Birds of a feather
<p>JEROME A. POLLOS/Press Jim Powell visits with a grouse Wednesday which he befriended in the forest near Cataldo three years ago. For the first two years while Powell would harvest lumber on his property, the grouse would watch from a distance. This summer, the grouse came in closer, standing on logs while Powell used his chainsaw or sitting on the ATV the retired engineer used on his property.</p>
<p>JEROME A. POLLOS/Press As his pet grouse watches from a nearby log, Jim Powell saws through timber that he harvested from his property Wednesday.</p>
<p>JEROME A. POLLOS/Press Jim Powell travels on a gravel road to his property on his ATV Wednesday morning to harvest firewood and visit with a grouse that he's gained the trust of over the past three years.</p>
ROSE LAKE - When friends ask Jim Powell how his morning went, his answer might seem strange.
But then, it is strange.
"I say, 'I went up in the woods and played with my bird,'" Powell said, laughing.
Really, he did. And he does today.
His bird is a male grouse he befriended and named "Missy" three years ago.
It settled on property he owns not far from his Rose Lake area home. First, it kept its distance. Over time, as they came to know each other, the small grouse crept closer to this friendly man. Close enough, finally, to where it sat on his shoulder, tugged on his cap and scrambled around his feet.
For Powell, this feathered little friend is a delight.
"She's my little buddy. We talk all the time," he said.
Almost every morning.
Wednesday, around 7 a.m., Powell hopped on his ATV and set out on the two-mile drive to reach a piece of his 34 acres not far from Exit 34 off Interstate 90.
Wearing a blue stocking cap, tan coat, gloves, blue jeans and boots, he zips down a road around 30 mph, slowing when he turns right onto a dirt path. From there, he steers his way up a steep trail until he arrives at a clearing.
It is quiet, but for chirping birds hidden in the hemlock, cedar, white pine and larch peering down through an early morning fog.
The 84-year-old Powell moves carefully as he picks up his chain saw and walks a short distance to a stand of trees.
He looks around.
"Hey little girl. Where are you?" he calls.
Nothing.
So he fires up the chain saw and disappears behind some trees and brush. The saw screeches, high and low for few minutes. Then, suddenly, silence.
"There's my pretty little girl," Powell says, his voice chipper. "How's my little girl today?"
For the next 10 minutes, they have a one-sided conversation - Powell does all the talking as he slowly pulls a log down a hillside, through brush and toward his ATV - while the grouse walks, hops, flutters and flies.
"You have to help. Oh my goodness, you're a good helper, little girl."
"Let's go. Let's get this tree out of here. Get off the log. Get off it."
Powell lets go of the log, crouches down to the bird until they're almost nose to beak.
"Oink, oink," he says, then lets out a loud laugh. "That's how we talk."
The grouse, in turn, seems to react to his soft-spoken words as it flitters about.
"Isn't that something? She's my pet," Powell says.
He sits on his ATV, and gestures for the grouse to join him.
It does.
In a few quick moves, it hops onto the ATV, then to his leg, his arm, and finally his shoulder, where it pecks at his cap or his jacket.
Through it all, Powell grins and chuckles.
"We do this almost every day," he says. "She's just made my summer for me. It's been a wonderful summer because of her."
The retired engineer recalls that first day he saw the grouse. It wasn't love at first sight. He didn't think much of the light-brown bird. But the following weeks and months, as he returned to relax on his land, to collect firewood, to enjoy the outdoors, the grouse was almost always there to greet him.
"I realized he wanted company," Powell said.
That first year, it stayed some 20 feet back. The next, maybe five. And this summer, it seemed to trust Powell, even climbing onto logs as he worked. Once, to Powell's great grief, he accidentally ran over its tailfeathers. Wood chips, he says, sometimes hit it in the face.
"She doesn't mind," he says.
Today, the 6-foot Powell, and the 8-inch Missy - named such before Powell knew it was a male grouse - remain best buddies.
He believes it's a spruce grouse, described as "very tame" in the Patterson Field Guide on Western Birds that sits on an end table in his living room.
Some mornings, Missy doesn't appear. On those days, Powell doesn't stick around. No need to, he says.
"Why else would I be up here this morning if she wasn't here?" he asks, chuckling. "She's my little girlfriend in the woods."
But most summer days, Missy is there. Waiting.
"Any nice day I'll probably be up there," he says. "She's with me the whole time I'm up there, usually."
Powell was born in Mishawaka, Ind. He left there when he was 29, owned a sports shop in Elk City, Nev., and traveled often for work. Twice married, he's single today and lives in a cozy home with his poodle, Andy.
Life, he says, has been good to him.
"I did a lot of things I shouldn't have and done a lot of things I should," he says.
Only one person other than Powell, before Wednesday, had seen Missy. But many around Rose Lake had heard the tale of their bond. They urged Powell to snap a few pictures so they could see the bird of his life.
No deal.
"She and I agree we didn't need pictures," he says.
But Wednesday, it was time to go public with their affair of the heart.
That morning, as he started to drive away, Missy suddenly took flight after her friend, landing next to the ATV and following by feet.
"Missy, you stay here," Powell commands.
For a moment, it stands and stares.
"Go back," Powell says, this time with a firm voice.
Missy mulls it over, then turns and trots toward the trees and brush. Satisfied, Powell resumes driving down the dirt path.
He can't help but grin.
"He's my pet," he says. "I love that little bird."