354 



The Outer's Book 



dent that they are all of one and the same 

 species," (p. 87). It may be said that Mr. 

 David Douglas was eminently correct about 

 Franklin's grouse being a distinct species, 

 and he so described it in 1829 in face of the 

 opposite opinion of such an indifferent 

 observer of the specific differences in birds 

 as was Audubon, who was totally incapable 

 of noting any in the cases of four different 

 kinds of American grouse now all included 

 in the genus under consideration, that is, 

 the genus Canachites. The idea of one not 

 being able to see the differences in plumage 

 between an adult male dusky grouse (Den- 

 dragapus obscurus) and an adult male 

 Franklin's grouse (Canachites franklini} , with 

 the skins of the birds before him! If any 

 of the sportsmen who read these articles 

 are of the immense host in the United States, 

 who believe that Audubon described and 

 figured all of the birds in North America, 

 without making a single error of any kind, I 

 would say that it would be a good thing 

 to get that erroneous idea out of their heads, 

 if they ever expect to gain an accurate knowl- 

 edge of any of our groups of birds, the game 

 birds included. Audubon did not see, much 

 less describe and figure, one in fifty of the 

 birds of North America; the text, figures 

 and classification of his work are each and 

 all pregnant with errors; and had it not 

 been for the vastly superior knowledge of 

 the distinguished Scotch ornithologist, Wil- 

 liam MacGillivray. who more than assisted 

 him, he would never have been able to 

 get out the text matter at all. Even Mac- 

 gillivray did not have the opportunity to 

 see but a comparatively small part of 

 Audubon's MSS. before they went to 

 press, as his work in natural science practi- 

 cally occupied all his time and prevented 

 him from doing so. He was, moreover, 

 born in Aberdeen, and lived and died there. 

 Most of Audubon's life was spent in this 

 country. 



Of the Canachites canadensis series, I still 

 have to describe the last subspecific form. 

 This is the Canada spruce grouse (C. c. canace) 

 Canace was the daughter of ^Eolus, the 

 Greek word meaning a noise. Figure 5, 

 here reproduced, gives a beautiful represen- 

 tation of the male and female of this bird 

 an illustration I obtained by photograph- 

 ing Plate 41, of Eaton's "Birds of New 

 York," the original having been made by 

 Mr. Fuertes. 



The Canada spruce grouse ranges through 

 Manitoba, southern parts of Ontario and 

 New Brunswick, and, within the boundaries 

 of the United States, through certain regions 

 of New England, New York and westward 

 as far as northern Minnesota. This is the 



Tetrao canace of Linnaeus (1766), and the 

 common Canada grouse of such writers as 

 Audubon and Coues, which last-named bird 

 with them includes it. In the case of this 

 grouse as in others, the females are smaller 

 than the males, the length for the two being 

 from 15 to 17 inches. The young are like 

 the hens. 



In this form there are no ruffs on the 

 neck, neither is the head crested; the usual 

 bare orange spot is above either eye; legs 

 (tarsi) are feathered to the toes, which 

 latter have the horny, comb-like fringe 

 on their sides referred to above; tail feathers 

 sixteen. 



In the male, the sides and upper parts 

 are generally wavy, barred with gray and 

 black. Beneath, mostly clear black, the 

 feathers being tipped with white; the feath- 

 ers of the otherwise black tail are also tipped 

 with a brownish-orange of an ocherous shade. 



Eaton describes the female of this species 

 as taken in New York State, as "quite 

 uniformly varied with ocherous, gray and 

 blackish, the gray appearing as a veil cast 

 over the ocherous and blackish bars; under 

 parts with white feather tips" (p. 365). 

 (Fig. 5, the sitting bird). 



Finally, we have in this genus the distinct 

 species Canachites franklini, Franklin's 

 grouse. This elegant bird was first discovered 

 by Lewis and Clark in Idaho in 1805, but 

 not scientifically named. As above stated, 

 it was again discovered by David Douglas 

 in the then territories of Washington and 

 Oregon, who named it Tetrao franklini after 

 the distinguished Arctic explorer, Sir John 

 Franklin. (Trans. Linn. Soc. Lond. Vol. 

 xvi. 1829 p. 139). Both Swainson and 

 Bonaparte have given us figures of this 

 species, and Figure 6 of this Part, reproduced 

 from my own drawing of a male in full 

 plumage, is another contribution in this 

 direction. 



In all particulars, Franklin's grouse has 

 the general appearance of the Canada 

 grouse described above; but in its range, it 

 is restricted to the central parts of British 

 Columbia, southern Alaska, and the western 

 regions of central Alberta. From these 

 parts it ranges southward through the forest 

 districts of northern Oregon, central Idaho, 

 and the forested regions of the western parts 

 of Montana. Personally, I have shot this 

 grouse in the extreme lower part of its range 

 in Montana. 



As will be observed in Figure 6. the tail 

 is relatively as well as actually longer 

 than it is in the Canada grouse, and the 

 white tips to the broader feathers are very 

 scant. Moreover, distally, the tail in Frank- 

 lin's grouse is nearly even, and it lacks the 



