148 The Grouse Family 



those who have enjoyed the pleasure of shooting 

 and later eating it have yet to be heard from in 

 the line of adverse criticism. Its sole fault as a 

 game bird consists in its seldom being found in 

 cover which affords a fair chance to the gun. In 

 fact, it is such an inveterate lover of trees that it 

 takes to the branches as naturally as a duck takes 

 to water. Like the ruffed grouse, it will tree, 

 and remain motionless until it fancies it has been 

 observed ; then it at once departs with a sound- 

 ing rush, which may only be stopped by the quick- 

 est and most skilled of shots. I have flushed it 

 when it seemed to do hardly anything more than 

 leap from the ground to a convenient limb, and 

 more than once, while seeking to trim off its head, 

 it has left the perch so suddenly that the gun 

 could not be shifted in time to prevent the wast- 

 ing of a shell — and this little joke at the expense 

 of a notoriously quick shot. Could this grouse 

 be induced to take to what in the case of ruffed 

 grouse would be fair cover, it would furnish sport 

 not surpassed by any of its family. 



Only those familiar with the western cover can 

 understand how easy it is to fail to bag at short 

 range a bird about as large as a common barn- 

 yard hen — to be accurate, of between three and 

 three and one-half pounds' weight. The tender- 

 foot would imagine such a bird, rising close at 

 hand, to be an easy, perhaps too easy, mark. 



