Grouse of the Northern Cattle Plains 79 



of some wind instrument, and would hardly be 

 recognized as a bird note at all. I have heard it 

 at evening, but more often shortly after dawn; 

 and I have often stopped and listened to it for 

 many minutes, for it is as strange and weird a form 

 of natural music as any I know. At the time of 

 the year when they utter these notes the cocks 

 gather together in certain places and hold dancing 

 rings, posturing and strutting about as they face 

 and pass each other. 



The nest is generally placed in a tuft of grass 

 or under a sage bush in the open, but occasionally 

 in the brushwood near a stream. The chicks are 

 pretty little balls of mottled brown and yellow down. 

 The mother takes great care of them, leading them 

 generally into some patch of brushwood, but often 

 keeping them out in the deep grass. Frequently 

 when out among the cattle I have ridden my horse 

 almost over a hen with a brood of chicks. The 

 little chicks first attempt to run off in single file; 

 if discovered they scatter and squat down under 

 clods of earth or tufts of grass. Holding one in 

 my hand near my pocket, it scuttled into it like a 

 flash. The mother, when she sees her brood dis- 

 covered, tumbles about through the grass as if 

 wounded, in the effort to decoy the foe after her. 

 If she is successful in this, she takes a series of 

 short flights, keeping just out of reach of her pur- 

 suer, and when the latter has been lured far enough 

 from the chicks the hen rises and flies off at a 

 humming speed. 



