Steve Griffin: The woodcock is a little bird that occupies a big part of my hunting heart

Three times the Michigan DNR’s wildlife division asked me in an email for my thoughts about woodcock. I’ll answer, but I wanted to review what I think about woodcock, first. And what I think is: It’s hard to think of anything so small that occupies such a big piece of my hunting heart.
The first gamebird I ever shot was a woodcock, a long-billed Midland County missile that posed a puzzle when it tumbled from the sky and seemed to disappear. It was my first time wrestling with game gone missing – probably hit, maybe dead, certainly now unfound and a burden on the conscience.