GROUSE, PARTRIDGES 203 



Only one brood is reared, but if robbed of her first laying 

 another set will be laid in a new nest. 



Six to fourteen eggs are laid varying in color from pale 

 ochraceous buff or cream color to pale buff. Many eggs are 

 absolutely unspotted but a fair proportion are spotted with 

 small dots of reddish brown and drab. A typical nest found, 

 May 14, 1904, was loosely hollowed in dead leaves at the foot 

 of a ledge in a rather open thicket, and this like practically 

 all the nests I have seen was so placed that the bird could not 

 be readily approached from the rear, and every time I visited 

 the nest she was facing the only point from which danger could 

 easily approach her. This nest was six and a half inches 

 across the outside and the cavity within was two and a half 

 inches deep. The twelve eggs in this nest measured 1.52 x 

 1.16, 1.46 X 1.13, 1.48 X 1.18, 1.44 x 1.13, 1.52 x 1.16, 1.54 

 X 1.19, 1.39 X 1.13, 1.52 X 1.16, 1.41 x 1.12, 1.59 x 1.19, 1.42 

 X 1.12, 1.51 x 1.16. 



As incubation advances the female sits closer and often does 

 not leave the nest until almost stepped upon. Then she goes 

 off with a few hops to play cripple and whine like a whipped 

 puppy in hopes of distracting attention from the nest, and this 

 whipped puppy call is very characteristically uttered when the 

 female is with young, at which times I have had them fly at 

 my feet in a vain endeavor to attract my attention while the 

 young quickly hid amidst the leaves. When the eggs are fresh 

 the female is generally up and away with a "whirr" not to 

 return for some time. 



The incubation period I have not been able to work out 

 very definitely but am very sure it is under twenty one days, 

 that is to say all the eggs are hatched in slightly less than 

 twenty one days from the time when the last egg was laid. 

 The bird sits more or less from the time when the first egg is 

 laid but incubation does not seem to be commenced in dead 

 earnest until the final egg has been laid. 



