107 



of Old World names to New World forms. There are many such cases, 

 confusing to the beginner but too well established in vernacular usage to 

 be corrected at this late date. 



This family is of rather southern distribution reaching its maximum 

 in number of both species and individuals in the southwestern states 

 and Mexico. 



289. Bob-white. American quail. Colinus virginianus. L, 10. Plate IX B. 



Distinctions. Can be mistaken for no other bird in Canada. Size and coloration 

 combined with evident fowl-like character are distinctive. 



Field Marks. Small, partridge-hke bird which rises suddenly from the groimd and 

 flies with rapid beats and loud reverberating wing-strokes. 



Distribution. The Bob-white and its allied subspecies are distributed over eastern 

 North America, north to and including southern Ontario. 



SUBSPECIES. The subspecies of Bob-white native to eastern Canada is the type 

 form — the Virginia Bob-white. 



The Bob-white occurs in Canada only in southern Ontario where 

 it is known to every country dweller. In the autumn the sportsman hunts 

 it with dogs, in spring the ploughman and small boy find its nest in the 

 course of their farm work, and all are familiar with its clear whistle-hke 

 call of "Bob-white," or as otherwise interpreted "More-wet." It is not 

 a retiring species which withdraws into the deepest woodland recesses on 

 the advent of cultivation; but it keeps to the clearings, hanging about 

 woodland edges, shrubby fence-lines, or overgrown wastes in close prox- 

 imity to the fields. When food is scarce it will often come into the barn- 

 yard and feed with the poultry. Open land is its feeding ground, the brush 

 its refuge from danger. Before the country was cleared, the Bob-white 

 was probably rare in Canada, but advancing settlement opened up new 

 ground for the species. Even in the most southern parts of the country 

 to-day the Bob-white remains precariously, fluctuating greatly in numbers, 

 and it is evidently hardly suited for this northern limit of its range. It is 

 prolific, however, and favourable winters and a few years of abstention 

 from shooting increase its numbers many times; but coverts are almost 

 invariably overshot and hard winters periodically reduce its numbers. 

 The hardest natural conditions it has to combat are deep snow covering 

 the food supply, and wet sleety weather which not only chills it but seals 

 it under an icy crust when it seeks refuge in the snow at night. The Ring- 

 necked Pheasant, rather extensively introduced as a sporting bird, is said 

 with some supporting evidence to be inimical to it. In addition to the 

 sporting value of the species it is deserving of every encouragement by 

 agriculturists from a purely economic standpoint and for this reason 

 might perhaps with advantage be withdrawn from our list of game birds. 



It has been a common practice to repopulate depleted covers with 

 birds imported from the southern states. Whether this introduction of 

 stock, unacclimatized to northern conditions, has weakened the constitu- 

 tion of native birds is still undetermined. Several subspecies of the Bob- 

 white occur in the south and importation has left doubtful the real char- 

 acters of our own original form, which to-day can only be judged from 

 specimens antedating such introductions. 



Economic Status. The bulk of the Bob-white's food is weed seed. 

 The grain it eats is waste, gleaned from the ground. The insect content, 

 57172—8 



