OUTDOORS 



number of the states they have become very 

 scarce where not many years ago they were 

 comparatively plentiful. Just why, it is not 

 so easy to determine. 



Of course, they have been relentlessly 

 hunted; but so have the prairie-chickens. It 

 is not because they have been frozen out by 

 the severe winters, for the very Indians them- 

 selves have no more endurance and stoicism 

 than the ruffed grouse. The woods are there 

 yet, and to a great extent the chance for get- 

 ting a living is as good, but many thousands 

 of acres of timber-land near the railroads are 

 almost entirely deserted by the birds. It may 

 be that the gradual destruction of the under- 

 brush and the cleaning-up of the woods by 

 the habit of making them pasture-grounds 

 have made the birds leave. At any rate, they 

 are gone, where twenty years ago they were 

 found in very large numbers. Restocking 

 the woods might be the means of afford- 

 ing occasional shooting, but where the tim- 

 ber has been denuded of the brush ruffed 

 grouse will not stay in any numbers. They 

 are sometimes found in tamarack swamps 

 around lakes in the hilly portions of the 

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