Biography 49 



winter progresses and the story returns to the time of beginning, 

 early spring. 



With each change of season the cover types used have shifted, 

 and likewise the food habits are altered. As fall gave way to winter, 

 the diet gradually changed from a predominance of fruits to a pre- 

 dominance of buds. Throughout the winter some fruit is eaten, an 

 occasional insect and a little green leaf material. But the fare is 

 largely buds, mostly those of trees found in association with the 

 conifers or near by— birches, hophornbeam, soft maple, popple, 

 cherry, and others. Traveling through the woods in winter one can 

 readily understand why the grouse resort to budding, for food in 

 other forms is mighty scarce indeed. Yet they are very skillful in 

 locating available fruit. Even with a deep blanket of snow on the 

 ground, grouse will find a few cherries, dogwood fruits, and similar 

 fare when ordinary man is entirely unable to find them. 



Food is not usually an important factor in limiting or reducing 

 winter grouse numbers in coverts that are otherwise satisfactory. 

 Shelter is very often a delimiting factor, according to the extent, 

 type, and distribution of coniferous types and dense slashings. The 

 winter season does bring on problems of survival in relation to the 

 elements and to predators. While it is rare for ruffed grouse to be 

 killed directly by freezing or exposure, the rigors of the season do 

 increase their vulnerability to predation. Snow-roosting, the lack of 

 protecting leaves on deciduous plants, telltale tracks in the snow, 

 the bare snow ground cover, all contribute to this problem. Toward 

 the end of the winter the arrival of the courtship activities greatly 

 increases the danger of predation. 



So it was that in February one of our five grouse was picked out of 

 a snow roost by a fox and early in March another was taken from 

 its tree perch in the dead of night by a great horned owl. The three 

 remaining birds, one the old male, the other two a young male and 

 a young female, left the shelter of their hemlock winter homes to 

 locate new homes for the spring. The old male reestablished his ter- 

 ritory of the previous year and once more boomed his defiance of 

 the rest of the grouse world from his favorite drumming log. The 

 young female set forth to find a suitable nesting territory from which 

 she could seek out desirable males for mating. Possibly she would 

 return to the part of the woodland where she was bom, now left 

 vacant by her mother's death. 



