Sage-Hen 153 



present uncertain. Gary believes the Routt co. bird is referable to 

 the other subspecies. 



Habits. — The Sharp-tailed Grouse is very generally 

 mis -called the " Prairie Chicken " in the north-west. It 

 is a bird of the prairie in summer, retiring in winter to 

 ravines and wooded lands, and often roosting beneath 

 the snow when the wea,ther is severe. 



The food consists chiefly of vegetable matter — about 

 90 per cent. ; it is a great browser, devouring leaves, buds 

 and flowers of various bushes and trees, while in La 

 Plata CO. it chiefly feeds on the acorns of the scrub-oak. 



In the breedmg season the males give a dancing display 

 before the females. A nest, described by Oilman, was 

 found on May 11th : it was a slight depression in the 

 ground lined with grass and feathers, and hidden and 

 sheltered by a small scrub-oak. The eggs were eleven 

 in number ; these were creamy-buff to pale olive-browii, 

 plain or very finely spotted with reddish-brown. They 

 average 1'7 x 1*24, and are small for the size of the bird. 



Genus CENTROCERCUS. 



Head hardly crested ; neck with a large protuberance in front 

 capable of great distention, covered above by long hair-like filamentary 

 plumes and below with scaly, stiff feathers ; tail as long as, or even 

 exceeding the wing, very strongly graduated, composed of 16 to 20 stiff, 

 narrow, acuminate feathers. 



Only one species ; confined to the dryer parts of western North 

 America. 



Sage- Hen. Centrocercus urophasianus. 



A.O.U. Checklist no 309— Colorado Records— Fremont 45, p. 284 ; 

 Baird 58, p. 624 ; Aiken 72, p. 209 ; Henshaw 75, p. 437 ; Scott 79, 

 p. 96 ; Morrison 88, p. 139 ; 89, p. 182 ; Cooke 97, pp. 71, 203 ; Warren 

 08, p. 20 ; 09, p. 14 ; Rockwell 08, p. 161. 



Description. — Male — Above mottled tawny, black and a little white, 

 markings finest on the head, primaries and their coverts plain brown ; 

 below, chin and the lower-breast black ; under tail-coverts black with 



