Summer in the tall country of west-central Idaho is hot. Folks in the little river town of Riggins regularly watch the mercury climb into triple-digit territory, and more often than not, August skies are clear, but tinged with acrid smoke from surrounding wildfires. Some days, the sun looks like a distant orb — it’s easy to make out its edges thanks to all the haze its light must work through in order to reach the earth.

It’d been so long since I’d stumbled into a family unit of grouse that it took a moment for all the tumblers to click into place. I’d crossed the old hilltop farm field and come to the pipeline cut when, just as I reached the lip where the cut slopes down to the creek, a largish, brownish bird with thunder in its wings erupted from the shaggy grass, bore left, and vanished into the concealing green of the woods.