By Garrick Otero (Photo by Rob Drieslein)

There’s good news and bad news about ruffed grouse in New York, “depending on how you look at it,” according to Megan Skrip, a graduate student at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry. Skrip studied the bird’s population for her recently completed master’s thesis. She attempted to learn why their numbers have declined 75 percent from the 1960s to the present. “They are the second-most-popular game bird in New York State, wild turkey being the most popular,” Skrip said. Some people think that popularity is at least partly responsible for the sharp drop in the bird’s numbers.

Under professor William Porter’s supervision, Skrip trapped and radio-collared 169 grouse at Fort Drum and at Partridge Run Wildlife Management Area in Berne, near Albany, during the winters of 2008 and 2009. She used the radio-tracking to see how many birds died and how they died.

To read the full article http://blog.syracuse.com/outdoors/2010/05/ruffed_grouse.html