156 AMERICAN GAME BIRD SHOOTING 



summer and especially for the young birds insects, 

 notably grasshoppers and crickets, make up a portion 

 of its diet. It is fond of berries of all sorts, and black- 

 berry patches and wild grape vines are often visited 

 by it when the fruit is ripe. Indeed, from midsum- 

 mer until early winter there are always berries for them 

 to feed on. In autumn also they feed on fallen apples, 

 and wild apple trees in the midst of woods are a fa- 

 vorite resort for them morning and evening. They eat 

 some grass and the leaves of many plants. They feed 

 on the fruit of the skunk cabbage (Symplocarpus) ; 

 early in the winter tearing away the pithy covering that 

 holds the seeds and picking them out from their spongy 

 bed, or later gathering them from the ground. 



Most of all they like nuts, such as chestnuts, acorns 

 and beechnuts. I have taken from the crops of grouse 

 two or three pignuts, a double handful of chestnuts and 

 as many beechnuts as I could hold in one hand. There 

 is a record of a small snake having been taken from a 

 grouse's crop. 



The Biological Survey has shown that over 10 per 

 cent, of the food of the ruffed grouse is animal and 

 89 per cent, vegetable matter. The vegetable food is 

 seeds, more than 1 1 per cent. ; fruit, more than 28 per 

 cent ; leaves and buds, more than 48 per cent. Most of 

 the insects eaten are injurious; either those that prey 

 upon the growing crop or borers destructive to the 

 forest. Every ruffed grouse that is killed, if he had 

 lived out his time would have destroyed a great mul- 



