THE DUSKY GROUSE. 43 



flew from the branch on which they had settled. Broods of young, on being 

 disturljed, scatter and hide, the old bird flying into a neighboring tree. 

 These broods ustially number from eight to ten." 



A nest found near Fort Garland, Colorado, is described by Mr. H. W. 

 Henshaw as follows: "A nest found June 16 contained seven eggs on the 

 point of hatching. The nesting site was a peculiar one, being in an open 

 glade, where the grass had been recently burned off. The nest proper was a 

 slight collection of dried grass placed in a depression between two tussocks, 

 there apparently having been no attempt made at concealment.'" 



The Dusky Groiise raises but a single brood a season, and, as a rule, the 

 nest is well concealed. A slight depression is scratched out by the bird, 

 alongside an old log, under a small thick bush or a tall bunch of grass ; 

 this is slightly lined with pine needles, bits of dry grass, or whatever suitable 

 material is most convenient to the site selected. The number of eggs to a 

 set varies from seven to ten, rarely more, although they have generally been 

 credited with larger numbers, up to fifteen. Such large sets are very excep- 

 tional, and eight or nine are the numbers most often found. An egg 

 is deposited daily, and incubation does not commence till the set is com- 

 pleted. Nidification begins usually about the middle of May, and varies 

 somewhat, both according to season and altitude. Incubation lasts, as nearly 

 as I caji determine, from eighteen to twenty-four days. The eggs resemble 

 in shape, size, and markings those of the Sooty Grouse; and as the U. S. 

 National Museum collection contains a much better series of this race, show- 

 ing considerable variation both in the ground color and the markings, and 

 as the same differences would unquestionably be found in an equal number 

 of the eggs of the Dusky Grouse, I have had only a series of the former figured. 

 The average size of the few specimens in the U. . S. National Museum col- 

 lection is 50.5 by 35 millimetres. 



i6. Dendragapus obscurus fuliginosus Ridgway. 



SOOTY GROUSE. 



Canace obscura var. fuliginosa Ridgway, Bulletin Essex Institute, v, December, 



1873, 199. 

 Dendragcvpus obscurus fuliginosus Ridgway, Proceedings U. S. National Museum, 



VIII, 1885, 355. 



(B — , C 3815, R471rt, C 559, U 297a.) 



Geographical range : Northwest Coast Mountains, from California "north to 

 Alaska (Sitka), east to western Nevada, western Idaho, and middle British Columbia. 



The Sooty Grouse, as fine a game bird as the preceding, is an inhabitant of 

 the mountains of the NorthAvest. It has been taken as far north as Portage 

 Bay, Alaska, near latitude 60", and probably reaches farther in this direction 



'Exijloratious and Surveys west of lOOtU lueridiau, Wheeler, 1873, p. 92. 



