160 NOTES ON THE 



BONASA UMBELLUS (L.). (300.) 

 RUFFED GROUSE. 



Nowhere was the Ruffed Grouse more abundant than in all 

 the deciduous forests of this State, until mercilessly slaught- 

 ered by the pot-hunters. Almost any cluster of trees, particu- 

 larly if well interspersed with brush, to say nothing of the 

 extended forests of hardwoods stretching north and south and 

 east and west over the middle and southern portions of Minne- 

 sota, formerly contained its covey of "pheasants," as these 

 birds are popularly called. But their ' 'glorious day is passing 

 away" as fast as about 300 dogs and 700 double-barrelled 

 breech-loading shotguns can accomplish their annihilation. 

 Improved game laws, which restrict the limits of the time in 

 which their destruction may be continued, may prolong their 

 represantation among the bird-fauna of the State somewhat, 

 but how much, time alone can demonstrate. 



Not long after the first of May, the female seeks a retired 

 spot on slightly elevated ground or on a gentle declivity, and 

 under a more or less weathered log or in a bunch of thick 

 brush, she scrapes out a slight hollow in the ground, into 

 which she gathers a plentiful supply of leaves, which by 

 treading while turning round and round she shapes into a 

 loose nest, in which she drops about fourteen eggs. 



Whenever she leaves her nest she carefully brings a good 

 supply of dry leaves and drops them over it in such perfect 

 imitation of the work of the wind that there is not the slight- 

 est indication of a nest left. For many years these birds 

 bred on the rear end of my ' 'Cosy Nook Cottage" lot, on the 

 east shore of Lake Minnetonka, where I had an exceptionally 

 good opportunity to study their habits in the period of incuba- 

 tion. I am satisfied that the male has no part in domestic 

 duties during this time but spends his time to a considerable 

 extent in the society of the other coxcomb shirks of his sex 

 — for at those times I have never seen one of them in the same 

 section. While yet laying, if the female hears footsteps ap- 

 proaching her, she steps off the nest and turns and places 

 leaves over the whole, one at a time, so rapidly that before 

 the spot has been reached all is perfectly concealed and she 

 has a chance to get from ten to twenty yards away where she 

 watches the intruder until he has clearly passed the nest, when 



