10/05/2025
Climbing for Dusky Grouse
By Noah Davis
In mid-September, when I climb to hunt dusky grouse, it’s back through time.
The line between months blurs in the heat shimmers of the valley. Irrigated fields blink green below brittle, brown hills. Whitetails graze in their summer-red coats and muleys bed in the sage.
But as I travel from the river up a creek and follow the tumbling course higher, I ascend from cheatgrass and medusahead into bunchgrass and kinnikinnick. Up from brookies and browns into cutthroat. Up to where moose and elk spend hot days in the cool of elevation and north-facing slopes. Up to the dusky grouse— previously called blue grouse—where at 6,000 feet, I’m back in July. There are still ripe huckleberries.
Read more of this Montana Outdoors story here:https://fwp.mt.gov/binaries/content/assets/fwp/montana-outdoors/2025/so25/so25-dusky-grouse.pdf
🖌by Gary Palmer
