SHOOTING THE WOODS GROUSE 373. 
where grow palatable huckleberries and blackberries, 
though rarely venturing further than a short flight, 
and often but a few yards from cover. 
Though always a wary bird, and ever avoiding man, 
it is not so wild and quick to take wing before the frost 
and unsettled weather of fall set in as it is afterward; 
yet if the gunner disturb it once or twice, the full 
wildness of its nature, and its constant alertness to 
avoid man, are fully and permanently aroused. Then 
man and the places he frequents are shunned as much 
as possible. Indeed, it is not a social bird with its 
own kind. After the young birds have matured they 
separate, and in the fall the gunner will find them in 
ones and twos, and at rare times in threes. 
Given to the sportsman the conditions of an open 
field, and therein a ruffed grouse on the wing, within 
range, then the difficulties of killing it are but little, 
if any, greater than those which obtain in the killing of 
a prairie chicken on the open prairie; though whether 
in open or cover, the ruffed grouse is always swift 
and decisive in its flight. But in the open, whether 
it be on field or prairie, there is an even light and an 
unobstructed view. Then, for safety, the bird can rely 
only on its swiftness of wing, all too slow when pitted 
against the sportsman who can, under those circum- 
stances, with studied quickness and deliberation, com- 
mand a large circle around him. Thus the ruffed 
grouse is at a fatal disadvantage when shot at in the 
open field, as is also every other bird pursued under 
the same conditions; but these conditions are rare in- 
