GROUSE FACTS
RANGE
Ruffed Grouse (Bonasa umbellus) are the most widely distributed resident game bird in North America, living now or recently in all of the Canadian Provinces and in 38 of the 49 states on the continent.
Their range in the East extends from near the tree-line in Labrador to northern Georgia and northeastern Alabama, and they once occurred as far south as Arkansas in the central part of the continent, although now they occur only in isolated pockets west of the Appalachians and south of the states bordering the Great Lakes.
Quite isolated populations live in the Black Hills of South Dakota and the Turtle Mountains in North Dakota. In the mountains of the West, they range south to central Wyoming and central Utah, but apparently never reached most of the mountains of Colorado, northern Arizona and northwestern New Mexico.
Ruffed Grouse have become established where they were not native in both Newfoundland and Nevada by transplanting wild-trapped birds. On the Pacific Coast, Ruffed Grouse occur on the western slopes of the Cascades and in the coastal ranges south into northwestern California (but not in the high Sierras), and north to the Yukon River valley in Alaska. By far the major portion of the Ruffed Grouse range and population is in regions where snow is an important part of the winter scene and consistently covers the ground from late November to late March, early April or later. The Ruffed Grouse is a hearty, snow-loving, bud-eating native which thrives during severe winters that decimate flocks of partridges, quail, pheasants and turkeys.