REPORT OF THE FISH AND GAME COMMISSION. 



109 



and seven to have been killed by the accidental discharge of a gun while 

 hunting. The reports of accidents were necessarily incomplete, but they 

 were sufficient to vividly show the criminal carelessness exhibited during 

 each hunting season. It is important that the hunting fraternity under- 

 stand that there is nothing accidental in the results attained when an 

 object, the identity of which is in doubt, is fired upon. 



In furtherance of the investigation of the food habits of nongame 

 birds instituted in 1911, a study of the food of the roadrunner has been 



Fig. 65. A Blainville horned toad taken from the stomach of 

 a roadrunner. Photograph by H. C. Bryant. 



completed and a full report is in press. Eighty-three stomaclis were 

 examined and the contents identified. The results of the investiga- 

 tion have not sustained the oft-repeated accusation that the roadrunner 

 is a destroyer of the eggs and young of valley quail. Although young 

 birds are occasionally taken as food, there is no evidence that quail 

 are preyed upon to the exclusion of other small song-birds. (See 

 Fig. 66.) The bulk of the food of the roadrunner is made up of 

 insects, especially beetles, grasshoppers, crickets and caterpillars. 

 Lizards and snakes and mice comprise the larger part of the vertebrate 

 food taken, but small birds are sometimes eaten (see Fig. 66). One 



