GROUSE AND PTARMIGAN. 403 



and mottled with black ; while the throat, chest, and middle of the breast are 

 black, the sides and under-parts being tipped with white, and the tail black tipped 

 with chestnut. The female has the general plumage barred and mottled with 

 black and rufous yellow. In both the male and female of Franklin's grouse this 

 chestnut band across the end of the tail is absent, and the upper tail-coverts are 

 tipped with white instead of grey. 



The sharp - winged grouse (Falcipennis) of North-Eastern 

 Siberia and Kamschatka may be recognised by having the outer 

 flight-feathers narrowed towards the extremity and sickle-shaped. The dusky 

 grouse (Dendragapus obscurus) and its two allies, of the pine-forests to the east 

 and west of the Rocky Mountains, have the tail with twenty feathers, and the 

 males are provided with an inflatable air-sac on each side of the neck. The home 

 of the dusky grouse is the southern Rocky Mountains, from New Mexico to Idaho, 

 its place further west being taken by the sooty grouse (D. fuliginosus), ranging 

 along the Pacific Coast from California to Sitka ; while, on the east side of the 

 Rockies, Richardson's grouse (D. richardsoni) is found from Central Montana 

 northwards. Much larger than the Canadian grouse, the males of this species 

 have the upper-parts smoky black, mottled with grey, and the under-parts grey ; 

 while in the females the plumage of the upper-parts and breast is barred and 

 mottled with buff. In both the dusky and sooty grouse the tail is somewhat 

 rounded in shape, with a terminal grey band wider (more than an inch wide) 

 in the former. In Richardson's grouse the grey band is absent and the tail 

 square. 



The males of the three species of prairie-hen are characterised 

 by an elongate tuft of feathers, and an inflatable air-sac on each side 

 of the neck, but in the females these tufts are less conspicuous and the air-sacs 

 absent. The common prairie-hen of the Mississippi Valley (Tympanuchus ameri- 

 canus\ shown in the woodcut on p. 404, has the plumage brown above, barred 

 and marked with buff and black, the longer feathers of the neck-tufts being black, 

 and the under-parts pale brown, barred and fringed with white. During the 

 pairing-season these birds assemble in numbers in the morning on some high 

 dry knoll, when the males go through strange antics to captivate the females. 

 Inflating their orange air-sacs and erecting their long neck-tufts, they utter their 

 .strange, booming love-note, which may be heard at a great distance in the still 

 morning air. The females are remarkably prolific, laying eleven to fourteen eggs 

 on an average, while as many as twenty or more are not unfrequently found. The 

 females alone undertake the incubation and care of their young, the males separat- 

 ing from them as soon as all the eggs are laid. 



The largest American representative of the family is the sage- 

 grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus), inhabiting the dry sage-brush 

 plains of the western United States. Distinguished from the allied forms by its 

 long pheasant-like tail of twenty feathers, with the middle pair elongate and 

 pointed, the male has an inflatable air-sac on each side of the neck, and attains a 

 weight of 8 Ibs., the female being smaller. The chief food of this bird, especially 

 -during the winter months, is the sage-brush, though during summer it is varied 

 with grasses, berries, insects, and sometimes grain. The stomach of this species 



