132 GAME BIRDS OF NORTH AMERICA. 
is often repeated with each beat of the wings, even after 
they have flown for some distance. The flight is mostly 
performed in a straight line, except where the nature of 
the ground makes it an impossibility,and is swift,the bird 
being borne along by alternate flappings and sailings. 
When the wings are held motionless, they are much 
curved, with the primaries spread far apart toward the 
tips, and turned down. If many coveys occupy similar 
tracts of country they keep their little family parties sepa- 
rate and distinct from each other, and if they have not 
been much molested will permit one to approach very 
near them without exhibiting any signs of alarm. In 
the autumn, in such localities as the Bad Lands of the 
Dakotas, they are in the habit of passing much of their 
time in the ‘‘coulées” or wooded ravines, into which they 
always fly for shelter if by chance they have been flushed 
anywhere in the open grounds, or among the buttes. 
When scattered in these ravines excellent sport can be 
had with them, as they lie close and generally rise singly, 
and as the sportsman is frequently above them, they 
present easy marks as they fly out of the bushes into the 
open, or rise above the cover if declining to leave the 
place of refuge. 
The Prairie Sharp-tail or White-belly, as it 1s some- 
times called, is partly migratory, and, as I have already 
said, its habits vary somewhat in the different seasons, 
being a good deal of a prairie dweller in the summer, but 
more of a woodland bird in the winter. But this is natural, 
as it would not be likely to remain on the storm-swept 
plains during the severe weather, if the shelter that the 
trees afforded was near at hand and easily secured. In 
the autumn and winter the flocks unite and form great 
packs of several hundred individuals and are then wary 
and very watchful, running swiftly away from any object 
