220 PRAIRIE AND FOREST. 



pack ; only once or twice have I seen more than the usual 

 number of a covey together, and then remarked that the 

 weather had been unusually severe and stormy. 



A peculiarity, however, this bird possesses is that in wet 

 and slushy weather it will frequently when disturbed take 

 shelter on the limbs of trees, from which if flushed they af- 

 ford the hardest possible shots. In the open it is by no 

 means easy to hit, for its flight is very strong and swift, 

 and frequently irregular, but it does not go far, so that a 

 good marker seldom has much trouble to re-find it. Some 

 persons are under the impression that this ortyx is migra- 

 tory; however, this is a mistake, for, although they may 

 wander from their breeding-place, from constant attention 

 I am convinced that the change of quarters is caused from 

 scarcity of food. On the edges of the dry prairies in South- 

 ern Illinois, in early autumn, this bird abounds ; in winter 

 they disappear into the neighboring thickets and brush for 

 why ? the prairies are constantly burned at the end of the 

 season, and consequently starvation or change of residence 

 are their alternatives. In one section of the country that I 

 resided in, a great portion of the prairie-land was too wet 

 to burn, and many a heavy bag I obtained late in the sea- 

 son, even when the roots of the grass were submerged in 

 ice. My dogs, which I invariably broke upon them, seldom 

 made mistakes, and never do I remember a covey depart- 

 ing (except the pointer or setter had run into them coming 

 down wind) without getting at least a barrel into them. 

 With other varieties of game they appear to agree well, 

 for I have on several occasions killed the ortyx with one 

 barrel, and the ruffed grouse with the other over the same 

 point. 



They are universally scattered over the United States 

 east of the Rocky Mountains, where cultivation exists, al- 

 though possibly most abundant in Maryland and Virginia. 



