The Valley Quail 157 



numbers, and the vibrant whi-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r often fills 

 the air. No bird is so disconcerting. Recently, at 

 Santa Catalina, in the off season, I was riding along 

 when at a sudden turn my horse faced a covey of 

 quail in the road. Did they rise? Not at all. The 

 hens ran down the road a way, while the cock stood his 

 ground, walking back and forth in a comical fashion, as 

 though saying, " You know it is not the season and I 

 am safe." These birds refused to fly and walked 

 some distance down the road, then into the low 

 bushes, where they watched me with many a note 

 whit-w hit-whit. 



Laguna and vicinity is one of the best quail grounds, 

 and there are scores of localities all down the coast as 

 good. You find the birds, perhaps, in some little valley 

 shut in by hills, whose sides are covered with green Ade- 

 nostoma and whose edges, perhaps, are broken with 

 cactus patches. The air is clear, with a marvellous carry- 

 ing capacity, and suddenly there comes woo-w/ia-ho, 

 \voo-wha-\\o', and from another point or canon rises 

 O-/IZ-Q, and many variants, possibly with a slightly differ- 

 ent inflection. We are in the quail country, there can 

 be no question as to that. They have not discovered 

 you, and louder come the sweet notes, tuck-ca-cue, 

 tuck-0-hoe, of the males, who are calling for the 

 mere pleasure of it. Perhaps you are walking down 

 the ridge and now look over ; perhaps your gun 

 has caught a sun gleam and tossed it into the 

 next carton, as up from the sage comes whit-w hit- whit, 



