lO 



BIRDS OF AMERICA 



brown. Adult Female: Top of head, uniform grayish- 

 brown from bill to neck; crest, brown, smaller and with 

 a less number of feathers than in male: throat, dull 

 whitish with some dark streaks ; no head markings or 

 black patch below where feathers are dull whitish with 

 dusky longitudinal streaks ; otherwise similar to adult 

 male. 



Nest and Eggs. — Nest: A hollow in the sand 

 beneath a creosote bush, mesquite, cactus, yucca, or a 

 tuft of grass ; sparsely lined with grass or leaves. 



Eggs : lo to 12, white or buffy-white, irregularly 

 speckled, blotched, or clouded with shades of brown 

 or lavender. 



Distribution. — Desert region of southern California, 

 southern Nevada, Arizona, and southwestern Utah, 

 east to the southwestern corner of Colorado, and also 

 in southwestern New Mexico to the Rio Grande valley 

 and the El Paso region of extreme western Texas, and 

 south into northeastern corner of Lower California 

 and to Guaymas, Sonora. 



One November evening as the sun went down 

 I found myself in camp by a small group of 

 water-holes far up in a desert canon of the Santa 

 CataHna Mountains of Arizona. I was alone, 

 my guide having gone back several miles to look 

 for the third member of the party whose absence 

 had caused some uneasiness. I was sitting on a 

 bowlder enjoying the wild, unusual surroundings 

 when I was startled by a low Chd-Chca, Cha- 

 Chca. which came from the little thicket behind 

 me. This was followed at once by another call 

 of a like nature, then another and another. I 

 had no idea as to the nature of the language or 

 from whom it emanated. Throwing over me the 

 rotting remains of an old tent cover lying near I 

 crouched among the bowlders and waited. The 

 calls increased in number, the soap weed seemed 

 filled with them and then suddenly out stepped a 

 splendid Gambel's Quail, the first I had ever seen. 

 Its long head-plume waved gradually as it ad- 

 vanced. Quickly others appeared and before 

 long there before me, not twenty feet away, more 

 than forty birds rimmed the edge of the water- 

 hole. After a day spent in the desert they had 

 come to the otily place for miles around where 

 water could be found in order to drink before 

 going to roost. In a few minutes they began 

 flying up into one of the few stunted, scrubby 

 trees which grew in the canon. So intent had I 

 been watching them that I failed to note a second 

 company nearly as large which had come to an- 



other water-hole perhaps twenty yards away. 

 But this was not all. They continued to arrive 

 until fully two hundred had taken up their 

 quarters for the night in the scrubby trees around 

 our camp. Now and then there was a flutter as 

 some bird changed its perch. There was also 

 much conversation after they had settled for the 

 night, just as other folk are sometimes known to 

 talk after going to bed. 



Later I met them many times on the desert 

 and watched them as with low words of caution 

 they ran from the cover of one creosote bush 

 or cactus plant to another. It was rare that I 

 saw them take wing ; even when the gtiide one day 

 declared that he proposed to vary our diet of 

 peccary and bacon that night with a mess of 

 broiled Quail, and began to shoot them, the sur- 

 vivors preferred to trust their legs rather than 

 their wings while in quest of safety. 



The Gambel's Quail is a prolific bird. Ten or 

 a dozen beautifully spotted and blotched eggs are 

 laid and the long dry summers of the country it 

 inhabits are very conducive to the health and 

 happiness of little ground-running birds. There 

 is plenty of food to be found, too, here in these 

 glorious deserts, and shottld you spy a flock at 

 eating time you might find a menu something like 

 this : grasshoppers, ants, grain, berries and mes- 

 quite beans. Surely this feathered racer of the 

 desert is thrice blessed with dainties. 



T. Gilbert Pearson. 



MEARNS'S QUAIL 

 Cyrtonyx montezumae mearnsi Nelson 



A. O. U. Number 296 



Other Names. — Montezuma Quail: Messena Par- 

 tridge : Fool Quail ; Fool Hen ; Black Quail. 



General Description. — Length, 9 inches. Males are 

 streaked above with black, reddish, and yellowish- 

 brown, and below they are red and gray ; females are 

 barred above with black, brown, and lavender, and be- 



low they are pale lavender-brown. Both sexes have the 

 bill very stout; the tail less than half the length of the 

 wing; and an elongated square-cut crest of soft, blended, 

 depressed feathers. 



Color.— Adult Male: Plumage of upper parts 

 streaked with black, reddish, and yellowish-brown; 



