I Witnessed the Glory Days of Sage ...

This story, “Stroll Up a Flight,” appeared within the August 1953 concern 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 track saved working by my thoughts.

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

I had simply phoned residence — Phoenix, Arizona — solely to study that my sched­uled journey down the Center Fork of the Salmon River had been referred to as off. The telegram saying 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 palms.

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 backwards and forwards be­tween the telephone sales space and my chair, muttering once I couldn’t get a name by. The Forest Service phone strains have 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 once I realized what a spectacle I introduced I needed to chortle too. So I smiled at him and stated howdy a bit shamefacedly. He should have been somewhat 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 have been going fantastic. 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 right this moment. He’s going once more tomorrow.”

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

“It’s a whole lot of work however it’s enjoyable. Say, I’m going to telephone Mr. Sillivan — he’s my landlord — somewhat in a while. Would you prefer to go alongside if he has room? 

“I certain would.” I stated enthusiastically. “I’ve no gun or license, after all, however I do have my digicam and I’d prefer to get some footage.”

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

“Nicely,” Paul concluded, glancing at his watch, “I’ve bought 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 stated, smiling. “Shall I depart a name for you?”

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 I went to sleep suppose­ing it’s a fairly good outdated world, at that.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

They appeared completely happy to have one other outdoorsman alongside.

The solar by no means appeared brighter than it did that morning when it came visiting the horizon and solid lengthy shadows throughout the sagebrush flats, simply outdoors 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 have 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 way in which they hunt-walking by the sage, poised to swing on a flushed chook. Pete moved out to the left, Russ to the correct, 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 have been driving a cutover hayfield. They have 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 rushing chook excellent, and his shot folded it in flight. Then I bought 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. In case you 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. You then actually need to stroll your legs off to rise up a flight.

We whipped backwards and forwards, frequent­ly discovering a “set” the place a grouse had spent the evening, however no dwell birds. Throughout the ridges and down into the gullies, Russ and I stepped up the tempo till we have been each respiratory onerous. Lastly he referred to as a welcome halt on a ridge we had combed from one finish to the opposite, holding 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 below the chook.. The second blast from his 12 gauge auto­ loader, a miss too, triggered 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 a giant one, one of many largest we have been to see that day.

It was then properly alongside within the morn ing, and the distant booms of shotguns have been much less frequent. Russ and I started the lengthy circle to the automobile, and by now we have been looking properly 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 have been now sunning and dusting themselves a ways from the irrigated fields.

How improper we have 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 under 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 subject that had yielded Pete’s first chook earlier that morning. We noticed him elevate his gun, then decrease it, and moments later got here the uninteresting 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 have been painful as we began towards the ridge. As soon as there, we liter­ally trampled down the sage cowl attempt­ing to flush the chook however lastly had to surrender, exhausted, given us the slip.

“We didn’t mark it properly 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 street. Though 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 steered 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 regarded 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 have been left frozen. Then all of us needed to chortle — chortle 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 fantastic morning of brand-new sport. For that I might thank the pleasant smile of a younger fellow sit­ting within the foyer of the most important lodge in Arco, the place the place you by no means meet a stranger.