The Mountain- Quail 391 



much of a bag. The only places where I have 

 seen it plenty enough are in the wild and almost 

 inaccessible parts of the Coast Range of Oregon 

 that appear on the map as unsurveyed. Why it 

 should be so I cannot imagine ; for the conditions 

 are the same in many other places as to food, 

 etc., while it is nowhere in that country kept down 

 by the gun. But I have there seen dozens of 

 bevies in a morning's hunt for elk, with every in- 

 dication that in the salal and ferns they would lie 

 well to a dog. I believe a bag of fifty a day could 

 easily be made there, in places, though I did not 

 try to shoot any. In most places a bag of a dozen 

 would be good, and ordinarily they would bother 

 a dog far worse than the valley-quail or his desert 

 relative. It does not unite in large packs like the 

 other two quails, so that you lack the numbers, 

 which, in case of the others, make up for the run- 

 ning away of so many. You must generally hunt 

 a single bevy, or, at most, two or three together. 

 The greater part of its range lacks the ground 

 cover that allows the other quails to hide well, 

 and everywhere he wears legs that forget none 

 of their cunning. Though not quite so swift of 

 foot as the Arizona quail, the mountain-quail 

 knows even better where to run to and generally 

 inhabits ground where he can utilize to the best 

 this information. There is no finer judge of up- 

 hill, and if you are laden with " walking shoes " 



