LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN GALLINA- 

 CEOUS BIRDS (ORDERS GALLIFORMES AND 

 COLUMBIFORMES) 



By Arthur Cleveland Bent 



Taunton, Massachusetts 



Order GALLIFORMES 



Family PERDICIDAE, Quails 



PERDIX PERDIX PERDIX (Linnaeus) 

 EUROPEAN PARTRIDGE 



HABITS 



Attempts to introduce the European gray partridge into North 

 America have met with marked success in certain favorable locali- 

 ties and with many dismal failures in other places less congenial to 

 it. Dr. John C. Phillips (1928) has summarized the whole history 

 of these attempts. Of the earlier unsuccessful importations he 

 says : 



The earliest attempt at introduction, which so far as known was made by 

 Richard Bache, son-in-law of Benjamin Franklin, who stocked his plantation 

 on the Delaware River near what is now the town of Beverly, N. J., with 

 Hungarian partridges, dates back to the latter part of the eighteenth century. 

 There were subsequent attempts in Virginia and New Jersey, most important 

 of which was Pierre Lorillard's effort in 1879 at Jobstown, N. J. Later at- 

 tempts commenced in a small way in 1899, but the real fever of importation 

 along the Atlantic coast began about 1905 and has lasted up to the present, 

 although the period 1907 and 1914 saw the height of the industry. In Eastern 

 States importations of these hardy little birds have been put down all the way 

 from Portland, Me., and northern New York to South Carolina, Georgia, Flor- 

 ida, and Mississippi. In Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, the work 

 was done on a large scale and, at first, with encouraging results. In a few 

 places the birds undoubtedly bred the first season, and in other places as in 

 the Connecticut Valley, they persisted for 8 or 10 years in considerable num- 

 bers ; eventually they vanished, however, between 1915 and 1920. 



The results on the western plains and prairies have been quite 

 successful, of which he writes : 



The results in the far Western States and in western and central Canada 

 may be briefly summarized. The most remarkable success followed immedi- 



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