30 GROUSE AND WILD TXJEKEYS OF UNITED SXATJliiS. 



femur-rubrum) , which was unusually abundant in pastures where the 

 birds foraged. They had picked up also long-horned grasshoppers 

 {Xiphidium sp.) and a few black crickets. Crickets often swarm in 

 fields during fall, and offer tempting morsels to birds. The ruffed 

 grouse occasionally eats such caterpillars as cutworms, army worms, 

 cotton worms {Alabama argillacea), the red-humped apple worm 

 (Schisura concinna), and the oak-leaf caterpillar {Symmerista albi- 

 frons). A number of observers, among them Doctors Fisher and 

 Weed, report that it feeds on oak caterpillars. 



The ruffed grouse, like the bobwhite, prefers beetles to any other 

 insects. It takes almost as many of them as of all other kinds put 

 together, including even such small ones as the clover weevil {Sitones 

 hispidulus) . It likes also the injurious leaf -eating beetles {Chryso- 

 melidce), destroying even the notorious potato beetle (Leptinotarsa 

 decemlineata) . It eats the pale-striped flea beetle {Systena hlanda) , 

 as well as many other leaf beetles, including Systena hudsonias, 

 Disonycha carolinmna, Chcetocnema sp., Galerucella sagittariw, and 

 the grapevine pest, Adoxus vitis. By scratching, the grouse unearths 

 many pests not found by other birds, notably beetle larvse, click 

 beetles, and May beetles, including Lachnosterna hirsuta. It also 

 consumes another injurious beetle, Dichelonycha sp., closely related to 

 the May beetles and resembling them in habits and appearance. It 

 scratches up many ground beetles belonging to Pterostichus, Aniso- 

 dactylus, Harpalus, and other genera. Beetles of other families 

 also — fireflies (Lampyridce) , metallic wood borers (Buprestidce) , and 

 Galitys scabra {Trogostidw) — are in the food list. 



The grouse feeds also on such miscellaneous insects as flies, bugs, 

 ants, and such other Hymenoptera as sawflies and ichneumon flies. 

 A large proportion of the flies are slow-flying species, like crane flies, 

 which are prej^ed upon by many other kinds of birds. Bugs, how- 

 ever, are much more often destroyed by bobwhite and the ruffed 

 grouse than by other birds. The ruffed grouse has been known to 

 prey on the chinch bug, which at times is the most injurious insect 

 in our country, and seldom destroyed by any except gallinaceous 

 birds. Farmers who permit market hunters to rob them of their 

 game should remember this fact. The grouse picks up also many 

 other bugs, among them predaceous species like the ambush bug 

 {Phymata sp.) and the assassin bug {Beduviidce). They eat also 

 homopterous insects, including leaf hoppers (Jassidce) and buffalo 

 tree hoppers (Membracidce) . 



Like many other birds, the ruffed grouse eats ants, frequently 

 including such large species as Gamponotus permsylv aniens. Among 

 small ants may be mentioned the pavement ant {Tetramorium, 



