman puts forth original and genuine experiences."—Richard Yatzeck, author of Hunting the Edges