I didn't advocate that NCinhabitants drive to the suburban areas to hunt, I indicated that those from suburbiawith camps in the NC, might be better served to hunt closer to their homes for awhile, where the deer are nowoften more abundant than they currently are in many NC areas.

Agreed that more may need be done for grouse habitat on SGLs and that was part of the purpose for the grouse study: to learn what may or may not work in improving conditions for grouse. I do nothing to improve conditions for grouse on my own little parcel up north, other than to let stands of sumac and "aspen"alone, or provide brush piles for them as a byproduct of clearing some areas.

There have been grouse there since I was too young to hunt them. There have been periods when we'd flush a half dozen birds and periods whenwe only flushed a pair or two. I don't hunt them unless I've personally flushed at least three distinct pairs. They haveplenty of cover, assortedapples, berries and large stands of hemlocks. Grouse are either plentiful there, or they ain't. It's been that way as long as I can remember.

As for C-Horse's contention that rank and file workers somehow discovered extra birds to fill the plannedcutback for youth hunt stockings, that's something he may have info on. All I know is that the folks in charge made the decision to add the birds to keep closerthe number originally allocated for the youth hunt stocking.

They had X number of birds to start with. If they hadbirds toput back into theoriginalyouth hunt number, then they probablycame from some other previously-planned allocation.

Not sure where you guys got the data on hunting licenses increasing on a national basis, versus declining sales in PA. Ino longer read many hunting magazines, so it may be so. I have read that license sales and deer harvests, are declining in many of the states surrounding ours and at percentage rates not unlike ours.