PHASIANIDAE 235 





Tympanuchus, while the eggs, from seven to seventeen in number r 

 may be found placed in an excavation of the bare soil, or resting on 

 a slight lining ; they are drab or olive in colour, with roundish 

 brown spots. What seems to be the ground colour is easily rubbed 

 off before incubation commences, a fact noticeable in other Galline 

 birds and Plovers. The Sage-Grouse reaches a considerable eleva- 

 tion, as does the sage-brush, which gives its name to the bird. 



Tympanuchus americanus, the Prairie-hen, found in the 

 districts drained by the Mississippi and its confluents, and thence 

 northwards to Ontario, is brown above, barred with buff and 

 black, and chiefly paler brown below, marked with white. The 

 small crest is tipped with white, and a tuft of long, stiff, black 

 feathers covers the inflatable yellow air- sacs on the sides of the 

 neck, the sacs being absent and the tufts shorter in females. In 

 spring parties assemble after daybreak on dry knolls, and conduct 

 their love affairs after the fashion of the Dusky Grouse (p. 236), 

 a booming noise being audible from afar, and the skin of the neck 

 being expanded below the erected tufts. The cocks are most pug- 

 nacious when the pairing-time is nearly over. Shoots of plants, 

 berries, grain, acorns, and insects constitute the food. The flight is 

 powerful and rapid, but individuals often run and squat. For a 

 Grouse the nest is considerable ; and from eleven to fourteen, or 

 even twenty, creamy or olive-coloured eggs are deposited, with very 

 small reddish-brown spots. T. cupido, the Heath -Hen of the 

 eastern United States, now only found on the island of Martha's 

 Vineyard, off Massachusetts, has smaller neck-tufts of pointed 

 feathers, and more conspicuous whitish marks on the scapulars. 

 T. pallidicinctus, the Lesser Prairie-Hen, ranging from Texas to 

 Kansas, is barred with brown, margined on each side with black. 



Dendragapus olscurus, the Dusky, Blue, or Pine-Grouse of the 

 Eocky Mountain districts, has black upper parts mottled with 

 grey and a little brown, and pure grey under surface ; the female 

 having a considerable admixture of buff, and the male possessing 

 air-sacs like those of Tympanuchus. A darker race, D.fuliginows, 

 extends the range to Sitka and California. Another northern form, 

 which lacks the broad grey tail-band, is termed D. richardsoni. 

 These birds frequent wooded ravines up to nine thousand feet, 

 preferring the neighbourhood of water, and feeding as do their 

 allies. The characteristic booming noise, common to this species 

 and others, may be heard throughout the day in spring, the male 



