SUBFAMILY TETRAONINA:, 201 
Legs bare from heel, scutellated in front. Carriage upright, 
dignified. 
One species and three subspecies are recognized of this genus 
in North America and three allied species (Genus Tetrastes), in 
the Eastern Hemisphere. They are strictly birds of the woods 
and thickets, exceedingly cunning and wary, strong of wing and 
fruitful in expedients to foil the hunter and his four-footed ally, 
and secure their own escape. The flight is powerful and well 
sustained, and when startled the birds rise with such a whirring 
noise that, on a calm day, it resounds through the woods like 
distant thunder. The flesh is white and palatable, and the 
species, from their thoroughly gamelike ways and habits, are 
justly esteemed as perhaps the most gallant and desirable of our 
native gallinaceous birds. 
KEY TO THE SPECIES. 
A. Upper parts rusty; tail usually without 
gray markings. 
a. Pale above, markings on lower parts in- 
distinct. Tail yellowish brown or och- + 
} RUFFED GROUSE. 
Traceous, j 
B. umbellus. 
SABINE’S GROUSE. 
B. u. sabint. 
6. Dark above, markings on lower part very 
distinct. Tail rust color or reddish. 
B&. Upper parts mostly or entirely gray. Tail 
gray. 
a. Size large. RUFFED GROUSE. 
CANADIAN 
B. u. togata. 
GRAY RUFFED 
GROUSE, 
6, Size small. Pe aoehel. 
lordes. 
GENUS DENDRAGAPUS 
(Greek devipov, drendron, a tree; +ayaraw, agapao, to love). 
Dendragapus, Elliot. Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phil., 1864, p. 23. 
Type Jetrao obscurus, Say. 
Head slightly crested. Tail long, composed of twenty broad 
feathers, square at tip. Airsacs on neck. Size large. 
The single species and its two subspecies, comprising this 
genus, are fine large birds with white flesh, strictly inhabitants 
