588 



The Outer's Book 



pattern, and the markings mostly transverse. 

 An illy-defined white area on each side of 

 neck, over tympanum, and slight whitish 

 stripe behind eye. Throat fine light buff, 

 usually immaculate, but sometimes finely 

 speckled quite across. Under parts white, 

 more or less tinted with buff toward throat; 

 breast with numerous regular dark brown 

 U-shaped spots, one on each feather; similar 

 but smaller, sharper and fewer such spots 

 thence scattered over most of the under 

 parts, only middle of belly being left un- 

 marked. Long feathers of sides under wings 

 matching upper wing-coverts nearly; under 

 wing-coverts and auxiliaries pure white, not 

 marked; flanks with bars or V-spots of dark 

 brown. Legs grayish-white, unmarked. 

 Quills of wings fuscous; outer webs of secon- 

 daries with equidistant, squarish, white or 

 tawny spots, secondaries tipped and imper- 

 fectly twice or thrice barred with white, and 

 gradually becoming sprinkled with the varied 

 color of back, so that the innermost of them are 

 almost precisely like greater coverts. Four 

 middle tail-feathers variegated, much like 

 back; others white or grayish- white on inner 

 webs, the outer webs being mottled; a few 

 under tail-coverts spotted, the rest white; 

 upper tail-coverts nearly like rump. Iris 

 light brown; bill dark horn-color; part of 

 under mandible flesh-colored; claws like bill; 

 toes on top light horn-color, soles darker. 

 Length 18.00-20.QO; extent 24.00-30.00; wing 

 8.00-9.00; middle tail-feathers 4.00-6.00; 

 shortest tail-feathers (outermost) about 1.50 

 inches." ("Key", 5th edition, 1903, pp. 

 737, 738). 



Surely no one will ever miss identifying a 

 Columbian sharp-tailed grouse from this 

 description. I quote it in full, in preference 

 to any other known to me, in order that it 

 may be passed along as standard. When read, 

 it should be compared with Figure 16 of the 

 present Part. I can fully endorse it as 

 agreeing with my own observations. 



Ridgway first described the prairie sharp- 

 tailed grouse (Pedioecetes phasianellus campes- 

 iris), believing, as he did, that the specimens 

 he examined were "above more rusty or 

 ochraceous," and Coues, in his "Key," 

 records "the name without further remark." 

 (Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash. II, Apr. 10, 1884, 93). 

 The compilers of the A. O. U. "Check-List" 

 (3rd ed. 1910) have recognized the subspecies 

 (p. 144), and it is therefore listed here. At 

 the limits of their several ranges, these 

 sharp-tailed grouse imperceptibly grade into 

 each other, and so we find examples, the 

 plumages of which and to some extent other 

 characters would require special descriptions 

 to record them, as they depart in one 

 particular or another, or in several particu- 



lars from the recognized type forms. By 

 taking a map upon which may be plotted out 

 all the ranges of the several kinds of grouse 

 of this genus, it will at once be appreciated 

 in which parts of this country, Alaska, or 

 the Dominion of Canada we would be likely 

 to meet with the "intermediates," and where 

 we would not; and finally, where the typical 

 representatives of any of the three subspecies 

 would occur. 



There is but one more grouse left for me 

 to consider in the present contribution, and 

 it is the largest of all our American ones. 

 This is the sage hen, known also as the sage 

 cock and "cock of the plains," Centrocercus 

 urophasianus (Gr. our a, tail, and phasianus, 

 a pheasant). 



This magnificent representative of the 

 TetraonidcR is an inhabitant of the sagebrush 

 plains of middle eastern California, New 

 Mexico and Arizona, northwestern Nebraska, 

 and still northward to 49 farther, into 

 British Columbia, southern Saskatchewan, 

 Alberta, thence in northwestern Dakota and 

 Missouri Basin. I found it very abundant 

 on the eastern slopes of the Rocky Moun- 

 tains, in Wyoming and northward. It is 

 or was to be found in immense flocks on 

 the sage plains of certain parts of Utah, 

 Idaho, Nevada and Oregon. 



On the plains in western Wyoming, south 

 of the Owl Creek Mountains, I frequently 

 met with flocks numbering several hundreds 

 in the latter 70's. I knew of a man who rode 

 through such a flock and killed over a dozen 

 by knocking them over with his "quirt;" 

 indeed, such wanton amusement was by no 

 means uncommon. 



Up to date, there has been but one species 

 of sage cock described; it was Swainson who 

 created the genus about 1831 or 32, and Bona- 

 parte named the bird Tetro urophasianus in 

 1827 (Zool. Jour. III. 213), hence the name 

 it bears. 



Wilson never knew of its existence, and 

 Audubon saw only a few skins of them. His 

 account of the bird which he called the 

 pheasant-tailed grouse consists of three 

 published letters, one from Townsend, one 

 from Nuttall and one from Douglas. Those 

 from the two first-named naturalists are 

 excellent, and the statements in them true 

 and interesting. Its flight, as described by 

 Douglas, is entirely incorrect, and, when 

 describing the courtship of the male, his 

 statement that "the bare yellow oesophagus 

 inflated to a prodigious size, fully half as 

 large as his body, and, from its soft membrane- 

 ous substance, being well contrasted with the 

 scale-like feathers," etc., etc., is not only 

 untrue, but ridiculous. 



