204 AMERICAN GAME BIRD SHOOTING. 
start from San Francisco in the morning, and return the 
same evening with a bag of fifty, sixty, or seventy-five 
birds, but over the same ground at the present time it is 
sometimes difficult to bag a dozen in a day’s shooting. 
In the southern counties, however, where no restriction 
is placed on quail shooting, splendid sport can be en- 
joyed, as the birds exist in thousands and are as tame 
as chickens in afarm-yard. The fault with most inex- 
perienced sportsmen in shooting valley quails is that of 
firing too quickly and before they have fairly covered 
them. In shooting over a dog, the gun should be carried 
at a ‘‘ready,” and when the birds are flushed, a prompt 
and decided aim should be taken, and the trigger pulled 
gently while the gun is in motion—or in “swing,” as 
the hunters say. This ‘‘ swing” is absolutely necessary 
for bagging them, being far preferable to snap-shooting 
—that is, pulling the trigger as soon as the gun touches 
the shoulder. ‘The most effective method of destroying 
the birds in California is by trapping. The trap gener- 
ally used is that known as the figure four, which is sure 
and noiseless, and does its work so thoroughly that half 
a dozen similar machines, well attended, would not leave 
a quail in a large extent of country in a week. One of 
them is more destructive than twelve guns, as escape from 
it is impossible. Some of the quails weigh nine ounces, 
and I have known a few to go as high as ten, but the 
average weight is between five and eight ounces. 
Gambel’s partridge, or Arizona quail (Lophortyx gam- 
beli), is found in the south-western portion of the United 
States, its range extending from the thirty-fifth parallel 
to Mexico, and from Texas to the Colorado River. It is 
very abundant in Arizona and New Mexico, and seems to 
be equally at home on the parched deserts and the rocky 
hills. It is, according to Archer, larger than the Virginia 
bird, approaching more closely in size to the California, 
or valley colin, but from which it is easily distinguished 
