The Sacrifice of the Sage Hen
The screams of his beloved were becoming harder to endure than the terrifying blizzard of ' As with it, what else could he do but wait it out? He was anxious to see his first child. Taking a seat in his wife's slat-backed rocker, he knew there would be no sleep tonight. It carried a sweet fragrance of pine to him.
He glanced eastward at the mottled horizon where a bulging red sphere began slicing through it. As often as he'd watched this scene unfold in the top of these mountains, he had never tired of its majesty and beauty. He stood and walked to a clearing east of the cabin, allowing his thoughts to be temporarily drawn away from the drama going on behind him.
The air became still and quiet.
The Sacrifice of the Sage Hen by Susie Schade-Brewer - FictionDB
Even the wind through the trees hushed as if commanded to. God had been on his mind a lot lately. Another scream penetrated the stillness, but this time more subdued. He turned and stared toward its source. He hoped his wife's ordeal was winding down. She sounded near the end of her endurance.
Walking a little further, he found a rock to sit upon where he could watch the sunrise, but not so far away that he couldn't hear the noises from the cabin. His mind reflected back to the day he had married his beautiful Quaker wife. A pleasurable smile covered his face. Her father hadn't liked him at all, mountain man and unsteady wanderer that he was. He'd thought Fremont way too old for his young daughter. Several other suitors had been much more to her father's liking.
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However, the young woman's eyes had been only for him. A tear gathered at the corner of his eye.
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Of all the bounteous gifts God had ever bestowed upon him throughout his full life, she was the very finest and most prized. Behind him just then came a rustling in the underbrush. From the corner of his eye he saw movement, not an arm's length from where he sat. Slowly, so as not to startle the visitor, he turned his head. Perhaps in search of food, a small sage hen wandered into the clearing.
She stopped beside some blackberry bushes a few feet away, pulled one foot up into her brown marbled feathers, and peered cautiously about. Then slowly, she put it back down and proceeded forward. Behind her came another hen and then a third, much smaller, who walked with a limp. In single file, they continued past where Fremont sat, oblivious to his presence, or at least not caring, and through some underbrush to another clearing ten feet away.
Fremont watched as they joined several others. These were larger, roosters with majestic head plumes that pricked abruptly up and with bright orange pouches on their breasts. Where they'd come from, Fremont didn't know.
For a few moments, the roosters stood curiously still in their places. Then, becoming excited by the presence of the females, one of them spread his tail feathers. His wings lifted and unfolded slightly, and the long black plumes at the back of his neck pricked upward. The large orange sacs on his breast thrust forward and up several times, emitting loud pops.
An Interview with Susie Schade-Brewer, author of The Sacrifice of the Sage Hen
Noting the advances of the rooster, one of the hen's wings drooped and she walked forward, circling him as if she had chosen him. Spellbound, Fremont watched, until suddenly he heard a beckoning from the cabin, and he jumped to his feet. The sage chickens fled. Fremont could not run fast enough. An excitement tempered with dread infused him.
Before the doorway, he saw one of the Indian women. She waved him inside. As he entered, he saw the other two beside his wife's bed in the warm corner. One held a small, tightly wrapped parcel in her arms. Both turned toward him, their dark eyes expressionless. It was the lack of blissful excitement in their faces that frightened him most.
His wife, her eyes seemingly glued to the ceiling, was pallid and covered with sweat. Taking her hand in his, he sat on the bed beside her.
Each spring males congregate on leks and perform a "strutting display. Groups of females observe these displays and select the most attractive males to mate with. Only a few males do most of the breeding. Males perform on leks for several hours in the early morning and evening during the spring months between February and April. Leks are generally open areas adjacent to dense sagebrush stands, and the same lek may be used by grouse for decades.
Hens build nests and lay and incubate their eggs under the cover of sagebrush. The hen uses grass and forbs between patches of sagebrush for additional cover.
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Chicks can walk as soon as they are hatched and are able to fly short distances within two weeks. Within five weeks they are able to fly longer distances. Populations of sage grouse are in decline due to environment loss and decline of the pristine plains environments it requires to mate. The sage grouse is found in significant numbers within only half of the states comprising its original territories. The Biodiversity Conservation Alliance and other organizations have petitioned to list the grouse under the Endangered Species Act.
In March the U. However the USFWS also concluded that immediate listing was "precluded" by higher listing priorities for other jeopardized species. Thus they designated the species a "Level 8 Candidate" for addition to the list of threatened species at some future date. Their finding is being litigated by groups contending the species should immediately receive protections under the ESA.
Researchers observed cattle who share grazing land with the sage-grouse. GPS trackers show that sage grouse congregate in small areas with certain resources, rather than being widely spread. US federal conservation plans have been met with lawsuits from wildlife organizations. On December 6, , according to the New York Times: The Trump administration on Thursday published documents detailing its plan to roll back Obama-era protections for the vast habitat of the greater sage grouse, a chickenlike bird that roams across nearly 11 million acres in 10 oil-rich Western states.
The earlier proposal to protect the bird, whose waning numbers have brought it close to endangerment, was put forth under the Interior Department in and set out to ban or sharply reduce oil and gas drilling in From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. Learn how and when to remove these template messages. This article's lead section does not adequately summarize key points of its contents.
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