A Look Back

Gerald Kobriger, retired upland game biologist, weighs a sage grouse harvested during the 1964 season. The hunters in the background were from the Regent area.

You've read in these pages before about the continued work to strengthen a sage grouse population in southwestern North Dakota that has experienced its share of struggles over time.

While concerns today center around making sure sage grouse don’t disappear from the North Dakota landscape, what you won’t read much about is hunting this large upland game bird.

North Dakota had its first sage grouse hunting season in 1964 and it was closed just once, in 1979, before being shut down indefinitely in 2008, following the die-off of a number of birds from West Nile virus.

“Hunters in North Dakota were privileged to participate in the first regulated sage grouse season in the state in many years … Hunting pressure was very light, in fact exceptionally so. Probably less than 200 birds were harvested from a population that numbers between four and five thousand,” according to the November 1964 issue of North Dakota OUTDOORS.

To get a feel for how things used to be, according to Game and Fish Department records, nearly 300 male sage grouse were counted on leks in spring 1964. This year, by comparison, fewer than 10 strutting males were counted on leks in southwestern North Dakota.

“All in all, most hunters contacted in the field were greatly interested in the hunt and pleased with the privilege of hunting sage grouse,” according to the November 1964 issue of NDO. “Indeed, one party had traveled from Dumas, Texas to shoot sage hens, and to partake in the other fine hunting found in North Dakota.”

Wildlife managers at the time called the 1964 sage grouse hunting season experimental, and guessed it would remain as such for the next few years.

“As more data is accumulated, and census techniques refined, we feel that the sage grouse will take its place alongside the sharptail, Hun and pheasant as a popular game bird,” from the November 1964 issue of NDO.