336 



Bird - Lore 



combs the earth with furtive claws, every muscle in his body quivering with 

 expectancy. His tail waves ever so little, his green eyes burn with the ardor 

 of the chase. Nearer he crawls and nearer, he stops, crouches, he is almost 

 close enough to spring, when one of the outside ring of Quail emits a shrill 

 warning of keet keet, and then zizz-uzz, the entire bevy have scattered to the 

 foothill cover back of my house, and not a feather is left for grimalkin. The 

 Valley Quail of southern California is a little smaller than the Bob-white of 

 the eastern states, a trifle swifter on the wing, and a great deal more cunning 

 in his methods of evading his enemies. When a bevy of Valley Quail are 

 flushed by the hunters, they often scatter in every direction, not holding their 

 formation nearly so close as the Bob-whites. When they alight, instead of 



VALLEY QUAIL FEEDING IN THE SNOW 



running a short distance and squatting, as the Bob-white does, they run some- 

 times for a half mile before hiding. 



When they go to roost, instead of squatting in a circle with their heads out, 

 as does Bob-white, making them an easy prey to prowling raccoons, foxes, 

 skunks, etc., they frequently roost in the trees, deep in the leaves, so as to 

 hide from the Owls, and they often dive into the densest recesses of thick 

 bunches of cactus, where they are safe from all enemies. They usually fly 

 instantly to the most impenetrable cover in the vicinity when alarmed, and 

 here in southern California much of the brush cannot be penetrated with 

 anything short of a spear. And even when they alight in this thorny chap- 

 arral they keep on running, and if you send in a dog to rout them out, they 

 are three or four hundred yards away before the dog has burrowed in a foot 

 into the closely interwoven thicket. 



In Hollywood the Valley Quail are protected from everything except cats, 



