Mourning Dove PIGEONS, QUAILS, GROUSE. 



Pigeons been slaughtered, that one accoimt from the West 

 records instances where they have been shot down by the 

 hundred, and left on the ground as food for the pigs ! The 

 result is, that all game is only locally plentiful, and that we 

 have less in general than countries hundreds of years older 

 where a reasonable protection has existed. The only flights 

 of Wild Pigeons heard of now belong to the Northwestern 

 States and the Mississippi Valley at large. Then, too, the 

 destruction of the forests and far-extending blizzards have 

 hastened the extinction that the gun began. 



Mourning Dove : Zenaidura macroura, 



Plate VI. Figs. 1-2. 



Length : 12-13 inches. 



Male and Female : General appearance when in the trees, a bluish 

 fawn colour. Above olive-brown, varying to a bluisb gray, 

 neck and head washed with metallic tints. Below a dull 

 purplish, changing to reddish brown. Two middle tail feathers 

 as long as the wings. Bill black, feet lake-red. Female duller. 



Note : A plaintive mournful " Coo-o, coo-o ! " 



Season : Common summer resident ; March to November. 



Breeds : From southern Canada to the Gulf of Mexico. 



Nest : A few loose sticks, sometimes laid on an old Robin's nest. 



Eggs : 2, white. 



Bange : North America, from southern Maine, southern Canada and 

 Oregon south to Panama and the West Indies. 



This Dove is one of most prettily shiftless housewives 

 among birds. She has softly coloured plumage, a refined, 

 though sad, voice, and many gentle, lady-like ways; but 

 when it comes to nest-building (and the female is always 

 rightly held responsible for the neatness of the home), she 

 is utterly wanting. Even though her mate should decline 

 to furnish her with a more liberal supply of sticks, she could 

 arrange those she has to better advantage ; but she evidently 

 lacks that indispensable something, called faculty, which 

 must be inborn. 



The eggs or bodies of the young show plainly through 

 the rude platform and bid fair either to fall through it or 



226 



