THIEF RIVER FALLS, Minn. — THIEF RIVER FALLS, Minn. _ More than a dozen sharp-tailed grouse glided across the frozen landscape, riding a frigid northwest wind beneath a dirt-gray sky that spit snow and threatened worse. The birds landed in grasslands and in a small tree a few hundred yards away. "They're everywhere!" exclaimed Matt Breuer, an avid sharpie hunter who grew up nearby. "There's a ton of them by that patch of willows." We were in luck. The birds had landed in a field that Breuer, 33, of Bemidji, had permission to hunt. So four of us pulled on hats, jackets and gloves, uncased our shotguns, released four eager dogs and headed into the field and bitter below-zero windchill,...
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