Pine Chicken and deer hunting

 My brother Paul posted this:  Oakley in a cabin, in Oakley canyon on the way to Smith and Morehouse I saw the cabin when I was a teenager mom took me and Chris up there and showed us the cabin it was falling apart Grandpa built it. 

I added the following: I saw that same cabin. Mom showed it to me. A creek runs behind it where grandpa made a ‘fish cage’ with green willows or some such stuck next to each other like an underwater jail. When he caught a mess of Brook Trout he would keep them alive in the stream and get a couple every morning for grandma to fry up.

Dad used to go deer hunting at Smith & Morehouse every year with the Frazier family deer camp. We would drive him up there, then so mom had a car to drive, spend part of the day with cousins then drive home, leaving him there.  We stopped at the cabin one year and mom showed me the tiny room they lived in. It did have a loft!

Dad would either get a ride home or we would drive up and get him and his deer. I remember driving down the canyon with a buck tied to the roof of the station wagon.

The year I had turned 12, I got to stay up at deer camp in the Uintah Mountains at Smith & Moorehouse. with dad and the Frazier Clan.  One of the first days he took me up on the mountain with him.  I was not trained in being quiet; seems that is actually what he was doing, showing me how to move without scaring everything with ears.  Toward the end of the day since, surprise, we hadn’t seen a thing, we were starting the long walk down the mountain. It was 30-45 minutes down to camp. And you needed to get down before dark. Suddenly dad signaled me to stop and raised his rifle. It was a 1918 Enfield 30.06, bolt action with open iron sights. No scope here. Just those stock, open sights. He had amazing vision. And even better rifle marksmanship skills. What he was aiming at was a Pine Hen, otherwise known (to me) as a Sage Grouse. Nice plump game bird, but tiny little bird head. I couldn’t even see it, but he did. From about 25 yards-that’s 75 feet- he squeezed off this unbelievably loud boom while I was trying to see what he was shooting at.  He instinctively racked another round in the chamber, my clue to stay put. To my surprise he raised the barrel and squeezed off another incredible ‘boom’! That 30.06 can take down a moose or an elk.  He had used it to blast the head off from a Pine Hen, and knowing they always hung out in pairs, had waited for the other bird to take a look to see what happened.  Hitting one of those tiny heads was worthy of serious bragging rights. He took out two, with two clean shots, one right after the other.  We cleaned those two birds and had roasted ‘Pine Chicken’ for dinner.  And I had one more reason to look up to dad as a quiet hero who said more with actions than ever with words.