SHOOTING THE WOODS GROUSE 373. 



where grow palatable huckleberries and blackberries, 

 though rarely venturing further than a short flight, 

 and often but a few yards from cover. 



Though always a wary bird, and ever avoiding man, 

 it is not so wild and quick to take wing before the frost 

 and unsettled weather of fall set in as it is afterward ; 

 yet if the gunner disturb it once or twice, the full 

 wildness of its nature, and its constant alertness to 

 avoid man, are fully and permanently aroused. Then 

 man and the places he frequents are shunned as much 

 as possible. Indeed, it is not a social bird with its 

 own kind. After the young birds have matured they 

 separate, and in the fall the gunner will find them in 

 ones and twos, and at rare times in threes. 



Given to the sportsman the conditions of an open 

 field, and therein a ruffed grouse on the wing, within 

 range, then the difficulties of killing it are but little, 

 if any, greater than those which obtain in the killing of 

 a prairie chicken on the open prairie; though whether 

 in open or cover, the ruffed grouse is always swift 

 and decisive in its flight. But in the open, whether 

 it be on field or prairie, there is an even light and an 

 unobstructed view. Then, for safety, the bird can rely 

 only on its swiftness of wing, all too slow when pitted 

 against the sportsman who can, under those circum- 

 stances, with studied quickness and deliberation, com- 

 mand a large circle around him. Thus the ruffed 

 grouse is at a fatal disadvantage when shot at in the 

 open field, as is also every other bird pursued under 

 the same conditions; but these conditions are rare in- 



