I Witnessed the Glory Days of Sage Grouse Hunting

This story, “Stroll Up a Flight,” appeared within the August 1953 problem of Outside Life. Sage hens are one other identify for sage grouse.

“Only a thousand miles away from home-and a-waitin’ for a prepare.”

The chorus of a lonesome hobo’s tune stored operating by my thoughts.

It was one in every of life’s darkest hours. There I used to be, within the shadow-filled foyer of Arco’s largest resort. It was now almost darkish, however I may nonetheless visualize the awful, lonesome, sagebrush flats of Idaho. Windswept miles of them on the city’s edge.

I had simply phoned house — Phoenix, Arizona — solely to be taught that my sched­uled journey down the Center Fork of the Salmon River had been referred to as off. The telegram asserting the change in plans had come after I’d left. And right here I used to be, a thousand miles north of Phoenix with nothing however time on my fingers.

The gloom that surrounded me was lighted by just one factor — the pleasant face of a younger man who’d been watch­ing as I stomped forwards and backwards be­tween the cellphone sales space and my chair, muttering after I couldn’t get a name by. The Forest Service phone traces had been shorted out, and I couldn’t attain the ranch on the Center Fork to seek out out in regards to the cancellation.

The younger man appeared half amused at my antics, and after I realized what a spectacle I introduced I needed to snort too. So I smiled at him and mentioned hi there a bit shamefacedly. He should have been a little bit bored, as a result of we jumped at one another, conversationally.

This fellow proved the native saying, “You by no means meet a stranger in Arco.” After half an hour’s warm-up we had been going nice. I knew who he was — Paul Vogali — and why he was there. And he knew all about my canceled journey down the Center Fork and the good disap­pointment that was mine. Then he males­tioned having had a sage-hen dinner that night. “My landlord,” he ex­plained. “went looking immediately. He’s going once more tomorrow.”

“Sage hens? I’ve heard about them however by no means gunned for them.”

“It’s loads of work but it surely’s enjoyable. Say, I’m going to cellphone Mr. Sillivan — he’s my landlord — a little bit afterward. Would you prefer to go alongside if he has room? 

“I positive would.” I mentioned enthusiastically. “I’ve no gun or license, in fact, however I do have my digicam and I’d prefer to get some photos.”

Paul went on to elucidate that the sage grouse is strictly a Western species-a chook that generally runs as large as a small turkey. He mentioned it was identified regionally as a sage hen no matter intercourse.

“Effectively,” Paul concluded, glancing at his watch, “I’ve acquired an errand to do after which I’ll name Mr. Sillivan. I’ll drop by your room and let you know the way I make out.”

I used to be simply settling in mattress, a while later, when a knock got here at my door. It was Paul.

“Mr. Sillivan will cease in entrance at 6 tomorrow morning,” he mentioned, smiling. “Shall I go away a name for you?”

He waved off my efforts to say thanks and disappeared. I went to sleep suppose­ing it’s a fairly good previous world, at that. It was top-notch subsequent morning, for proper on schedule a automobile pulled up in entrance of the resort and a fatherly-looking chap acquired out. He was Mr. Sillivan­ — Russ to his mates. He launched me to Pete Anderson, who was driving.

They appeared completely satisfied to have one other outdoorsman alongside.

The solar by no means appeared brighter than it did that morning when it came to visit the horizon and forged lengthy shadows throughout the sagebrush flats, simply exterior city, the place we parked the automobile. I used to be on my first sage-grouse hunt, though all I carried was a digicam.

Arco, on the Misplaced River, facilities an irrigated space of farmland. The inexperienced, saucerlike flats are rimmed by flat-gray sage which we had been to hunt. The ocean­ son had opened at midday the day earlier than and was to shut at sundown-only a day and a half of looking, however I used to be in on it.

The distant increase of shotguns echoed throughout the valley as fortunate hunters be­ gan to stroll up sage hens. For that’s the best way they hunt-walking by the sage, poised to swing on a flushed chook. Pete moved out to the left, Russ to the precise, and I trailed barely be­ hind and between them.

We skirted the irrigated fields of al­falfa into which hens had moved very early within the morning. The technique was to intercept their return to the sage after they’d completed feeding.

1 / 4 of a mile away another hunters had been driving a cutover hayfield. They had been urgent a stubble-covered nook when a trio of sage hens flushed with a roar. The hunters missed and the birds fanned out. One, on set pin­ ions. soared over us, inside vary. Russ missed. Pete led the dashing chook good, and his shot folded it in flight. Then I acquired my first shut have a look at one of many nation’s most interesting upland gamebirds.

With Pete one up, Russ started to hunt tougher, and I trailed my host whereas he bird-dogged the flats and instructed me extra about sage hens. They spend most of their time within the brush, however in early morning and late night they transfer into the sides of the cultivated fields.

The trick is to get them simply after they’ve had their morning meal. For those who wait till 10 or so, till they get again into regular cowl, they’re onerous to seek out within the miles and miles of open nation. Then you definitely actually need to stroll your legs off to rise up a flight.

We whipped forwards and backwards, frequent­ly discovering a “set” the place a grouse had spent the night time, however no dwell birds. Throughout the ridges and down into the gullies, Russ and I stepped up the tempo till we had been each respiratory onerous. Lastly he referred to as a welcome halt on a ridge we had combed from one finish to the opposite, preserving about 30 yards aside. Whereas we rested Russ ventured the opinion {that a} sage hen is as unpredictable as a slot machine. After a 5­ minute blow, we stepped off, and

Phr-r-o-o-m!

…proper out of Russ’s pants cuff zoomed a sage hen!

It got here up so quick Russ touched off toe fast. and shot underneath the chook.. The second blast from his 12 gauge auto­ loader, a miss too, prompted the sage hen to jam down the throttle, and it scudded away over the following ridge.

Russ laughed as he turned. “Like I used to be saying,” he started — and one other hen erupted from a near-by clump of sage.

Because it curved away Russ, now over his nervousness, led the whistling chook and spilled it right into a sagebrush thicket. The hen was an enormous one, one of many largest we had been to see that day.

It was then nicely alongside within the morn ing, and the distant booms of shotguns had been much less frequent. Russ and I started the lengthy circle to the automobile, and by now we had been looking nicely again within the sage, removed from the alfalfa fields. We reasoned that the grouse had all filtered again by the margin we’d hunted earlier that day and had been now sunning and dusting themselves a ways from the irrigated fields.

How mistaken we had been! We didn’t flush a chook.

Again on the automobile, Russ sighed deeply and comfortably as he eased himself down on the sharp fringe of the bumper. I felt bowlegged. myself, and sensible­ly numb beneath the waist. I used to be that drained. Then we spied Pete. who had gone off on a tangent of his personal, popping out of the inexperienced saucer of irrigated fields.

We had not more than noticed his tiny determine, when a brace of hens rocketed out of the hay stubble within the very area that had yielded Pete’s first chook earlier that morning. We noticed him increase his gun, then decrease it, and moments later got here the boring increase of his shot. He had missed.

The birds flew towards us. One curved away. The opposite planed down onto a sage-covered ridge.

Russ groped as he heaved to his toes and chambered a shell. The primary few steps had been painful as we began towards the ridge. As soon as there, we liter­ally trampled down the sage cowl strive­ing to flush the chook however lastly had to surrender, exhausted, given us the slip.

“We didn’t mark it nicely sufficient, I suppose,” mumbled Russ.

Shortly Pete got here up, and he and Russ stood for a second, debating whether or not they had sufficient energy left to exit after the remainder of their bag restrict.

It was midday. The hunt for sage hens had cleared my thoughts of the turmoil of the night earlier than. It had been enjoyable, assembly these two strangers. However by now I used to be itching to get again on the highway. Although the journey down the Center Fork had been canceled, I used to be optimistic. If this flip in luck would solely maintain there was no telling what sport lay forward of me.

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As if studying my thoughts, Pete and Russ urged we name it a day. That they had a chook every, one in need of the bag restrict. We turned to go to the vehicles, and the bottom appeared to blow up with the roar­ing take-off of the sage hen that Russ and I had seemed for vainly.

It had been hiding at our toes on a regular basis we’d been standing there.

It erupted so quick that Pete and Russ had been left frozen. Then all of us needed to snort — snort at each other’s dum­based expressions. They’d missed with the shotguns; I’d missed with my digicam — the very best image of the day. However I hadn’t missed a nice morning of brand-new sport. For that I may thank the pleasant smile of a younger fellow sit­ting within the foyer of the largest resort in Arco, the place the place you by no means meet a stranger.