Tb 



The Prairie Sharp-tailed Grouse 197 



The nest is placed in any convenient cover, 

 brush or grass, and the eggs are buff, freckled 

 with reddish brown. The average number is 

 about a dozen, and only one brood is raised in a 

 season. The female is a careful mother, tending 

 her chicks with all the watchfulness of a barnyard 

 fowl ; but in spite of her devotion and the activity 

 and cleverness at hiding of the young, a large 

 percentage of them fall victims to hawks and 

 snakes and foxes. 



It has been claimed by more than one well- 

 known expert that the sharptail and pinnated 

 grouse are bitter foes, but this I am inclined to 

 doubt. I am well aware of the belief among 

 western sportsmen that the one species drives 

 the other from its haunts, but believe that the 

 true reason for the supplanting of one species by 

 the other is nothing more than the closer settle- 

 ment of what a few years ago were wild regions. 

 In other words, one bird follows the farmer, while 

 the other retreats before him. Of the frequently 

 mentioned battles between the two birds, I must 

 confess ignorance, having never seen such an 

 encounter. No doubt a couple of love-mad males 

 would fight and to a finish, precisely as two rival 

 barnyard cocks will fight when each fancies that 

 the other is invading private rights ; but that the 

 two species are hostile to the point of non-endur- 

 ance of a close proximity, is, to say the least, ques- 



