46 BULLETIN 162, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



The fifth nest was found on June 20 by tramping through deer brush near 

 the place where a male had been heard calling for several days. It was the 

 best concealed of any, being under quite a thick mass of ceanothus, though I 

 hardly think I should have overlooked it, even though the female had not flushed 

 with a great whirr of wings when I was three or four feet away from her. The 

 nest was quite well constructed of coarse dry grass, a few small twigs, and many 

 breast feathers from the bird. The measurements were the same as those of 

 the last nest described and the eggs were twenty-two in number, laid in two 

 layers, the lower of the nineteen eggs with three on top in the center. 



Eggs. — The plumed quail does not lay so large sets of eggs as the 

 valley quail. Probably the average is not more than 10 or 12, but 

 as many as 19 or even 22 have been found in a nest, probably the 

 product of two females. In shape they vary from ovate to subpyri- 

 f orm ; some eggs are quite pointed ; the shell is smooth and somewhat 

 glossy. The color varies from pale cream to a reddish buff, or from 

 " pinkish buff " to " pale ochraceous-salmon." They are entirely un- 

 spotted. The measurements of 61 eggs average 34.7 by 27 milli- 

 meters; the eggs showing the four extremes measure 38 by 28, 35 by 

 29, and 33 by 25 millimeters. 



Young. — Bendire (1892) says that incubation lasts about 21 days 

 and that " in the higher mountains but a single brood is raised ; but 

 in the lower foothills they rear two broods occasionally, the male 

 caring for the first one while the female is busy hatching the second." 

 Probably both sexes share the duties of incubation. Mrs. Irene G. 

 Wheelock (1904) gives the following account of the hatching process : 



I stole back alone for a last peep at them, and two had pipped the shells while 

 a third was cuddled down in the split halves of his erstwhile covering. The 

 distress of the mother was pitiful, and I had not the heart to torture the beauti- 

 ful creature needlessly ; so going off a little way, I lay down flat along the 

 " misery," regardless of the discomfort, and awaited developments. Before I 

 could focus my glasses she was on the nest, her anxious little eyes still regard- 

 ing me suspiciously. In less time than it takes to tell it, the two were out and 

 the mother cuddled them in her fluff ed-out feathers. This was too interesting 

 to be left. Even at the risk of being too late to reach my destination, I must 

 see the outcome. Two hours later every egg had hatched and a row of tiny 

 heads poked out from beneath the mother's breast. I started toward her and 

 she flew almost into my face, so closely did she pass me. Then by many wiles 

 she tried in vain to coax me to go another way. I was curious and therefore 

 merciless. Moreover, I had come all the way from the East for just such hours 

 as this. But once more a surprise awaited me. There was the nest, there were 

 the broken shells; but where were the young partridges? Only one of all that 

 ten could I find. For so closely did they blend in coloring with the shadows 

 on the pine needles under the leaves of the " misery " that although I knew 

 they were there, and dared not step for fear of crushing them, I was not sharp 

 enough to discover them. 



Bendire (1892) writes: 



I met with a brood of young birds, perhaps a week or ten days old, near 

 Jacksonville, Oregon, on June 17, 1883. The male, which had them in charge, 



