Bob-white 297 



common Bob-white of the eastern United States, merging by gradual changes 

 from one to another, but the evidence is somewhat conflicting on several points 

 and must await further elucidation. In any event they are Bob-whites and 

 have practically the same familiar whistled call throughout. 



The Bob-white par excellence (Colinus virginianus}, or Partridge, as it is com- 

 monly called in the South, is a bird with the lower breast and abdomen white 

 or buff, barred with black, while in the male the throat and band over the 

 eye are white, and a crown together with a band from beneath the bill to the 

 eye, and a band on the upper breast are black. Bob-whites are sociable 

 birds, although never going in very large flocks, and may be heard calling 

 in low tones to each other. They prefer rather open country, such as fields 

 and pastures where there are small bodies of woodland, brush and brier 

 patches and rank-growing vegetation. Naturally they are quite tame and unsus- 

 picious, but the continual warfare of gunners has made them cautious. They 

 cling closely to cover, from which it is difficult to flush them without the services 

 of a trained dog, although they fly strongly when once up. If unmolested, they 

 go about in family parties, wandering but little from their birthplace until 

 spring, when they break up into pairs and begin the duties of rearing the young. 

 The male is fearless at this season and may be heard whistling the familiar 

 " Bob-while,'' "Ah, Bob-white," from a fence post or other point of vantage, 

 while the female is shy and but little in evidence. The nest is a simple affair, 

 placed on the ground in a tussock of grass, a brier patch, or in a field or garden, 

 and is usually provided with a natural archway of vines or other vegetation, but 

 occasionally an artificial dome is constructed over it. In the northern part of 

 the range, where they rear but a single brood, the clutch of eggs may number 

 twenty-five or thirty ; but in the South, where they raise two or even three broods, 

 the number does not usually exceed fifteen. The male apparently takes little 

 part in incubating the eggs, although he assists in caring for the young, taking 

 full charge of the first brood while the female is hatching the second. They 

 feed on grain of various kinds, seeds, berries, wild grapes, and insects, and in 

 the fall often eat acorns, beechnuts, etc. In Florida there is a smaller, darker 

 race, the Florida Bob-white (C. v. floridanus), which is common throughout 

 the pine-covered areas ; and in Texas and northeastern Mexico occurs another 

 race (C. v. texanus] that is more olive-grayish above and has usually a distinct 

 band of pale cinnamon across the chest below the black band. To quite a 

 distinct group apparently belong certain Mexican and Central American forms, 

 in which the lower parts are uniform cinnamon or cinnamon-rufous. Thus in 

 Grayson's Bob-white (C. graysoni) of southwestern Mexico, the throat and a 

 stripe over the eye are white, while in the Masked Bob-white (C. ridgwayi) and 

 others the throat is black, and the white superciliary stripe much reduced or 

 obsolete. 



Massena Partridge. Of the remaining genera but one (Cyrtonyx) is repre- 

 sented in the United States, and this by a single subspecies, the Massena Par- 

 tridge (C. montezuma mearnsi), which ranges from western Texas, New Mex- 

 ico, and Arizona south into Mexico. The members of this genus, some five in 



