Moose were not the only wildlife I saw yesterday. This birding season continues to be amazingly good in terms of seeing Spruce Grouse (normally very hard to find). Yesterday I saw two Spruce Grouse, and unlike on other birding outings, I scared these birds on purpose. While I am not anti-hunting, I knew there were some grouse hunters about two miles behind me on Stony River Forest Road, and I did not want the spruce I had found getting plugged.

Amazingly this particular Spruce Grouse did NOT want to be scared. In the first image I am only three feet from the bird, and it would not spook / fly.

Finally by my jogging towards the bird I convinced it to fly up into a nearby spruce tree. I took a few more images (see below), and once again had to walk within three feet to convince the bird to fly DEEP into the forest. Go figure?? You can tell the grouse is watching me!

This morning I checked berries and crabapples. While I did not expect to find many birds yet at my favorite “fruit haunts” going up the shore from my house into Two Harbors, and inland, I was very curious to learn the status of this year’s Mountain Ash and Ornamental Crabapple crop. The answer is unlike last year when a late frost killed much of the fruit, we have a great crop in 2022. Thus, soon it will be time to find birds migrating south into my area with the goal of eating fruit this winter!