54. AMERICAN GAME BIRD SHOOTING 
of Texas are at once recognized by northern gunners as 
essentially the same bird that they know at home in the 
north. The uneducated birds of the southwest, how- 
ever, do not afford the same sport furnished by birds 
frequently pursued, but show the disposition to run be- 
fore the dog exhibited by the other quail of the dry 
country—Gambel’s, the scaled and the valley quails. 
It is said of bobwhite that years ago it was scarcely 
found west of the Missouri River, but that it has fol- 
lowed the settlements north in Minnesota and west in 
Nebraska. This may be true, but it is quite as likely 
that it has always existed in this region, but was not 
observed there until the country became more or less 
thickly settled. 
Wherever found, the quail is resident and breeds. Al- 
though occasionally large flocks occur, consisting of 
twenty-five or thirty birds, it never packs, as do many 
of the grouse of the open, and where such large flocks 
are found it is probable that they consist of the first and 
second broods of the same parents, or of the birds 
hatched by two hen quail that have occupied the same 
nest. 
, It must be said, however, that there are at least two 
records where packs of quail have been seen by good 
sportsmen of great experience. One of these was 
Edmund Orgill, who made the following interesting 
report: 
“A curious experience occurred a short time ago to 
a friend of mine who went on a hunt to north Missis- 
sippi, where he had been earlier in the season and found 
